On the political theology of apartheid: a philosophical investigation

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article aims to discuss the relation between political theology and apartheid critically. The relation is traced by reconsidering Carl Schmitt’s notion of political theology and the accompanying friend-enemy distinction within the South African context in dialogue with Achille Mbembe. The political theology of apartheid is accordingly analysed as the creation of a racial figure of enmity intertwined with a religious myth. Within this heuristic framework, the philosophical roots of the racial concept of the “K”-figure – as a figure of enmity – are outlined by delineating its foundations in the metaphysics of modernity with specific reference to the writings of Immanuel Kant. This concept is further considered regarding its intertwinement with the creation of the religious myth of justify Afrikaner Nationalism Volk as a chosen people of God, used to justify the Afrikaner nationalism and apartheid ideology. Finally, the opening of a space is sketched where the task of rethinking the political ontologically within a post-apartheid world may take place. The task that attempts to avoid a reconstitution of the political theology of apartheid in new figures of enmity, both religious and racial, while opening the possibility for the reparation of the dignity of those it was stolen from.