The central problem that Gobineau poses and seeks to resolve in his main work is the problem of the decline and death of various civilizations. Initially, in Gobineau’s concept, the main subject of consideration and the main subject of the historical process is race, or, what is synonymous for Gobineau, an ethnic group. In his opinion, social institutions do not determine the life activity of races (ethnic groups), but, on the contrary, are determined by them. Institutions that are not in harmony with the deep tendencies of the race are not grafted in unless racial mixing occurs. As a result, Gobineau denies the civilizing role of world religions, for example, Christianity, which, being accepted by a wide variety of peoples, cannot in itself shake their deep characteristics and inclinations.

In his interpretation of the origin of human races, Gobineau gravitates towards the polygenetic concept, according to which different races have different origins. However, he expresses his commitment to the polygenetic concept very carefully.

Skin color serves as the basis for Gobineau to distinguish three main races: white, yellow and black. Gobineau views these races as a three-level hierarchical ladder with the white race at the top and the black race at the bottom. Within the white race, the highest place is occupied, according to Gobineau, by the “Aryans”. Races, in his opinion, are distinguished by the constancy and indestructibility of physical and spiritual traits; the white race is superior to the rest in physical strength, beauty, perseverance, etc. But the most important criterion for a place in the racial hierarchy is intelligence.

Real existence Gobineau attributes three “pure” racial types to the distant past. Thus, “pure” original races have long ceased to exist, and in the modern era there are racial types that have been mixed countless times. Gobineau's concept of “race” emerges from narrow anthropological definitions, receiving a symbolic meaning.

Gobino seeks to discover internal, “natural laws governing the social world,” which have an unchanging character. These two laws, according to Gobineau, are the laws of repulsion and attraction between human races. These “laws” are concretized by the fatal phenomenon of mixing of separated races and their countless combinations. Mixing is a necessary source of the emergence and development of civilizations (with the obligatory participation of the “white” race), but this is also the reason for their degeneration in the future.

The thesis about the harmful nature of racial mixing determines Gobineau’s anti-colonialist position, since colonial conquests, in his opinion, contribute to mixing and, therefore, degeneration of European civilization.

In Gobineau’s interpretation of the fate of civilizations, fatalism is closely related to pessimism. He states the degeneration of European civilization and prophesies its imminent end. Gobineau denies the existence of social progress and believes that European civilization is largely moving along the path of regression.