On Friday 21 November, Georgios Varouxakis will present From Plato to NATO: What does 'The West' Mean?

He argues that while 'The West'  used to be defined by geography — as for a long time location was the determining factor — now, borders have dissolved, and the West also includes countries like Japan and South Korea.

Values such as democracy and respect for the individual are being absorbed into an expanding idea of what the West means, a concept that continues to move eastward.

But are these values really unique to the West? Is democracy or respect for women a Western value?

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The West by Georgios Varouxakis — a journey from Plato to Nato

Today’s “gloomsters”—from US Vice-President JD Vance to Elon Musk—warn of “Western Civilisation’s” decline, pushing to revive Western Civ courses. The familiar story of this “West” ties it to ancient Greek philosophy, the Hebrew Bible, and a European legacy spanning the Renaissance and Enlightenment. Yet, none of the “great minds” (Aristotle, Aquinas, Locke) in this lineage saw themselves as part of “the West”—to them, it was just a geographic term.​

Historian Georgios Varouxakis (Queen Mary University of London) answers when “the West” became a cultural/political concept: it is a 19th-century idea, emerging as a “potential political entity based on civilisational commonality.” Before then, 17th–18th century thinkers framed Europe as split between north and south (replacing the old “Christendom” idea). Post-1815 (Napoleon’s defeat), “the West” gained traction: some Europeans feared Russia’s rise and questioned its place in Europe, while others looked to the US as a post-colonial “new future.”​

Key thinkers shaped its meaning: French philosopher Auguste Comte first systematized “Western values,” envisioning a “Western Republic” uniting humanity without empire. German-born US academic Francis Lieber (1853) coined “Western History” (apologizing for its “indistinct” novelty) to link European and American values. Later, WWII interventionists and Cold War thinkers (like journalist Walter Lippmann) tied “the West” to US foreign policy—though notably, Churchill’s 1946 Iron Curtain speech and the 1947 Truman Doctrine never used the term.​

The term’s trajectory shifted from liberal optimism to gloom. Oswald Spengler’s 1918 The Decline of the West argued decline was inevitable (centered on Germany/Central Europe). French conservative Henri Massis countered, urging defense of a Mediterranean-focused “West”—influencing T.S. Eliot’s interwar cultural anxiety. Today, invocations of “the West” echo this despair, targeting global south immigration and cultural relativism, forgetting its emancipatory roots.​

Varouxakis avoids defining “the West” (noting Nietzsche’s maxim: “Only that which has no history is definable”) but leans toward French philosopher Raymond Aron’s view: the West’s essence is “liberty to criticise.” Yet the term remains ambiguous, tossed between US nationalists clinging to Europe ties and European liberals dependent on US leadership. Only future geopolitics will say if “the West” has run its course—until then, Varouxakis’s book reminds us: our ideas about “ancient” Western heritage are surprisingly modern.

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