From Hegel to Nietzsche: Losurdo’s Critical Entanglements with Liberalism

Abstract This article examines Domenico Losurdo’s treatment of Hegel, Marx, Engels, and Nietzsche with the aim of unearthing his critical entanglements with liberalism. I will argue that Losurdo’s reflections on these thinkers betray a deeper ambivalence towards liberalism as a political tradition. This ambivalence ranges depending on which of the thinkers is under Losurdo’s microscope, receiving its starkest expression in Losurdo’s treatment of Nietzsche. By closely engaging with Losurdo’s treatment of Hegel, Marx, Engels, and Nietzsche, one leaves with a deeper grasp of these individual thinkers and the political implications of their respective philosophies. In much the same way, Losurdo’s work encourages readers to interrogate their own attitudes towards liberalism’s dialectic of emancipation and dis-emancipation. The only difference is that liberalism is now under renewed attack from a variety of political quarters. Consequently, Losurdo’s critical entanglements with liberalism could not have come at a better time.