Abstract

Nietzsche is a silent interlocutor in Francis Fukuyama’s polemic The End of History and the Last Man (1992). But Fukuyama, I argue, ignores the rationale behind Nietzsche’s critique of the liberal worldview and misinterprets his call for the revaluation of all values. By exploring the relations between the end of history, the last man and the need for revaluation, this chapter aims to reconstruct the relevant aspects of Nietzsche’s critique of liberalism, which challenges the political vision of The End of History. I contend that Nietzsche’s exposure of the conceptual and value inversions as central yet perilous sources of legitimacy in modern ‘industrial civilization’ continues to resonate today and deserves critical attention.