In his article, I reconsider the normative dimensions of Michel Foucault's genealogical method, especially as they pertain to analyzing the nature of political institutions. He puts forward a normative reading of Foucauldian genealogical critique, and through its lens views political institutions as historically contingent phenomena. This helps us to see how political institutions are transformable.

Postfoundational political theory has been criticized for being incapable of establishing a normative basis for politics. This is because postfoundationalism's conception of the “political” as a radical contingency disproves the existence of an objective ground that would make it possible to evaluate political movements from a neutral position. In this article, I counter this critique by distinguishing between Chantal Mouffe's political theory and other postfoundational theories based on their respective normative implications. This is done by explicating how Mouffe's way of (...) conceptualizing the political implies a conservative political disposition. In order to accomplish this, I develop an understanding of the conservative political disposition, which refers to the normative idea that police power is necessary for producing and upholding a social order. Through an analysis of Carl Schmitt's theory, I elaborate that the conservative disposition is an attempt to justify the depoliticization of social relations. On the basis of this idea that some political theories have normative implications that are in line with the conservative disposition, I examine postfoundationalism. My argument is that while Mouffe's theory does imply the idea that police power is necessary, this is not the case with other postfoundational theories. On the contrary, other postfoundational democratic theories categorically deny that a form of power, namely police power, would be necessary. (shrink)

The COVID-19 pandemic has made relevant questions regarding the limits and the justifications of sovereign power as nation states utilize high degrees of power over populations in their strategies of countering the virus. In our article, we analyze a particularly important facet of the strategy of sovereignty in managing the affects caused by a pandemic, which we term the ontology of war. We analyze the way in which war plays a significant role in the political ontology of our societies, through (...) its aiming to produce a unified political subject and an external enemy. Taking our theoretical cue from Butler’s thinking on frames of recognizability we extend her theory through augmenting it with affect theory to argue for how the frame of recognizability produced by the ontology of war fails to guide our understanding of the pandemic as a political problem, a failure that we analyze through looking at the affective register. We argue that the main affect that the nation state tries to manage, in relation to the pandemic, through the ontology of war is anxiety. We show that the nation state tries to alleviate anxiety by framing it through the ontology war, this leads to the appearance of a potentially racist and nationalist affective climate where the “enemy” is no longer felt to be the virus, but members of other nations as well as minorities. We argue that the pandemic reveals both the political ontology of war central to the foundation of our political communities, and how this ontology is used by the nation state to manage feelings of anxiety and insecurity. Ultimately, as we will discuss at the end of this article, this leads to failure. (shrink)

In this article, we analyze the political ontology of the nation state in the context of the pandemic and cosider how the virus has been made a part of it. Our argument is that the discourse regarding a war on the virus embodies an attempt to control the chronic insecurity and anxiety caused by the pandemic. Combining the work of Coernelius Castoriadis and the affect theoretical approach of Andreja Zevnik and Brian Massumi, we build a framework through which we make (...) intelligible the foundational role played by historically constituted shared networks of meaning and the political ontology it creates, as well as the affects leaning on it in our reactions towards the pandemic. By analyzing Carl Schmitt's understanding of politics, we locate the political ontology framing the pandemic as an ontology of war. Through this, we make visible how the management of insecurity through the distinction between friend and enemy becomes an affective channel for the insecurity caused by the pandemic. (shrink)

This thesis focuses on Carl Schmitt’s political theory of the strong state and the way his own concept of the political justifies strong coercive methods to de-politicise the economy. According to Schmitt, the strong state should have the legitimate capacity to counter democratisation of the economy and limit the possibility of social movements from “confounding” (Verwirrung) or “confusing” (Vermischung) the state and economy. Unlike many, who argue that Schmitt was in this extent (an economic) liberal, as he sought to uphold (...) a distinction between politics and economy, I argue that behind Schmitt’s institutional distinction between state and economy lies an explicitly anti-liberal conceptual distinction between the political and social. It is the task of this conceptual distinction to justify strong coercive means to counter socialist demands for economic justice. The distinction is anti-socialist or anti-democratic as it tries limit the “uncontrollable” expansion of the state into the economy by establishing the autonomy of the political from the economy. This enables him to accuse democratic forces of illegitimately “politicising” the economy in a way that contradicts this necessary autonomy. On the other hand, the distinction is anti-liberal as it does not argue for the autonomy of the economy, but its relative dependence on the strong state to uphold social order necessary for capitalist system of production. I have decided to use the term “authoritarian distinction” to define Schmitt’s conceptual distinction and its normative implications. The authoritarian distinction between the political and social is not simply a conceptual distinction but it establishes a normative basis for re-organising the relationship between the state and economy. In order to flesh out the specific nature of Schmitt’s authoritarian distinction, I have connected his thought with other theories of sovereignty and how they support the state’s authoritarian relationship with the economy. The thesis has three objectives. First, I want to develop a form of analysis of Schmitt’s work that connects his theoretical work with political struggle. To engage in political theory and conceptual work means to take part in politics. The concept of the political is no different, and it cannot be detached from political and normative entailments as it seeks to transform the way we perceive politics. In contrast to those who argue that Schmitt’s work on the concept of the political can be abstracted from his own political objectives, I analyse his conceptual work in tandem with his texts that explicitly engage in the politics of his time. On the basis of this analysis, I show that Schmitt’s abstract work takes part in the class struggle that was prevalent in the Weimar Republic. The conceptual distinction between the political and social is at the heart of his attempt to authorise exceptional measures to counter the labour movement of his time. Second, it is far too often that all distinction of the state and economy are reduced to analyses of liberalism. This has meant that Schmitt, too, has been claimed to adhere to a version of liberalism simply because his theory justifies limiting the politicisation of the economy. To me it seems that the focus on the liberal side of de-politicisation has produced a very one-sided narrative. In order to argue this, I discuss to an extent other theorists of sovereignty, namely Hobbes and Rousseau, and point out that even they sought to establish a distinction between the state and economy in a way that contradicts liberalism but still leaves capitalist means of production intact. To reduce Hobbes or Schmitt to a role of a precursor to liberalism means to look aside the specific nature of their theory – and, for that matter, the specificity of liberalism. Furthermore, I discuss to an extent how both liberals and these various theories of sovereignty are similar in so far as they accept the modern development of the economy as its separate sphere from politics. Third, I want to criticise the recent attempts to appropriate Schmitt’s concept of the political on the left. Many have argued that Schmitt’s concept of the political as autonomous to the social is useful in overcoming traditional Marxism and use for radicalising democracy. However, my thesis suggests that this strategy needs to be problematised, as Schmitt’s conceptual distinction cannot be separated from his anti-democratic and -socialist economic policies. In the future, I hope to further explore this need to re-think the relationship between the political and social, and whether or not we should return to a more standard Marxist understanding of this relationship. (shrink)