Abstract
Carl Schmitt’s controversial 1922 Political Theology: Four Chapters on the Concept of Sovereignty initiated a long-standing, lively, and oft misunderstood discourse at the intersections of religious studies, theology, and political theory. Political theology as a discourse has seen something of a revival in recent decades, which has raised genuine problems of interpretation. These include questions of what is at stake in political theology, how political theology can be applied to economic discourses, and how it can be understood in relation to secularity and post-secularity. This study takes Giorgio Agamben’s The Kingdom and Glory as a conceptual bridge that helps to situate contemporary political theologies of neoliberalism historically and theoretically. A survey of four recent political theologies of neoliberalism yields a methodological reflection on the limits and potential of political theology as a discourse. A distinction is made between descriptive-genealogical political theologies and normative-prescriptive political theologies. The former is privileged in its philosophical potential, insofar as it reveals both the contingency and genuine variety of normative-prescriptive political theologies.
Highlights
The past 15 years have brought renewed scholarly interest in political theology, resulting in many new published projects in this field
I have endeavored an account of what political theology has been, starting with the origins of the discourse in Carl Schmitt’s 1922 work and followed by a close reading of Giorgio Agamben’s genealogical account of the paradigms of governance and economy as they developed in Late Antiquity through the High Middle Ages and its implications for political theology
These accounts have provided historical examples and a methodological background for political theology, which can be defined as the discipline of drawing connections between religious and theological traditions and teachings and their mutual influence with the development of political theory
Summary
The past 15 years have brought renewed scholarly interest in political theology, resulting in many new published projects in this field. In Europe, these ethical and metaphysical assumptions have their roots at least partially in the Christian theological tradition Both thinkers tend to see modern theories of the nation-state to be in necessary continuity with preceding forms of government, whereas proponents of the secularization thesis hold that the modern nation-state is founded on a fundamental rejection of religiosity in the political sphere. For Habermas, the post-war nation-state represents a radical break from its predecessors insofar as it represents a civil community based solely on rational mutual necessity This rational mutual interest is self-founding; it owes nothing to the traditions of political and religious authorities that precede it and requires no metaphysical or religious commitments as necessary for membership in the body politic.
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