I was under the impression that you were a monarchist, so why did you describe yourself as an anarch? What exactly do you mean by ‘anarch’?
The special trait making me an anarch is that I live in a world which I "ultimately" do not take seriously. This increases my freedom; I serve as a temporary volunteer. ~ Eumeswil, Ernst Jünger
A monarchist by conviction, I am an anarch by necessity. That is to say, I hold, by reason and by faith, that monarchy is the political form most aligned with human nature, tradition, and the sacred. I see hierarchy not as oppression but as order, and in the person of the king as a symbolic center around which a people become a nation. My conviction is not nostalgic, but metaphysical, rooted in the belief that authority, rightly understood, flows from above.
Yet I live in a world that has cast down its thrones, mistaking liberty for license, and order for tyranny. It is an age of managed illusions, algorithms, mass man, interchangeable leaders, and rootless citizens. In such a world, to act politically is to shout into the wind.
So I do not join parties, nor do I deign to vote. Instead, I follow the path of the anarch, an ideal I aspire to, inspired by the vision laid out by the great German writer, philosopher, and soldier Ernst Jünger (1895-1998).
Introduced in Jünger’s 1977 novel Eumeswil, the anarch is a sovereign individual—someone who is internally free, indifferent to regimes, yet capable of navigating or even serving within them. He is inwardly detached, self-mastered, and apolitical. His kingdom is not of this world, although he moves through it with awareness and precision.
Despite the similarity in terms, the difference between Jünger’s anarch and the anarchist is profound.
An anarchist is a political activist who aims to eliminate all forms of external authority, particularly the state. Typically, an anarchist is an activist, often militant or revolutionary, defined by opposition to hierarchy and centralized power. The anarchist dreams of replacing the existing order with a radically decentralized or stateless society through protest, agitation, or even violence. His struggle is external, ideological, and collective.
The anarch, by contrast, is not a bomb-thrower; he observes power rather than acts against it. He may work within a regime without losing his spiritual integrity. He adopts roles without identifying with them. He prefers inner detachment over outward rebellion. He is “in the world, but not of it.” Grounded in self-sovereignty, discipline, and inner freedom, the anarch possesses a near monastic metaphysical reserve. He is not a revolutionary but something more radical—a man who transcends politics.
Related, but distinct, is Jünger’s earlier figure of the forest fleer (Waldgänger), introduced in his 1951 essay Der Waldgang (The Forest Passage). Both the anarch and the forest fleer are symbols of resistance and inner freedom, but they differ in context, attitude, and spiritual focus.
The forest fleer is the man who withdraws from a totalitarian or mass society, not in defeat, but in defiance. He “flees to the forest” symbolically. The forest symbolizes a realm beyond the grasp of the state, a mythic and existential space of freedom and moral courage. He is the one who says “No” when all others submit. Not primarily an outlaw or political agitator, he is a free man who accepts solitude, risk, and responsibility.
In Jünger’s view, the forest is the antithesis of the administered world. It evokes the ancient Teutonic hero who retreats into the woods when society becomes unjust, the Christian hermit who flees to the desert to preserve truth, and the idea that even under complete control, one free man remains ungovernable.
The anarch, by contrast, need not flee because he carries the forest within. He may (like Martin Venator in Eumeswil) serve a tyrant, live under surveillance, or work as a historian, yet he never spiritually submits. His resistance is not overt but rooted in his very being. The anarch is not a revolutionary; he is more radical. He does not challenge the state directly but questions the world itself.
In short, the forest fleer is a man of action amid the ruins, like an underground fighter or partisan. The anarch is a sovereign being after the collapse, a metaphysical exile living outside the political and historical current. One fights for freedom; the other embodies freedom.
~ By Giovanni di Napoli, August 11th, Feast of Santa Filomena
