- Table View
- List View
Political Theology: A Critical Introduction
by Saul NewmanGod is dead, but his presence lives on in politics. This is the problem of political theology: the way that theological ideas find their way into secular political institutions, particularly the sovereign state. In this intellectual tour-de-force, leading political theorist Saul Newman shows how political theology arose alongside secularism, and relates to the problem of legitimising power and authority in modernity. It is not about the power of religion so much as about the religion of power. Examining the current crisis of the liberal order, he argues that recent phenomena such as the rise of populism, the renewed demand for strong national sovereignty and the return of religious fundamentalism may be understood through this paradigm. He illustrates his argument through an exploration of themes such as sovereignty, democracy, economics, technology, ecological catastrophe, messianism and the future of radical politics, engaging with thinkers ranging from Schmitt and Hobbes to Stirner, Foucault, and Agamben. This book will be a crucial text for all students, scholars and general readers interested in the meaning and significance of political theology for political theory.
Political Theology: A Critical Introduction
by Saul NewmanGod is dead, but his presence lives on in politics. This is the problem of political theology: the way that theological ideas find their way into secular political institutions, particularly the sovereign state. In this intellectual tour-de-force, leading political theorist Saul Newman shows how political theology arose alongside secularism, and relates to the problem of legitimising power and authority in modernity. It is not about the power of religion so much as about the religion of power. Examining the current crisis of the liberal order, he argues that recent phenomena such as the rise of populism, the renewed demand for strong national sovereignty and the return of religious fundamentalism may be understood through this paradigm. He illustrates his argument through an exploration of themes such as sovereignty, democracy, economics, technology, ecological catastrophe, messianism and the future of radical politics, engaging with thinkers ranging from Schmitt and Hobbes to Stirner, Foucault, and Agamben. This book will be a crucial text for all students, scholars and general readers interested in the meaning and significance of political theology for political theory.
Political Theology: A Guide For The Perplexed (Guides for the Perplexed)
by Elizabeth PhillipsThere is an increasingly intense interest in political theology amongst contemporary scholars and students. Yet, while there are many authors engaging in political theology, there are very few resources about political theology which aim to orient students and other recent new-comers to the field. This is a concise and accessible advanced introduction which distinguishes various approaches to political theology, and which explores several of the central issues addressed in political theologies. Theological students will be able to approach courses and readings in political theology with a renewed confidence with this overview in hand.
Political Theology: A Guide For The Perplexed (Guides for the Perplexed)
by Elizabeth PhillipsThere is an increasingly intense interest in political theology amongst contemporary scholars and students. Yet, while there are many authors engaging in political theology, there are very few resources about political theology which aim to orient students and other recent new-comers to the field. This is a concise and accessible advanced introduction which distinguishes various approaches to political theology, and which explores several of the central issues addressed in political theologies. Theological students will be able to approach courses and readings in political theology with a renewed confidence with this overview in hand.
Political Theology: Four Chapters on the Concept of Sovereignty
by Carl SchmittWritten in the intense political and intellectual tumult of the early years of the Weimar Republic, Political Theology develops the distinctive theory of sovereignty that made Carl Schmitt one of the most significant and controversial political theorists of the twentieth century. Focusing on the relationships among political leadership, the norms of the legal order, and the state of political emergency, Schmitt argues in Political Theology that legal order ultimately rests upon the decisions of the sovereign. According to Schmitt, only the sovereign can meet the needs of an "exceptional" time and transcend legal order so that order can then be reestablished. Convinced that the state is governed by the ever-present possibility of conflict, Schmitt theorizes that the state exists only to maintain its integrity in order to ensure order and stability. Suggesting that all concepts of modern political thought are secularized theological concepts, Schmitt concludes Political Theology with a critique of liberalism and its attempt to depoliticize political thought by avoiding fundamental political decisions.
Political Theology: Four Chapters on the Concept of Sovereignty
by Carl SchmittWritten in the intense political and intellectual tumult of the early years of the Weimar Republic, Political Theology develops the distinctive theory of sovereignty that made Carl Schmitt one of the most significant and controversial political theorists of the twentieth century. Focusing on the relationships among political leadership, the norms of the legal order, and the state of political emergency, Schmitt argues in Political Theology that legal order ultimately rests upon the decisions of the sovereign. According to Schmitt, only the sovereign can meet the needs of an "exceptional" time and transcend legal order so that order can then be reestablished. Convinced that the state is governed by the ever-present possibility of conflict, Schmitt theorizes that the state exists only to maintain its integrity in order to ensure order and stability. Suggesting that all concepts of modern political thought are secularized theological concepts, Schmitt concludes Political Theology with a critique of liberalism and its attempt to depoliticize political thought by avoiding fundamental political decisions.
Political Theology: Four Chapters on the Concept of Sovereignty
by Carl SchmittWritten in the intense political and intellectual tumult of the early years of the Weimar Republic, Political Theology develops the distinctive theory of sovereignty that made Carl Schmitt one of the most significant and controversial political theorists of the twentieth century. Focusing on the relationships among political leadership, the norms of the legal order, and the state of political emergency, Schmitt argues in Political Theology that legal order ultimately rests upon the decisions of the sovereign. According to Schmitt, only the sovereign can meet the needs of an "exceptional" time and transcend legal order so that order can then be reestablished. Convinced that the state is governed by the ever-present possibility of conflict, Schmitt theorizes that the state exists only to maintain its integrity in order to ensure order and stability. Suggesting that all concepts of modern political thought are secularized theological concepts, Schmitt concludes Political Theology with a critique of liberalism and its attempt to depoliticize political thought by avoiding fundamental political decisions.
Political Theology: Four Chapters on the Concept of Sovereignty
by Carl SchmittWritten in the intense political and intellectual tumult of the early years of the Weimar Republic, Political Theology develops the distinctive theory of sovereignty that made Carl Schmitt one of the most significant and controversial political theorists of the twentieth century. Focusing on the relationships among political leadership, the norms of the legal order, and the state of political emergency, Schmitt argues in Political Theology that legal order ultimately rests upon the decisions of the sovereign. According to Schmitt, only the sovereign can meet the needs of an "exceptional" time and transcend legal order so that order can then be reestablished. Convinced that the state is governed by the ever-present possibility of conflict, Schmitt theorizes that the state exists only to maintain its integrity in order to ensure order and stability. Suggesting that all concepts of modern political thought are secularized theological concepts, Schmitt concludes Political Theology with a critique of liberalism and its attempt to depoliticize political thought by avoiding fundamental political decisions.
Political Theology and Law (Law and Politics)
by Geminello PreterossiThis book addresses two main questions. Can political theology be overcome? And, is what today – in referring to neoliberalism and its genealogy – many define as "economic theology" truly an alternative to political theology, as Foucault has claimed and as Agamben does today? As a first step, the book addresses and clarifies various misunderstandings about the notion of political theology, in its multiple and even opposite meanings. It then focuses on a conceptualisation inaugurated by Carl Schmitt, which sees political theology as the eloquent matrix of modern politics: insofar as the latter produces and continuously re-elaborates an "excess" that does not belong to it, its core remains theological-political, although secularised. The bulk of the book then pursues a reading of the analogic connection between juridico-political concepts and theological-metaphysical concepts; arguing that, although the ‘turn’ to economic theology is indeed another form of political theology, it is a deeply anti-political one, which forecloses modes of resistance. The book will be of interest to scholars, researchers and advanced students in the fields of modern political and legal philosophy and those researching the crisis of its legacy. In particular, it is addressed to those who study the relationship between theology (and its substitutes, such as hegemony and political myth) and politics, power and law, legitimacy and legality, in the perspective of secularization. In addition, the book offers a contribution to contemporary critical studies on the neoliberal state and the return of the "state of exception" in democracies, as well as a questioning of the moralization of law, which is an effect of globalist ideology and the "humanitarian turn" after 1989.
Political Theology and Law (Law and Politics)
by Geminello PreterossiThis book addresses two main questions. Can political theology be overcome? And, is what today – in referring to neoliberalism and its genealogy – many define as "economic theology" truly an alternative to political theology, as Foucault has claimed and as Agamben does today? As a first step, the book addresses and clarifies various misunderstandings about the notion of political theology, in its multiple and even opposite meanings. It then focuses on a conceptualisation inaugurated by Carl Schmitt, which sees political theology as the eloquent matrix of modern politics: insofar as the latter produces and continuously re-elaborates an "excess" that does not belong to it, its core remains theological-political, although secularised. The bulk of the book then pursues a reading of the analogic connection between juridico-political concepts and theological-metaphysical concepts; arguing that, although the ‘turn’ to economic theology is indeed another form of political theology, it is a deeply anti-political one, which forecloses modes of resistance. The book will be of interest to scholars, researchers and advanced students in the fields of modern political and legal philosophy and those researching the crisis of its legacy. In particular, it is addressed to those who study the relationship between theology (and its substitutes, such as hegemony and political myth) and politics, power and law, legitimacy and legality, in the perspective of secularization. In addition, the book offers a contribution to contemporary critical studies on the neoliberal state and the return of the "state of exception" in democracies, as well as a questioning of the moralization of law, which is an effect of globalist ideology and the "humanitarian turn" after 1989.
Political Theology and Pluralism: Renewing Public Dialogue
by Joseph RiveraReviving the ancient political wisdom of St. Augustine in combination with insights drawn from contemporary political theorist John Rawls, Joseph Rivera grapples with the polarizing nature of religion in the public square. Political theology, as a discipline, tends to argue that communitarianism remains the only viable political option for religious practitioners in a complex, pluralist society. Unsurprisingly, we are increasingly accustomed to think the religious voice is anti-secular and illiberal. On the contrary, Christian theology and political liberalism, Rivera argues, are not incompatible. Political Theology and Pluralism challenges the longstanding antithesis between theology and political liberalism by asking his readers to focus not on difference, but on our common humanity. Outlining real strategies for public dialogue in a liberal state, Rivera offers the opportunity to discover what it means to practice civic friendship in pluralist context.
Political Theology and Pluralism: Renewing Public Dialogue
by Joseph RiveraReviving the ancient political wisdom of St. Augustine in combination with insights drawn from contemporary political theorist John Rawls, Joseph Rivera grapples with the polarizing nature of religion in the public square. Political theology, as a discipline, tends to argue that communitarianism remains the only viable political option for religious practitioners in a complex, pluralist society. Unsurprisingly, we are increasingly accustomed to think the religious voice is anti-secular and illiberal. On the contrary, Christian theology and political liberalism, Rivera argues, are not incompatible. Political Theology and Pluralism challenges the longstanding antithesis between theology and political liberalism by asking his readers to focus not on difference, but on our common humanity. Outlining real strategies for public dialogue in a liberal state, Rivera offers the opportunity to discover what it means to practice civic friendship in pluralist context.
Political Theology for a Plural Age
by Michael Jon KesslerNew challenges that emerged in the postwar era have given rise to ongoing debate about the place of religion in public life, in the United States and in other established democracies, and this debate has dramatically reshaped the way scholars, policymakers, and religious leaders think about political theology. Political Theology for a Plural Age examines historic and contemporary understandings of political engagement in Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, engaging political theologies not merely as a set of theoretical concepts but as religious beliefs and principles that motivate specific political action. The essays in this volume, written by leading thinkers and practitioners within each tradition and their secular counterparts, examine a number of core issues at the intersection of religion and politics. They contest the definition of political theology, establish a common discourse across the three Abrahamic traditions, and closely examine how globalization, secularization, and pluralism affect the construction and plausibility of political theologies. Finally, they offer insight into how political theologies might adapt to the shared global challenges of the twenty-first century.
Political Theology for a Plural Age
by Jal MehtaNew challenges that emerged in the postwar era have given rise to ongoing debate about the place of religion in public life, in the United States and in other established democracies, and this debate has dramatically reshaped the way scholars, policymakers, and religious leaders think about political theology. Political Theology for a Plural Age examines historic and contemporary understandings of political engagement in Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, engaging political theologies not merely as a set of theoretical concepts but as religious beliefs and principles that motivate specific political action. The essays in this volume, written by leading thinkers and practitioners within each tradition and their secular counterparts, examine a number of core issues at the intersection of religion and politics. They contest the definition of political theology, establish a common discourse across the three Abrahamic traditions, and closely examine how globalization, secularization, and pluralism affect the construction and plausibility of political theologies. Finally, they offer insight into how political theologies might adapt to the shared global challenges of the twenty-first century.
Political Theology II: The Myth of the Closure of any Political Theology
by Carl SchmittPolitical Theology II is Carl Schmitt's last book. Part polemic, part self-vindication for his involvement in the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP), this is Schmitt's most theological reflection on Christianity and its concept of sovereignty following the Second Vatican Council. At a time of increasing visibility of religion in public debates and a realization that Schmitt is the major and most controversial political theorist of the twentieth century, this last book sets a new agenda for political theology today. The crisis at the beginning of the twenty-first century led to an increased interest in the study of crises in an age of extremes - an age upon which Carl Schmitt left his indelible watermark. In Political Theology II, first published in 1970, a long journey comes to an end which began in 1923 with Political Theology. This translation makes available for the first time to the English-speaking world Schmitt's understanding of Political Theology and what it implies theologically and politically.
Political Theology II: The Myth of the Closure of any Political Theology
by Carl SchmittPolitical Theology II is Carl Schmitt's last book. Part polemic, part self-vindication for his involvement in the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP), this is Schmitt's most theological reflection on Christianity and its concept of sovereignty following the Second Vatican Council. At a time of increasing visibility of religion in public debates and a realization that Schmitt is the major and most controversial political theorist of the twentieth century, this last book sets a new agenda for political theology today. The crisis at the beginning of the twenty-first century led to an increased interest in the study of crises in an age of extremes - an age upon which Carl Schmitt left his indelible watermark. In Political Theology II, first published in 1970, a long journey comes to an end which began in 1923 with Political Theology. This translation makes available for the first time to the English-speaking world Schmitt's understanding of Political Theology and what it implies theologically and politically.
The Political Theology of European Integration: Comparing the Influence of Religious Histories on European Policies
by Mark R. RoyceThis book traces the connections between diverging postwar European integration policies and intra-Christian divisions to argue that supranational integration originates from Roman Catholic internationalism, and that resistance to integration, conversely, is based in Protestantism. Royce supports this thesis through a rigorously supported historical narrative, arguing that sixteenth-century theological conflicts generated seventeenth-century constitutional solutions, which ultimately effected the political choices both for and against integration during the twentieth century. Beginning with a survey of all ecclesiastical laws of seventeen West European countries and concluding with a full discussion of the Brexit vote and emerging alternatives to the EU, this examination of the political theology surrounding the European Union will appeal to all scholars of EU politics, modern theology, religious sociology, and contemporary European history.
The Political Theology of European Integration: Comparing the Influence of Religious Histories on European Policies
by Mark R. RoyceThis book traces the connections between diverging postwar European integration policies and intra-Christian divisions to argue that supranational integration originates from Roman Catholic internationalism, and that resistance to integration, conversely, is based in Protestantism. Royce supports this thesis through a rigorously supported historical narrative, arguing that sixteenth-century theological conflicts generated seventeenth-century constitutional solutions, which ultimately effected the political choices both for and against integration during the twentieth century. Beginning with a survey of all ecclesiastical laws of seventeen West European countries and concluding with a full discussion of the Brexit vote and emerging alternatives to the EU, this examination of the political theology surrounding the European Union will appeal to all scholars of EU politics, modern theology, religious sociology, and contemporary European history.
Political Theology of International Order
by William BainIs contemporary international order truly a secular arrangement? Theorists of international relations typically adhere to a narrative that portrays the modern states system as the product of a gradual process of secularization that transcended the religiosity of medieval Christendom. William Bain challenges this narrative by arguing that modern theories of international order reflect ideas that originate in medieval theology. They are, in other words, worldly applications of a theological pattern. This ground-breaking book makes two key contributions to scholarship on international order. First, it provides a thorough intellectual history of medieval and early modern traditions of thought and the way in which they shape modern thinking about international order. It explores the ideas of Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, William of Ockham, Martin Luther, and other theologians to rise above the sharp differentiation of medieval and modern that underpins most international thought. Uncovering this theological inheritance invites a fundamental reassessment of canonical figures, such as Hugo Grotius and Thomas Hobbes, and their contribution to theorizing international order. Second, this book shows how theological ideas continue to shape modern theories of international order by structuring the questions theorists ask as well as the answer they provide. It argues that the dominant vocabulary of international order, system and society, anarchy, balance of power, and constitutionalism, is mediated by the intellectual commitments of nominalist theology. It concludes by exploring the implications of thinking in terms of this theological inheritance, albeit in a world where God is only one of several possibilities that can called upon to secure the regularity of order.
Political Theology of International Order
by William BainIs contemporary international order truly a secular arrangement? Theorists of international relations typically adhere to a narrative that portrays the modern states system as the product of a gradual process of secularization that transcended the religiosity of medieval Christendom. William Bain challenges this narrative by arguing that modern theories of international order reflect ideas that originate in medieval theology. They are, in other words, worldly applications of a theological pattern. This ground-breaking book makes two key contributions to scholarship on international order. First, it provides a thorough intellectual history of medieval and early modern traditions of thought and the way in which they shape modern thinking about international order. It explores the ideas of Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, William of Ockham, Martin Luther, and other theologians to rise above the sharp differentiation of medieval and modern that underpins most international thought. Uncovering this theological inheritance invites a fundamental reassessment of canonical figures, such as Hugo Grotius and Thomas Hobbes, and their contribution to theorizing international order. Second, this book shows how theological ideas continue to shape modern theories of international order by structuring the questions theorists ask as well as the answer they provide. It argues that the dominant vocabulary of international order, system and society, anarchy, balance of power, and constitutionalism, is mediated by the intellectual commitments of nominalist theology. It concludes by exploring the implications of thinking in terms of this theological inheritance, albeit in a world where God is only one of several possibilities that can called upon to secure the regularity of order.
The Political Theology of Schelling (New Perspectives in Ontology)
by Saitya Brata DasSaitya Brata Das rigorously examines Schelling's theologico-political works and sets his thought against his more dominant contemporary, Hegel. Das argues that Schelling inaugurates a new thinking outside of Occidental metaphysics, by a paradoxical manner of exit, which prepares for the post-metaphysical philosophy of Martin Heidegger, Franz Rosenzweig and Jacques Derrida. This new reflection, outside of the Universal world-historical politics of modernity, is achieved by re-thinking religion as eschatology. Intervening in contemporary debates on post-secularism and the return to religion, Das shows that religion, in an essential sense, always opens up infinitude from the heart of finitude, to an irreducible outside of the profane order of worldly hegemonies. Religion here assumes a negative political theology of exception without sovereign power.
The Political Theology of Schelling (New Perspectives in Ontology)
by Saitya Brata DasSaitya Brata Das rigorously examines Schelling's theologico-political works and sets his thought against his more dominant contemporary, Hegel. Das argues that Schelling inaugurates a new thinking outside of Occidental metaphysics, by a paradoxical manner of exit, which prepares for the post-metaphysical philosophy of Martin Heidegger, Franz Rosenzweig and Jacques Derrida. This new reflection, outside of the Universal world-historical politics of modernity, is achieved by re-thinking religion as eschatology. Intervening in contemporary debates on post-secularism and the return to religion, Das shows that religion, in an essential sense, always opens up infinitude from the heart of finitude, to an irreducible outside of the profane order of worldly hegemonies. Religion here assumes a negative political theology of exception without sovereign power.
Political Theology Today: 100 Years after Carl Schmitt
by Mitchell Dean, Lotte List and Stefan SchwarzkopfAlmost 100 years have passed since Carl Schmitt gave his controversial definition of the sovereign as the one who decides on the exception in his by now classic Political Theology (1922). Written at a time of crisis, the book sought to establish the institution of sovereignty, not from within a well-functioning governing machine of the state in a situation of normality, but rather as the minimal condition of state order in the moment of governmental breakdown. The book appeared anachronistic already at its publication. Schmitt went against Max Weber's popular thesis defining secularization as a disenchantment of the world characterizing modern societies, and instead suggested that the concepts of modern politics mirrored a metaphysics originating in Christianity and the church. Nevertheless, the concept of political theology has in recent years seen a revival as a field of research in philosophy as well as political theory, as studies in the theological sub-currents of politics, economics and sociality proliferate.
Political Theology Today: 100 Years after Carl Schmitt
Almost 100 years have passed since Carl Schmitt gave his controversial definition of the sovereign as the one who decides on the exception in his by now classic Political Theology (1922). Written at a time of crisis, the book sought to establish the institution of sovereignty, not from within a well-functioning governing machine of the state in a situation of normality, but rather as the minimal condition of state order in the moment of governmental breakdown. The book appeared anachronistic already at its publication. Schmitt went against Max Weber's popular thesis defining secularization as a disenchantment of the world characterizing modern societies, and instead suggested that the concepts of modern politics mirrored a metaphysics originating in Christianity and the church. Nevertheless, the concept of political theology has in recent years seen a revival as a field of research in philosophy as well as political theory, as studies in the theological sub-currents of politics, economics and sociality proliferate.
Political Theories of Decolonization: Postcolonialism and the Problem of Foundations
by Margaret Kohn Keally McBridePolitical Theories of Decolonization provides an introduction to some of the seminal texts of postcolonial political theory. The difficulty of founding a new regime is an important theme in political theory, and the intellectual history of decolonization provides a rich--albeit overlooked--opportunity to explore it. Many theorists have pointed out that the colonized subject was a divided subject. This book argues that the postcolonial state was a divided state. While postcolonial states were created through the struggle for independence, they drew on both colonial institutions and reinvented pre-colonial traditions. Political Theories of Decolonization illuminates how many of the central themes of political theory such as land, religion, freedom, law, and sovereignty are imaginatively explored by postcolonial thinkers. In doing so, it provides readers access to texts that add to our understanding of contemporary political life and global political dynamics.