Introduction In his 1945 work The Open Society and its Enemies, Karl Popper famously attacked what he saw as the intellectual roots of fascism. Tracing a lineage from Plato to its modern progenitors, he asserted that “Hegel’s hysterical historicism was the fertiliser from which totalitarianism was grown.” (Popper 1945: 270). Popper’s chapter on “Hegel and… Continue reading “Part One: Hegel and Fascism”
The tradition of German historismus (often translated in English as historicism) was the leading method of historical study in Germany through the 19th and well into the 20th century. Its reputation for rigour made it attractive to historians across Europe, notably in Britain through the advocacy of Lord Acton, Regius Professor of Modern History at… Continue reading “Historismus. Part One: Historismus, Ranke and its Roots at the University of Berlin”
