A Right-Wing Political System for the Future?

A look at Charles Haywood's Foundationalism…

Whether we like it or not, in the modern world, a society must be founded on a political system or charter.

In the distant past, societies were built by great heroes and demigods; the founding charter for those civilizations need not appeal to reason or rationality—the invocation of myth and legendry was good enough, and the founding mythos often involved the descent of a people from some god or goddess.

It’s a shame that those days are over—I much prefer to imagine my predecessors as a race of god-begotten heroes, with divine blood coursing through their veins, striving to impose their irresistible will on a hostile world. Instead, we get “declarations,” and “founding documents,” and “bills of rights”—the stuff of lawyers and bureaucrats.

Alas, such is the way of things.

The very unheroic modern world requires plans and charters devised with scientific precision, and—bowing to necessity—even the Right must adopt these methods when proposing a new government, or perhaps even a new civilization, to replace our own crumbling inheritance.

And that brings me to the first of the new, future-oriented political systems that I’d like to examine: Foundationalism. Its slogan is “a politics of future past”:

“…it is a new thing, for a new time, informed by the wisdom of the past. Foundationalism is not restorationism. There is no return; the way is shut. What is instead needed is a new thing, just as the Enlightenment was a new thing, and as the flourishing of Western medieval thought was a new thing. Erase the errors and begin again; Foundationalism ushers in the new dawn.”

First, a little background is in order. Foundationalism was devised by Charles Haywood, whom I imagine as a kind of wealthy and landed country squire, albeit one with aspirations toward warlordism—a kindly gentleman-philosopher with an impressive array of Kalashnikovs and AR-15s.

Anyhow, Haywood has achieved a great deal of fame in right-wing circles for his website The Worthy House, wherein he dilates at length on important and pressing matters—including trenchant critiques of the Regime—often through the medium of book reviews. The book reviews, you understand, aren’t really book reviews…well, they are, but they’re also a chance for Haywood to present his own ideas and theories, and we’re all better off for it.

Every once in a while, however, Haywood presents his thinking in a standalone article, and a little over two years ago he outlined the principles of his political program and philosophy in an article entitled “The Foundationalist Manifesto: A Politics of Future Past,” and it is upon this article that the following examination is based.

I should make it clear that my analysis is purely my own—and undoubtedly flawed—interpretation of the information presented in that article, and that its author will probably take some issue with that interpretation. I also greatly look forward to the promised book-length treatment of Foundationalism, which I’m sure will elaborate on many of its central tenets and ideas in greater detail.

So, without further ado, let’s dive in.

The aims and aspirations of Foundationalism are, as the name suggests, to root our future political system in the immutable fundament of human existence—namely, that which is real and has always been integral to mankind, in all ages and incarnations, rather than utopian theories about man as a blank slate, with unlimited possibilities. We all know where that sort of thinking has led.

A man’s got to know his limitations, a great sage once said, but that needn’t be a cause for despair—humility, not arrogance, and a reconnection with the real, is the first step toward rebuilding our rotten civilization.

There’s too much airy talk in our leftist, faux-egalitarian society of how everyone can achieve one’s dreams, that only the evil white patriarchy is keeping one from becoming the superhero girlboss one was always meant to be. It’s all nonsense, of course; we as a people grow less capable, more limited, and more deeply unimpressive with each passing day. Intuiting this, we puff up our egos and boast about ourselves, like stupid, petulant children.

Haywood counsels a different approach. It is, frankly, a more masculine approach, which naturally appeals to me, and I suspect many others, who have lived too long in the cloying, choking atmosphere of the Longhouse.

So just what is Foundationalism?

“Foundationalism is a reflection of reality, and through recognizing reality, it aims to maximize the chances of both individual and collective flourishing. It is a way forward, not a way back.

The twelve pillars of Foundationalism, outlined here, are organic to mankind, rather than an artificial means to create a new man or a new type of society—although Foundationalism, when executed, will indeed be a very different type of society from how we live now. And, in truth, Foundationalism is two things: the renewal of society, or the rebuilding anew of a crumbled society, combined with the long-term maintenance of that society.

Foundationalism does not guarantee happiness. The apocatastasis, the universal reconciliation, is not its concern. It is not an ideology—it does not offer all the answers. What it offers is a positive vision for a maximized future. The goal is to all muddle through together, to achieve as much human flourishing as reasonably possible, buffering the miseries inherent to human life. Foundationalism offers all members of society a chance for meaning, for transcendence, not through utopian ideology, but through rebasing ourselves in the real.

Foundationalism is grounded in what is universally known to be true, or what was once universally known to be true; it does not invent new truths. Thus, it contains a strong bias toward traditional Western knowledge and modes of thought, without calcification of application. The asteroid miner who knows his Aristotle and his Aquinas, and extracts metals to build great works with a picture of Henry the Navigator in his rocket ship—he is a Foundationalist.”

Haywood’s Foundationalism is violently opposed to the so-called Enlightenment ideals that undergird the political systems and philosophies of the Western liberal-democratic states; that means, inevitably, that it is opposed to the form of government established in the United States, which is the Enlightenment “utopia” par excellence.

Haywood makes no bones about this; Foundationalism is not intended to be an incremental and evolutionary advance from the current system to a future dispensation. It is, on the contrary, a rather abrupt break with the current system, and is designed (as I see it) to wholly supplant it; that would seem to make it a revolutionary political system, perhaps more along the lines of what is discussed in Heyer’s Revolution from the Right.¹

Should Foundationalism ever gain traction, therefore, you can imagine that the Regime would move heaven and earth, and use every little cluster munition and tactical nuke at its disposal to make sure it eliminated the threat. Haywood himself doesn’t beat around the bush:

“…the iron core of Foundationalism is that it opposes autonomic liberalism, and plans to destroy it as Foundationalism’s first act. Only when the Enlightenment, political philosophy based on false claims of wholesale human emancipation from all unchosen bonds, is both gone and wholly discredited is a new thing possible, for if not, the serpent will whisper his sweet lies in men’s ears forever, keeping them fixed in the dream become nightmare.”

Foundationalism, then, is uncompromising, revolutionary, and dismissive of half measures. What’s not to like?

At the heart of the Foundationalist political scheme is what Haywood calls “The Twelve Pillars,” perhaps in a cheeky nod to the Five Pillars of Islam. They are, in any case, the key to understanding this new system, and I shall do my best to summarize them here.

The first pillar, oddly enough, refers not to any program of political renewal at all, but rather to an aspiration: the conquest of space. It is chosen as the first pillar to give the Foundationalist society a positive unifying goal and vision for the future, a healthy means of directing toward fruitful ends the abundant human energies that are currently dissipated in endless sexual neuroses and obsessions.

Plus, it is intended to have the practical effect of extending human empery to the planets, opening up new frontiers for settlement and exploitation, (hopefully) unleashing material and technological benefits, alleviating the ontological boredom afflicting modern civilization, and giving young men new avenues to demonstrate their talents and achieve meaningful lives—all of which are sorely lacking in our crumbling, feminized civilization. Haywood also calls for reforming the sciences, eliminating the worthless social sciences, and ruthlessly suppressing the transhumanist tripe that’s so popular these days.

It’s a good start, and I’m halfway inclined already to acclaim Haywood the hereditary God-Emperor of the Solar System.

In the second pillar, Haywood advocates a mixed form of government as the most stable and the most conducive to human flourishing. Its form is not established, but it could be authoritarian or aristocratic, with the aim of representing what the people ought to be, the highest among us, rather than the lowest among us, as is lamentably the case today.

Alas, such was the aim of the Founding Fathers of the American Experiment as well, and that intention—as we can all see for ourselves—went straight into the crapper. We are without questioned governed by a kakistocracy—ruled by the worst among us. Still, Haywood makes it explicit that a Foundationalist government will emphatically not be a democracy, and that seems to be a good start. As books like Neema Parvini’s The Populist Delusion conclusively demonstrate, rule by elites is inevitable, so it’s best to pick one’s elites from the get-go and insure that they’re of the right kind.

As I see it, Foundationalism would be a return to a more civilized form of government, like the more enlightened empires of old; if nothing else, it would be a vast improvement over the anarcho-tyrannic liberal-democracies of today.

Virtue in the modern world is virtually non-existent, so the third pillar naturally concerns itself with the recrudescence of this much-needed corrective.

The degeneracy of the West flows directly from the degeneracy and lack of virtue in its human material; Foundationalism aims to redress this deficiency by promoting the good and the beautiful, through legal and even non-legal means, such as the reestablishment of social taboos and stigmas.

The false and evil taboos of the Left have been substituted for the just and righteous taboos of the past, the kind that often did more to keep society together than any formal law. Foundationalism would sweep these away, and restore the old stigmas and social correctives that we so desperately need.

“The incoherence of the modern philosophers will be replaced with the older and proven teleological conception of man, as filtered through Christianity. The government will seek to encourage virtue in the populace, but the populace, and in particular the ruling class, is the necessary repository and driver of virtue, if virtue is to permeate a society. The aim will be for society to seek the good, which is already known…”

The fourth pillar, a realistic appraisal and recomportment of the sexes, is perhaps the most important in all of Foundationalism. Haywood makes it clear that his political system is unabashedly and proudly anti-feminist, which any right-wing political system worth its salt must inevitably be.

The sexual distortions of modernity have been a disaster for our civilization, and Haywood’s Foundationalism would restore the roles of men and women to a more natural footing, as well as abolish the laws and technologies that disrupt family formation.

The fifth through tenth pillars are concerned with subordinating the economy to politics, encouraging intermediary institutions and local subsidiarity, establishing a hierarchical and orderly society, essentially recognizing Christianity as the state religion, and fostering a high culture as against our degenerate one. The eleventh pillar seeks to develop a humane and considered (rather than recklessly enthusiastic) approach to the adoption of new technologies, and, finally, the twelfth pillar rejects globalism altogether, and instead seeks to pursue a nationalist foreign policy of enlightened self-interest.

I can scarcely do the whole of Haywood’s Twelve Pillars any justice in this spare and of necessity condensed summary. I encourage you to read it, and decide for yourself if his points are well made.

For my part, I think there is much food for thought here. Undoubtedly, Haywood’s unapologetic anti-Enlightenment stance, and his harsh prescriptions and measures, will give many worthless, Constitution-worshiping “conservatives” the vapors. Actually, it appears already to have done so, as there seems to have arisen a sort of contretemps between Haywood and Rod Dreher, author of The Benedict Option, although I believe that was in connection with another matter than Haywood’s Foundationalist Manifesto.

Still, I’m sure the manifesto was read by these types, eliciting reactions of horror. But the hour is late, our civilization is in shocking decline, and America is not what it once was—nor will it ever be again. The truth is, there is no making America great again, and the same can be said for the West more broadly speaking. Now is a time for devising strategies of simple survival, for retrenchment, and for drawing up plans for what comes next. Because the enemy has already drawn up his plans, of that you can be assured, and he is implementing them as we speak.

That’s what I like about Haywood’s Foundationalism. There’s no starry-eyed nostalgia in his manifesto, nor any futile appeal to the ideals of a Constitution that has been warped beyond recognition through progressive chicanery—Haywood’s system harkens back to an older order, perhaps a harsher one, less amenable to our modern sensibilities, but more suited to our unsettled age.

There is, for instance, this passage, perhaps my favorite from the entire manifesto:

“[The Foundationalist state] will forbid most divorce, not because it is a sin, but because it destroys society. It will frown on adultery and homosexual acts, and disincentivize both, but not criminalize either. It will punish graft, theft, and sharp practice; the unfettered free market will no longer be thought of as some special good or moral in itself. Gambling will be mostly illegal; there will be no lotteries. The state will corral and curb prostitution; it will flog pornographers; and it will execute abortionists and other murderers.”

I guess when you know, you know; the antidote to the ills of our society is not difficult to discover. There it is, the solution, in stark, black-and-white lettering; it really is as easy as that. But no weak, cowardly, dithering politician will ever dare formulate that thought in his little brain…let alone voice it aloud.

Anyhow, maybe Foundationalism is just the kind of order we need to help us through the coming ordeal. It’s like a more specific application of Archeofuturism, perhaps more adapted to the American experience, with one foot firmly planted in the past, and another in the future.

I’m not sure it’s a workable solution, nor that it answers all of our present problems in a satisfactory way; but then I’m not sure even Haywood himself makes those claims for his new political system. Undoubtedly, for the implementation of a system like Foundationalism to be even remotely feasible, there will need to be a drastic reorganization of the world order—of a kind that is scarcely imaginable today. But the long annals of history are salted with many such unexpected sea changes; stranger things have happened, and we are certainly living in strange times.

Haywood, to his credit, has no illusions about this, and eschews any gradualist or evolutionary approach to his system. It is a matter of tearing down the current rotting superstructure, and replacing it with something better; the Left has already adopted this method, to great success, and perhaps it is time for the Right to do the same:

“Why a wholesale destruction and replacement, rather than incremental corrections, what we are told is the prim and proper conservative solution to problems? Because Foundationalism does not aim to conserve. It is a wholesale rebellion against the powers of the modern world, which realizes that those powers must be shattered, the world must be broken, to clear the way for new growth.”

That, it seems to me, is as neat and concise a summation of Foundationalism as you’re likely to find.

Ultimately, what matters is that Haywood has thrown his hat into the ring, and put his ideas out there for others to ponder, to criticize, and to elaborate upon, and for that I salute him.

Now it’s up to us to give his ideas the serious consideration they deserve, and to perhaps suggest ways to improve upon them. In the meantime, I look forward to hearing more about Haywood’s Foundationalism, and await his book on the subject with great anticipation.

1. Reviewed here by Esotericist.