Heidegger in Ruins: Philosophy, Fascism, and the Politics of Being
Rev Left Radio
Breht O'Shea
4.8 • 3.4K Ratings
🗓️ 12 November 2025
⏱️ 114 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In this episode, Breht speaks with Dr. Richard Wolin, author of Heidegger in Ruins: Between Philosophy and Ideology, about the dark entanglement between Martin Heidegger's philosophy and his lifelong commitment to National Socialism. Heidegger is often hailed as the most important philosopher of the 20th century, yet his work was deeply shaped by the reactionary politics of his time. Wolin explains how Heidegger's central ideas -- Being, Dasein, authenticity, rootedness, and the "decline of the West" -- became intertwined with fascist notions of destiny, hierarchy, and belonging. They discuss the long history of attempts to sanitize Heidegger's record, what the Black Notebooks reveal about his true convictions, the interwar period in Germany and the conservative revolution, Heidegger's spiritual racism, and how the same civilizational despair and longing for renewal echo through today's far-right political movements. This conversation explores how the search for meaning and authenticity, when divorced from solidarity and democracy, can turn toward reactionary myth-making, hierarchical exclusion, and fascist authoritarianism.
Check out Dr. Wolin's articles in the LA Review of Books HERE
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Today we're diving into one of the most challenging and revealing questions in modern intellectual history. |
| 0:11.0 | How do we make sense of a philosopher who reshaped the way we think about existence while also embracing one of the most murderous political movements in history? |
| 0:20.0 | Martin Heidegger is often described as the most important philosopher of the 20th century. |
| 0:25.6 | He revolutionized Western thought by shifting philosophy from abstract concepts to lived experience, |
| 0:31.9 | to our being in the world, our mortality, our historical situation, and our search for meeting in a disenchanted |
| 0:39.7 | age. He influenced existentialism, phenomenology, hermeneutics, postmodernism, political |
| 0:46.2 | theory, theology, literature, and even environmental and ecological thought. And yet, |
| 0:51.9 | Heidegger was also a committed Nazi, not reluctantly or momentarily, |
| 0:56.3 | but deeply and spiritually. He saw the rise of national socialism as a world historical awakening, |
| 1:02.8 | a metaphysical renewal of the German people. And crucially, his fascism wasn't a happenstance |
| 1:09.7 | or a side hobby. It was intertwined deeply |
| 1:12.5 | with his philosophy, with his ontology. His emphasis on destiny and rootedness fed into ideas |
| 1:19.7 | of a chosen vulk or people. His rejection of enlightenment humanism aligned with authoritarian |
| 1:26.1 | anti-liberalism and fascism. His critique of modernity and |
| 1:30.1 | technology became a civilizational narrative of decline. His concept of authentic belonging |
| 1:36.5 | shaded into a kind of spiritual racism, an ontology of exclusion. In other words, Heidegger wasn't just wrong politically. |
| 1:46.1 | He built a philosophical framework where authoritarianism and fascism could appear as authenticity |
| 1:52.1 | and where reactionary politics could seem like a path to spiritual renewal. |
| 1:57.7 | Understanding that connection matters today because many of the themes Heidegger leaned on |
| 2:02.7 | are alive once again. Civilizational decline, nostalgia for lost greatness, hostility to democracy, |
| 2:11.2 | the longing for rooted identity, and the romanticization of mythic pasts and strong leaders. |
| 2:18.4 | And so, engaging Heidegger is not simply an academic exercise. |
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