Political Thinkers Present in Nicolae Steinhardt's Journalism

Abstract

Nicolae Steinhardt was a refined intellectual who asserted himself in the interwar period through his collaboration with journals such as Revista Fundațiilor Regale, Revista Burgheză, Victoria, Libertatea etc. Apart from the topics that prove N. Steinhardt's love of literature and of any aspect related to culture and art, many of his interwar articles reveal a fine analytical sense at the political level. Steinhardt’s anchoring in political life and his concern for understanding political concepts and identifying the features of effective governance are revealed by reading, analysing and exposing the political ideas launched by various thinkers.
In the interwar Steinhardtian journalism one finds pertinent radiographs of different political events that changed the course of history, dissections of political ideologies but also critical analyses of the political ideas of important thinkers of different political “colours” and various ethnic origins, such as: Alexis de Tocqueville, Joseph Barthélemy, Lucien Prévost-Paradol, Benjamin Constant, Silvio Trentin, André Suarès, Georges Sorel, Saint-Simon etc. The way of reporting to the works and their theories is intended to be an objective one by pointing out some positive and negative aspects, but in essence they reflect the author's subjectivity and Steinhardt's political conceptions: the distinction between democracy and liberalism, support for constitutional monarchy and people’s freedom, hostility to universal suffrage as a form of mass tyranny, opposition to any form of totalitarianism.