Weak Decisionism and Political Polytheology: The Neutralization of Carl Schmitt’s Political Theology by Hans Blumenberg and the Ritter School

Abstract

Abstract In this article, I explore the liberal–conservative reception of Carl Schmitt’s political theology in post-war West-Germany. By focusing on the work of prominent members of the Ritter School – Hermann Lübbe, Ernst-Wolfgang Böckenförde, and Odo Marquard – and on the contributions of Hans Blumenberg, I will demonstrate how Schmitt’s thought was appropriated and critically inverted, in order to provide theoretical support to liberalism. This project of liberalizing Schmitt involved developing a “weak decisionism,” which avoids the state of exception, providing a liberalist reading of Schmitt’s Hobbes-inspired narrative on the origin of the modern state and even formulating a “political polytheology.” Finally, this article offers a reflection on “political theology” as a conceptual field. I argue that the liberal–conservative, “neutralizing” reading of Schmitt is to some extent already available as an option within this framework, and I conclude that this finding problematizes Schmitt’s own dualistic antagonism.