Table Of ContentTHE COMPANION TO RAYMOND ARON
RECOVERING POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY
SERIES EDITORS: THOMAS L. PANGLE AND TIMOTHY BURNS
PUBLISHED BY PALGRAVE MACMILLAN:
Lucretius as Theorist of Political Life
By John Colman
Shakespeare’s Political Wisdom
By Timothy Burns
Political Philosophy Cross-Examined: Perennial Challenges to
the Philosophic Life
Edited by Thomas L. Pangle and J. Harvey Lomax
Eros and Socratic Political Philosophy
By David Levy
Xenophon the Socratic Prince: The Argument of the Anabasis of Cyrus
By Eric Buzzetti
Reorientation: Leo Strauss in the 1930s
Edited by Martin D. Yaff e and Richard S. Ruderman
Sexuality and Globalization: An Introduction to a Phenomenology of Sexualities
By Laurent Bibard and translated by Christopher Edwards
Modern Democracy and the Theological-Political Problem in Spinoza, Rousseau,
and Jeff erson
By Lee Ward
Prudential Public Leadership: Promoting Ethics in Public Policy
and Administration
By John Uhr
The Companion to Raymond Aron
Edited by José Colen and Elisabeth Dutartre-Michaut
THE COMPANION
TO
RAYMOND ARON
Edited by
José Colen and Elisabeth Dutartre-Michaut
THE COMPANION TO RAYMOND ARON
Copyright © José Colen and Elisabeth Dutartre-Michaut, 2015.
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2015 978-1-137-52242-9
All rights reserved.
First published in 2015 by
PALGRAVE MACMILLAN®
in the United States— a division of St. Martin’s Press LLC,
175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.
Where this book is distributed in the UK, Europe and the rest of the world,
this is by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited,
registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills,
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Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies
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the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries.
ISBN 978-1-349-57463-6 ISBN 978-1-137-52243-6 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-1-137-52243-6
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
The companion to Raymond Aron / edited by Jose Colen and
Elisabeth Dutartre-Michaut.
pages cm.—(Recovering political philosophy)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Aron, Raymond, 1905–1983. 2. Political science—
Philosophy—History—20th century. 3. International relations—
Philosophy. 4. Liberalism—France—History—20th century.
5. France—Intellectual life—20th century. I. Colen, José, editor of
compilation. II. Dutartre-Michaut, Élisabeth, editor of compilation.
JC261.A7.C66 2015
320.51092—dc23 2015009822
A catalogue record of the book is available from the British Library.
Design by Newgen Knowledge Works (P) Ltd., Chennai, India.
First edition: September 2015
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
CONTENTS
Foreword ix
Pierre Manent
Series Editors’ Preface xi
Introduction 1
Elisabeth Dutartre-Michaut and José Colen
1. Life and Works: Raymond Aron, Philosopher and Freedom Fighter 3
Nicolas Baverez
Part I International Relations: “History Is on the Move” 15
José Colen and Bryan-Paul Frost
2. R aymond Aron on War and Strategy: A Framework for
Conceptualizing International Relations Today 19
Jean-Vincent Holeindre
3. In the “Era of Tyrannies”: The International Order from
Nazism to the Cold War 31
Matthias Oppermann
4. A ron and the Cold War: “Brother Enemies” 45
Carlos Gaspar
5. Forward to the Past: History and Theory in Raymond Aron’s
Peace and War 59
Bryan-Paul Frost
6. “Citizen Clausewitz”: Aron’s Clausewitz in Defense of
Political Freedom 77
Joël Mouric
7. Fin de siècle: Aron and the End of the Bipolar System 91
Carlos Gaspar
vi CONTENTS
Part II Theory, History, Philosophy: The Primacy of
the Political 101
José Colen and Scott Nelson
8. Raymond Aron and the Notion of History: Taking
Part in History 105
Perrine Simon-Nahum
9. T he Question of Political Regime and the Problems of
Democracy: Aron and the Alternative of Tocqueville 119
Giulio De Ligio
10. T he Totalitarian Negation of Man: Raymond Aron on
Ideology and Totalitarianism 137
Daniel J. Mahoney
11. A Machiavellian Conception of Democracy?
Democracy and Confl ict 149
Serge Audier
12. Revisiting Aron’s The Class Struggle: Rereading
Fifty Years After 163
Serge Paugam
13. The Origins of the “End of Ideology?”: Raymond Aron
and Industrial Civilization 177
Iain Stewart
Part III V oices of the Great Men of the Past:
Perennial Debates 191
Scott Nelson and José Colen
14. Raymond Aron and Immanuel Kant: Politics between
Morality and History 197
Pierre Hassner
15. S tatesmanship and Ethics: Aron, Max Weber, and Politics as
a Vocation 205
Scott Nelson and José Colen
16. Aron and Marxism: The Aronian Interpretation of Marx 217
Sylvie Mesure
17. “ Moderate Machiavellianism”: Aron, Machiavelli, and the
Modern Machiavellians 231
Diogo Pires Aurélio
18. M ontesquieu and Aron on Democracy’s Virtues and Corruption:
The Question of Political Legitimacy 245
Miguel Morgado
CONTENTS vii
19. Raymond Aron and Alexis de Tocqueville: Political Moderation,
Liberty, and the Role of the Intellectuals 261
Aurelian Craiutu
Epilogue: Raymond Aron and History in the Making 275
Christian Bachelier
Bibliographical Guide 293
Elisabeth Dutartre-Michaut
Index 301
FOREWORD
Pierre Manent
This volume succeeds in bringing to light, with sobriety and nuance, the rare
virtues and uncommon merits of an outstanding political thinker. After his
death in 1983, friends and foes alike were inclined to think that Raymond Aron’s
star would dim with the passing of the political order on which he had shed so
much light. The demise of communism and the ensuing end of the Cold War
were supposed to usher us into a new world definitively safe for democracy, and
which was more in need of brand new “democratic theories” cleverly deduced
than of old-fashioned political wisdom painstakingly acquired. The events of
September 11 cruelly dispelled these fond illusions. We were confronted anew
with the tragedy of history. Raymond Aron, while well aware of the variety of
“processes” which brought peace, comfort and order to the life of modern man,
had always been alert to the uncertainty, accidents, and disorder, to the “drama”
of human history. However impressive the accomplishments of modern science,
economy and politics, they have not freed human beings from the risks, the
greatness and misery of political life. Raymond Aron is a writer and thinker for
difficult times, and human beings always live in difficult times.
Raymond Aron was a learned man, and he constantly improved on an impres-
sive command of social sciences, including sociology, economics, strategy, and
political science and philosophy. While he delighted in analyzing the theoretical
subtleties of these sciences, and mapping out their relations and respective limits,
and thus greatly contributed to enlightening his various listeners and readers, he
never lost sight of their practical, especially political bearing. In this sense, he
was this very rare bird, a theoretical man who took very seriously the realm of
action. On the one hand, he never tired of questioning the limits of historical
knowledge, the relationship between economy and politics, or the possibility of
a science of international relations; on the other hand, he was constantly, even
anxiously asking the question: “what is to be done?” The cynosure of his deep-
est ambition was the producing of what he called “praxeology,” or theory of
action, a theoretical endeavor for which Clausewitz’s theory of war provided the
template. Using more traditional terms, we could say that his multifaceted œuvre
x FOREWORD
embodies one of the most successful eff orts in the twentieth century to elaborate
a political philosophy as practical philosophy.
The most potent and enduring hindrance to practical philosophy in the past
century was the prestige of History and the prevalence of what was called “phi-
losophy of history.” While very diff erent in their style and content, the theo-
retical endeavors belonging to this genus have this character in common: they
consider that the innumerable human actions in the past constitute a coherent
system that gives us the clue to future human actions. What has been done is
the clue to what is to be done. From the time of writing his dissertation to his
last courses and publications, Aron made strenuous eff orts to break free from
the stranglehold of this kind of “evolutionist” or necessitarian thinking. The
most politically infl uential of these doctrines was of course Marxism, of which
Aron became the nemesis in France. But he was also very interested in Comte’s
positivism which, while no friend of socialism, nourished the hope of bringing
action under the rule of a demonstrative science. Marxism and Comteanism
shared the ambition to fi nally substitute the administration of things for the
governing of men. Now, Aron maintained that men could not rid themselves
of the burden of politics because it was up to them as free and moral beings to
manage and order their lives. This inescapable end or purpose calls for two kinds
of theoretical endeavors.
The fi rst deals with the internal order of the political association, which
comes under the jurisdiction of a fairly complete and rigorous, but not demon-
strative, knowledge: following on the examples of Aristotle and Montesquieu,
Aron understood his task as the elucidation, by means of comparison, of the
several modern political régimes. For him, just as for his predecessors, this the-
oretical or analytical eff ort had an immediate practical import: Aron did not
tire of explaining that modern people had to choose between a “constitutional-
pluralist” regime or a one-party, totalitarian regime. The sobriety, justice, and
fi rmness with which Aron conducted this eff ort are for the reader a political
education by itself.
The second deals, so to speak, with the political disorder that obtains between
political bodies or nations. It is much less amenable to a complete and rigorous
knowledge. In a sense, Aron was even more interested in understanding inter-
national disorder than national (relative) order. It was more of a challenge. How
do you give an account of what has been done or what should be done in a realm
where laws are unavailable and which lacks the (relative) stability and predict-
ability of a cohesive society? He gave much thought to what Thucydides in
ancient times and Clausewitz in modern times accomplished. I am confi dent that
the next generation, if they are thoughtful, will ponder what Aron accomplished
on this score in the twentieth century.
The contributors to this volume originate from various European coun-
tries and from the United States of America. They are witness to the breadth of
Raymond Aron’s appeal, which their contributions will enlarge and deepen.
