Bio: (1880-1936) German philosopher. Oswald Spengler received his doctorate from Halle University, and after that, he taught in several high schools and did not have an academic career. He is best known for the two-volume book The Decline of the West (1918, 1922). In it, Spengler presents a very characteristic philosophy of history and culture.

            Cyclical History

Spengler believed that it was necessary to study the entire history because each period and region deserves equal attention and that the view that there are key periods or turning points in history is wrong. According to him, the schematic division of historical periods into the ancient period, middle ages, and modern age is wrong and futile. The entire world history is just a sequence of cultures that are born, grow, and disappear. In this sense, cultures are completely analogous to living organisms, and it is best to view them as artificial superorganisms. The method he applies to the study of history is identical to comparative morphology in biology. Behind concrete historical events stands the prototype of culture, which represents the basis of all cultures in the shape of a formed ideal. The prototype of culture is what enables the emergence of historical phenomena and stands behind all of them.

                                            Civilizations

Spengler denies any immanent purpose to humanity because it is only an emanation of culture. Humanity and its improvement to perfection are the basis of historical continuity. However, since humanity has no purpose of its own, nor can it be perfected, there is no continuity in history. Humanity has no role in the creation of history, the improvement of the social order, or even in the creation of art, science, language, and similar phenomena. The units of the study of history are individual cultures. In his opinion, there were only a few such unique cultures, and the first ones appeared only 3000 years before the new era in Egypt and Babylon. After that, Indian, Chinese, and ancient or „Apollonian“ cultures emerged. In addition to these five, only three other cultures have emerged throughout history: Mexican, Arab (magical), and „Faustian“ (Western/European). These eight cultures make up the entire human history. These cultures represent organisms with their life cycle of birth, growth, maturity, old age, and death. Events within each culture take precedence, while relations between different cultures are secondary.

Cultures go through their stages of development in exactly the same way. All phenomena and processes, both mass and specific phenomena, such as the rise of great leaders, occur in every culture at a specific time. Since this whole process is subject to strict deterministic laws, it is possible to precisely determine and predict when a phenomenon will occur. As cultures go through defined cycles, what already existed in earlier cultures is constantly repeated in younger cultures. What governs these cyclical processes is the "cosmic pulsations" as the spiritus movens of history. In that sense, the actions of individuals, and even the whole of humanity, cannot change the predetermined regularities of cultural development. Although he emphasizes the deterministic nature of the development of cultures, Spengler, at the same time, believes that cultures can only be studied by the method of deep understanding - intuitive immersion in the subject of study.

                             Wars and Decline of Civilization

Spengler believes that the most important and influential dimension of history is politics because world history is seen, above all, as the history of states and their wars. Countries exist to wage war, which is the eternal pattern of higher human existence. War is not only destructive but is also the creator of all great things. Victories or defeats in war bring everything that is important for a country and its people. Every culture experiences a "period of giant battles", that is, an era of great wars between different states of one culture. Western civilization entered this period with the Napoleonic Wars, so Spengler believes that the future will be a time of war that will involve the whole world and all continents. The victors of these wars will rule smaller states, the economy, and the people; smaller states will be only provinces and a means of meeting the goals of large states. Struggles within states are struggles of different "classes", and they take place in every culture. The clergy and the nobility make up the first two classes, while the rise of the third, the bourgeois class, led to a regrouping of the classes. The rationalization introduced by the bourgeoisie led to civil revolutions.

Spengler connects the emergence of culture with the emergence of the city, which is the birthplace of peoples, states, politics, languages, religion, and art. All great cultures are urban cultures, and the whole history is just the history of urban people. In contrast to the city, the village is ahistorical and lacks creativity. All nations that existed before the emergence of culture do not influence the development of culture. After the disappearance of their culture, the people, who represent the unity of the spirit, and not biology, fade away and become unimportant. At the peak, a culture reaches its apogee, that is, the highest point of development, which is inevitably followed by a decline. At the end of the decline of culture, as the last phase, comes the development of "civilization". Civilization represents the lowest stage of culture in which decadence and loss of creative power dominate. People in culture direct their energy inwards, while in civilization people direct their energy outwards. In civilization, there is a rise of the "fourth class", a formless mass that does not respect the past and has no future. Civilization also marks the end of the internal struggle of the classes. "inner religiousness" is emerging in civilization, because, due to the loss of creativity, people are turning to religion again. After the fall of civilization, the culture dies and so the cycle closes.

Main works

Der metaphysische Grundgedanke der heraklitischen Philosophie (1904);

Der Untergang des Abendlandes: Umrisse einer Morphologie der Weltgeschichte, 2 vols. (1918, 1922);

Preußentum und Sozialismus (1919);

Neubau des Deutschen Reiches (1924);

Der Mensch und die Technik  (1931);

Politische Schriften (1932);

Jahre der Entscheidung (1933).

Works translated into English:

Prussian Socialism and Other Essays (2018, in German 1919);

The Decline of the West (2021, in German 1918, 1922);

Man and Technics: A Contribution to a Philosophy of Life (2020, in German 1931);

The Hour of Decision (1934): Germany and World-Historical Evolution (2018, in German 1933).