The Parallax of the Real: Lacan between Žižek's Dialectical Materialism and Dugin's Fourth Political Theory

Introduction

Yes, Slavoj Zizek and Alexander Dugin do have a noticeable point of contact through the psychoanalysis of Jacques Lacan, although their interpretations and ideological applications are radically different. This is not a direct line of succession, but rather a parallel use of Lacan's arsenal to critique the modern world-capitalism, liberalism, and subjectivity. Let's analyze it point by point.

General via Lacan

• Lacan as a tool for deconstructing the subject: Both thinkers rely on Lacan's concepts of the "Big Other" (symbolic order, ideology), "jouissance" (pleasure beyond pleasure) and "real" (a traumatic basis that goes beyond the symbolic). Zizek, as a classical Lacanian Marxist, uses this to analyze ideology in pop culture and capitalism (for example, in "Watch Them Dance!" or "Fragile Absolute"). Dugin, in turn, adapts Lacan for traditionalist criticism: the liberal subject is an "empty shell", detached from the sacred "Big Other" (tradition, geopolitics), where jouissance is manipulated by global capital. This unites them in an anti-modernist impulse: both see in Lacan's "real" the gap that capitalism is trying to bridge with ideology.