Philosophy Group Accused of Fascist Influence Hopes to Grow in Canada
From 1957 until today, the esoteric new religious organization New Acropolis has operated on a global scale, at times labelled a “cult” and accused of running using neofascist and paramilitary structures. In September of 2022, I attended one of their workshops in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.
From its origins in Argentina as a breakaway from a larger organization (who would eventually accuse it of connections with Nazism), New Acropolis expanded into parts of the Americas and European countries over the next 64 years with varying degrees of success. The organization currently claims to operate in over 50 countries, but little is known about many of them, with much coverage in the modern day limited to operations in Spanish-speaking countries and France, where the group was labeled a cult by the French Parliament in 1996.
Though France’s methods of monitoring sectarian movements would prove to be controversial and were eventually changed, Swiss news network RTS reported in 2021 that the French government agency MIVILUDES still monitored New Acropolis as a group with “extreme right-wing ideology” and warned they have an “internal militia”.
Despite the controversy surrounding New Acropolis, the organization is still known for a variety of volunteering initiatives and philanthropic endeavors.
So, it was seemingly without resistance that New Acropolis Canada, first registered in Quebec in May 1984, has recently been pushing expansions in three Canadian cities. The organization ran a similar brand of fifteen-week philosophy workshops with a free first class in-person in 2019 before the Covid-19 pandemic forced the classes online. A Toronto class ran in June of this year, with an Ottawa one having started earlier this month. Posters plastered on university campuses and social media ads promoted what looked like a free Philosophy class on September 6 from 7 to 9pm at the Hintonburg Community Centre in Ottawa to kick off the cycle.
Looking for Meaning?
I walked into the rented room in the Hintonburg Community Centre to be greeted by several faces with memorably wide and seemingly unmoving smiles. Eventually twenty-two students, or at least prospective students, including myself, sat on chairs facing the instructor, a large paper flip pad with a marker, and a table with some props. Scattered among us were seven representatives of New Acropolis, identifiable because most met a passing glance with a bold smile, and because before the class started, each was either moving chairs, greeting people at the door, or moving in and out of the room running errands.
Behind us to the left was a table with reading materials, including pamphlets, periodicals, and books. A copy of Ankor, the Last Prince of Atlantis, written by New Acropolis founder Jorge Ángel Livraga Rizzi, sat on display, alongside other books with the New Acropolis logo printed on the back.
The instructor, a middle-aged woman who would later say she’d been with New Acropolis for fourteen years, asked questions throughout the workshop. Some were direct to the audience, starting with what brought people here. One member of the audience said his interest in philosophy drove him to it. Another said they were looking for meaning in their life, just as the advertisements asked. Other questions were more rhetorical — anecdotal scenarios in which she would ask us about the technicalities of a specific situation. For example, if someone knows how to make bread, but has never baked any professionally, can this still call themselves a baker? We were told how we would be taught how the lessons taught by Plato, Socrates, and Aristotle could still help in our modern lives today. We were told if we stuck around, that we would learn about how time cycles in civilizations were inevitable.
The workshop itself took roughly about forty minutes of the two hours booked, with the content changing to instead tell the class what the remainder of the workshops would look like and to introduce New Acropolis by name. It was then that she introduced the pricing of the full fifteen-week course: $260 for people above thirty-five years of age and $180 for people thirty-five and younger. She emphasized the volunteer nature of the organization, saying that she herself took no money from teaching four hours a week for fifteen weeks, nor would any of the other representatives who were there that day. In fact, the fees would profit no one, going only to expenses. It was during a brief question and answer period that followed when the instructor said New Acropolis was trying to establish a “school” in Ottawa.
The workshop ended with an informal session of cake and coffee as prospective audience members were encouraged to ask questions to the instructor and to the volunteers from New Acropolis. Potential students, undoubtedly also viewed as potential future members, gradually shuffled out.
Old New Acropolis
Jorge Ángel Livraga Rizzi was said to have set the foundation for New Acropolis during his time with the Argentina Chapter of the Theosophical Society, who claims his expulsion was due to “deceitful information against the Theosophical Society”. A 2004 letter from the Secretary and Secretary General of Argentina’s Theosophical Society lamented that Livraga’s teaching was appealing to their students and alleged that Livraga and New Acropolis “was internally connected with extremism of the ultra right and Nazism”.
Nicholas Goodricke-Clarke, a scholar renowned for his work on esoteric fascism, claimed in his book Black Sun that “the structure, organization, and symbolism of the Nouvelle Acropole (New Acropolis) is clearly indebted to fascist models”.
As the organization operates as a very closed-off organization, little is known about the current structure and what differs between branches. However, in 2014 a team of Vice News journalists conducted a three month long infiltration of New Acropolis Mexico and interviewed a former member, revealing information about New Acropolis Mexico. The former member’s story gave weight to accusations of the influence of fascist symbolism. As he told Vice News Mexico about the group’s initiation, “You end with the salute they want to pass off as Roman, even though we all know it’s Nazi, and you feel good. You know that you are part of something secret that the others do not understand.” In another story, he recalled how two of his classmates were kicked out for “homosexuality”.
However, some scholars have pushed back against describing New Acropolis as far-right and even as a cult altogether, even in regards to the organization’s presence in Canada. In 2013 Alain Bouchard, a teacher at Cégep de Sainte-Foy in Quebec City, told the newspaper Le Soleil that they believed it was a mistake to present New Acropolis “a dangerous cult with neo-fascist tendencies”. New Acropolis’ international leadership has included the promotion of “an Ideal of international fraternity, based on respect for human dignity, beyond racial, sexual, cultural, religious, social or other differences” as part of the group’s resolutions.
The organization has also been the subject of ridicule for the dubious claims followers of Livraga have made about his accolades. The Great Deception: The Truth About New Acropolis and Lidia Pérez López, a Spanish language ebook critiquing New Acropolis published under a pseudonym, shows alleged screenshots of online claims that Livraga had doctorates in “Divinity” and “Divine Healing”.
However, despite his career association with New Acropolis and accusations of running the organization with a neofascist and paramilitary structure, novels written by Livraga and published by New Acropolis are still sold by retailers such as Walmart, Amazon, Indigo, and Barnes and Noble.
Presence in Canada
New Acropolis Canada was first registered as Organisation Internationale Nouvelle Acropole Canada in 1984. Mike Kropveld, the executive director of Info-Cult: Centre for Assistance and for the Study of Cultic Phenomena, said that Info-Cult has been aware of New Acropolis’ activity in Quebec since at least 1995, if not earlier.
Currently, the national branch of the New Acropolis officially operates in Toronto, Ottawa, and Montréal under the direction of Catherine Guillerme of Montréal, a self-described “Specialist in Morphopsychology, Speaker and Consultant”. Morphopsychology, or Morphopsychologie, is an esoteric French pseudoscience relating the shape of people’s faces to inherent traits in them, similar to Greek physiognomy. The Association française pour l’information scientifique (The French Association for Scientific Information), called the practice “reminiscent of the old phrenology” and labeled it “disfigured science”.
The Ottawa and Montreal branches of New Acropolis were emailed and asked to comment on issues including the common categorization of the organization as a cult and allegations of far-right influences on the organization. In response, New Acropolis Montreal sent a link to a video interview with New Acropolis’ International President Carlos Adelantado and suggested that if I was interested I should “check it out”.
Whether New Acropolis grows to be a mainstay in Canada remains to be seen. For now, New Acropolis Ottawa’s workshops run at 7:00pm on Tuesdays at the Hintonburg Community Centre on Wellington Street and Fridays at the CCA Parish Hall in Aylmer.