The Return of History, Philosophy of History, and Civilization
In his contribution titled The Return of Civilization–and of Arnold Toynbee? (2014), Krishan Kumar begins with a reminder that speculative philosophers of history, such as Spengler, Toynbee, Quigley and Sorokin, have been viewed by our dominant modern paradigms as “unfashionable” and that “hardly anyone” reads them as Niall Ferguson had claimed (2011). Ferguson was one of the first historians I had come across when I was younger two decades ago, and reading his works had essentially been a rewarding experience especially in regards to modern Western history. Yet, two decades after reading his magnum opus, namely, The War of the World: Twentieth-Century Conflict and the Descent of the West (2006), it almost becomes clear that Ferguson’s work was not a work of philosophical history, but rather, of ordinary, or normal, history. Despite the title reflecting the specter of Oswald Spengler’s Decline of the West (1917), the modern Western historian has severed his connection with the speculators who have contributed significantly to the emergence of the modern fields of global, world, and universal history.
When speaking of civilizations, we are effectively speaking of units of analysis, but which specific field could be viewed as claiming ownership of this specific ontological category? Well, there is no specific field per se, rather, civilizations, high-cultures, cultures (in the German sense of the term – Kultur), societies, national spirits, and nations, can be viewed today as ontological categories, or units of analysis, that exist within a transdisciplinary plane of knowledge or episteme. The transdisciplinary status of this category thus allows it to acquire a multidisiciplinary character, that is, an approach that combines approaches from multiple disciplines, and bridging the epistemological gap between different departments. Second, and most importantly, it allows the ontological category to migrate through different academic departments when not congruent with their current departments. That all being said, there is a specific field, that is intrinsically connected to this notion of civilization, if not being the field that had in effect given birth to this notion within Western thought.
Speculative philosophy of history, which is now lacking any form of intellectual representation in Western academic institutions, could be seen as the inaugurator of this unit of analysis within Western thought. From its inception, the speculative philosophy of history clearly possessed a transdisciplinary status, as a field that engages with stakeholders in a specific subject matter, the stakeholders here being humanity, culture, nations, or civilizations, and the subject matter being history as ontological force not merely in the past, but directing our present, and guiding us towards a possible future. Speculative philosophy of history could be defined as possessing three primary characteristics and could be described as a philosophical history that attempts to present a “unifying descriptive model of what is assumed as the whole of significant history”; that model analyzes historical change; and is projected into the future through predictions and forecasts in order to answer questions concerning meaning in, and value of, history (Tucker, 1998). In short, speculative philosophers of history present a substantive view of human history in order to outline the shape of, or patterns in, history, which in turn leads to questions concerning the directionality of history, contingency, determinism, the possibility of prediction in history, and the role of individual agency. This is to some degree what Hegel was attempting when writing his respective philosophy of history, a work that could be viewed as one that had officially inaugurated Western speculative philosophy of history. Of course, Hegel was indebted to both Herder and Kant, adopting the cultural units of analysis from the former and the linearity of the latter in order to construct his own unique Hegelian form. That said, it is important to note that speculative philosophies of history did exist before the Enlightenment period, but could be said to have been stuck within its proto-typical format, as seen with Giambattista Vico’s work on historical cycles. Vico had effectively sown the seeds of what would eventually become the speculative philosophy of history which had attained its formal and more developed form during the late Enlightenment period. Vico correctly called it a “New Science” precisely because it was, for speculative philosophers of history, at least in its Western secular form, is primarily dependent on their vantage point in the “future of humanity” in order to gain any sort of function or intellectual feasibility. We can only do speculative philosophy of history from our vantage point in the future, with all of the human, and perhaps non-human, past behind us to assess and ponder upon. Finally, it is crucial to highlight that speculative philosophy of history, despite emerging from the West in its current form, is a fundamental human concern that exists in many forms and styles beyond the West.
The late 19th and early 20th centuries could be said to have been the point where speculative philosophy of history witnessed its flowering. Fichte and Schelling both produced their own respective philosophies of history during this time. Karl Marx famously produced his own inverted adaptation of Hegelian philosophy of history. August Comte who is less known for his own philosophy of history today worked on a positivist philosophy of history. Finally, the 20th century had given birth to the more pessimistic forms with the rise of Spengler, Ortega, Toynbee, Quigley, and Sorokin, and their more cyclical forms of philosophy of history. Yet, from our specific vantage point, this was not a flowering of speculative philosophy of history in the West, since the fruits born by this specific field had been discarded by Western academic departments alongside the professionalization and institutionalization of Western knowledge. Rather, it is more suitable to describe this period as the “swan song” of Western speculative philosophy of history, its final act before being rejected and buried by modern academic institutions. It is perhaps fitting to describe this period as a final act or swan song, since many of the philosophies of history produce between 18th and 20th centuries seem to exist within the longue durée and remain relevant to us within the 21st century, if not more relevant now than the past. This recurring relevance we see with speculative philosophies of history, and their primary ontological categories, is a direct result of its transdisciplinarity as a fundamental human concern of existential relevance and a crisis discipline. Thus, despite the overwhelming consensus against speculative philosophy of history and the notion of civilizations, we continued to see both emerge within different academic departments across the 20th century. Within the political sciences Fukuyama’s End of History (1992) and Huntington’s Clash of Civilizations (1996), emerge as adaptations of former Hegelian and Spenglerian forms of speculative philosophy of history albeit stripped off their metaphysically-oriented language and logic. Sorokin’s own contribution had clear speculative elements that could hardly be ignored, and thus, it comes as no surprise that his works were viewed as both deeply controversial and structurally unsound. For sociology, as a modern field, is a direct product of the modern reductionist materialist paradigm that had rejected and buried speculative philosophy of history. We can also go as far as saying that many modern works of history always have an element of the speculative philosophy of history, either in its predictive elements, its multidisciplinarity, its recognition of patterns in history, or imposing a direction on history. A deeper understanding of speculative philosophy of history, as both a field in its own right, and a field of intellectual competence, would even open up the possibility of deploying and weaponizing specific philosophies of history, or even the implicit belief in a specific philosophy of history by some academics that reject speculative philosophy of history. For one can possess an inherent speculative philosophy of history even if not having written one, any passing questions on the notion of historical directionality, pattern of history, attempt to forecast possible futures, or ask about meaning in history, are all questions with clear speculative elements.
More than a decade after the publication of Kumar’s contribution on the return of civilization, it is safe to say that not only are civilizations, but history as a whole – as a realm where notions such as “civilizations” could be cognized and explored. Thus, the return of history necessitates the return of both civilization and, more importantly, the speculative philosophy of history. The hyperspecialized approach that has been a primary characteristic of our modern scientific paradigms has now exhausted its creative energies, if it had once paved the way for paradigmatic breakthroughs, it now stands as an obstacle in front of new possible paradigm shifts in the humanities. As the humanities declined, and its holistic body and knowledge severed into separate departments as a result of overspecialization, speculative philosophy of history was rejected and its unit of analysis, civilizations, became largely relegated to research in the comparative studies in cultural history and societies. The 21st century is a century that is dominated, for now at least, by the emergence of existential risks at the global level, and as a crisis discipline speculative philosophy of history will most likely witness a re-emergence as a field that could navigate us across geopolitical, technological, ecological, and economic, anomalies. Moreover, a potential multipolar international political order is already shaping civilizational rhetoric across all different civilizational blocs globally – we do seem to be moving towards the era of “Re-Civilization” (Dusenbury & Pilkington, 2025). The ecological crisis could also reach a crescendo, of which a world historical experience of climatic changes could have drastic implications on all human civilizations, opening up questions concerning the possibility of “planetization”, or a platnterary culture which is only possible through a shared experience at the global level.
References
Ferguson, N. (2006). The war of the world: Twentieth-century conflict and the descent of the West. Penguin Press.
Fukuyama, F. (1992). The end of history and the last man. Free Press.
Huntington, S. P. (1996). The clash of civilizations and the remaking of world order.
Simon & Schuster.
Kumar, K. (2014). The return of civilization—and of Arnold Toynbee? Comparative Studies in Society and History, 56(4), 815–843.
Spengler, O. (1926). The decline of the West. Alfred A. Knopf.
Tucker, A. (1998). Philosophy of history–substantive. In D. Woolf and K. Brammall (Eds.), A Global Encyclopedia (pp. 709-710). New York: Garland.
About the Author
Naif Al Bidh is a Muscat-based lecturer of history and political science having previously lectured in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. He is also a political consultant and analyst focusing on the case of the Middle East with a specific focus on Yemen. His research lies at the intersection between international relations, philosophy of history, and history. His most recent contribution was "The Necessity of Speculation: A Comparison of Big History and Speculative Philosophy of History" in the Bloomsbury Handbook of the Philosophy of Historical Sciences and Big History (2025). He is currently working on a contribution on Ortega y Gasset's philosophy of history, and completing his PhD on Oswald Spengler and speculative philosophy of history. Other publications include "Brave Pessimism": The Clash of Caesarism and Democracy within Spengler's Philosophy of History (2023), Pandemonium in Yemen: A Historical Analysis of Yemen's Socio-Political State (2022). His articles and essays are also published in Multipolar Press, Arktos Journal, Europinion, Qawwam Magazine, and his Substack channel: Spenglerian Musings.
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