Integrating Olavo de Carvalho’s concepts and method in Geopolitical Studies

Abstract

This chapter analyzes the contribution of the Brazilian philosopher Olavo de Carvalho to political science, integrating that contribution within geopolitical studies. In a time in which the Global South is slowly challenging the Anglo-Saxon hegemony by entering the academic debate, the exam of Carvalho’s ideas and their pertinence to an innovative theoretic-methodological framework becomes relevant. The aim of the paper is twofold: (1) it defines some of Carvalho’s main concepts, such as political action, political and historial agent, consciousness horizon, revolutionary mentality, potential and power, intellectual hegemony, intentions and objectives, political network; and (2) it integrates these concepts into a quite innovative, probabilistic, dialectic, and phenomenological approach. In this context, some of Carvalho’s received influences are mentioned, and his disregard for grand theories – in detriment of case studies – is explained. Apart from the introduction to Carvalho’s approach in the English language, the chapter also incorporates his conceptual and methodological framework into foreign policy and geopolitical studies developing, therefore, these research agendas.