Historical Revisionism and Delegitimation of the Revolutionary and Anticolonial Tradition—A Review of War and Revolution: Rethinking the Twentieth Century by Domenico Losurdo

Domenico Losurdo’s War and Revolution: Rethinking the Twentieth Century tries to respond to historical revisionism, focusing on authors like Ernst Nolte and works such as The Black Book of Communism. Rereading categories such as totalitarianism and genocide, Losurdo’s essay defends against the demonisation of the French and Russian revolutionary cycles and the anticolonial revolutions they generated. Reinstating or relativising the Nazi-Fascist experience as a defensive “counter-movement” to the Bolshevik offensive, historical revisionism overlooks the violence that characterises the history of the classically liberal countries and Western colonialism. However, Losurdo demonstrates how, far from just representing a response to the Bolshevik advance, the Nazi-Fascist criminal projects followed the Anglo-American model of colonialism. Niall Ferguson also glosses over these genealogies, delegitimating anticolonial revolutions, transfiguring the United States as the legitimate heir of the British Empire, as well as making it the champion of the cause of modernity and democracy. Faced with its own difficulties and the current emergence of China on the global stage, the American Empire is called upon to openly reject the principle of equality between nations and establish a new world order for the good of humanity. The success that this British historian enjoys is especially worrying, Losurdo concludes.