Abstract

From his earliest interpreters to the most contemporary, conflicting views have emerged concerning the substance of Nietzsche's theory of the will to power. While Marxist interpreters, such as Georg Lukacs, contend that it is essentially an apology for liberal capitalism, Fascist and Nazi ideologues, such as Hitler and Mussolini, understand it as the philosophical foundation of their respective political regimes. Today, the orthodox interpretation of Nietzsche's thought bequeathed to us by Heidegger and Kaufmann is that the theory of the will to power has no necessary political content. ;This dissertation takes a stern philosophical look at the theory of the will to power and the problem of Nietzsche's politics. First, it contests the theoretical accuracy of Heidegger's and Kaufmann's interpretations of the will to power as "self-mastery" and their insistence that Nietzsche's thought is essentially apolitical. It argues that the theory of the will to power culminates in Nietzsche's advocacy of a new political order, the new aristocracy. ;Second, from Nietzsche's seemingly fragmentary and unsystematized aphorisms, the dissertation constructs the theory of the will to power into a coherent political doctrine. It portrays Nietzsche as a political theorist grappling with the fundamental problems of political philosophy, such as, the nature and origin of the state, the meaning of justice, the end and justification of political authority. It shows that the will to power is the basis of Nietzsche's deconstruction of politics. ;The underlining thesis of the dissertation is that Nietzsche's thought is intelligible only if it is understood within the context of his critique of classical, liberal and socialist politics and his effort to overcome nihilism. The dissertation argues that there is a necessary relationship between the will to power and politics, namely, that the political realm, as the domain in which norms are posited with absolute and final authority, is the arena in which the will to power finds its ultimate expression and realization