scholarly journals A Farewell to Homo Sacer? Sovereign Power and Bare Life in Agamben’s Coronavirus Commentary

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sergei Prozorov
Keyword(s):  
Global Governance ◽  
Normal State ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
State Of Exception ◽  
Sovereign Power ◽  
Bare Life ◽  
Sovereign State ◽  
Homo Sacer ◽  
Critical Commentary ◽  
Forms Of Life

AbstractThe article addresses Giorgio Agamben’s critical commentary on the global governance of the Covid-19 pandemic as a paradigm of his political thought. While Agamben’s comments have been criticized as exaggerated and conspiratorial, they arise from the conceptual constellation that he has developed starting from the first volume of his Homo Sacer series. At the centre of this constellation is the relation between the concepts of sovereign power and bare life, whose articulation in the figure of homo sacer Agamben traces from the Antiquity to the present. We shall demonstrate that any such articulation is impossible due to the belonging of these concepts to different planes, respectively empirical and transcendental, which Agamben brings together in a problematic fashion. His account of the sovereign state of exception collapses a plurality of empirical states of exception into a zone of indistinction between different exceptional states and the normal state and then elevates this very indistinction to the transcendental condition of intelligibility of politics as such. Conversely, the notion of bare life, originally posited as the transcendental condition of possibility of positive forms of life, is recast as an empirical figure, whose sole form is the absence of form. We conclude that this problematic articulation should be abandoned for a theory that rather highlights the non-relation between sovereign power and bare life, which conditions the possibility of resistance and transformation that remains obscure in Agamben’s thought.

scholarly journals Homo Sacer sebagai Figur Politis dan Kaitannya dengan Dunia Pendidikan Tinggi

Humaniora ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 335
Author(s):  
Ferdinand Indrajaya
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
The Political ◽  
General View ◽  
Sovereign Power ◽  
Bare Life ◽  
Giorgio Agamben ◽  
Higher Education System ◽  
Homo Sacer ◽  
The Third

Article is an outcome from writer’s reflection from his reading on Homo Sacer, Sovereign Power and Bare Life, a book by Giorgio Agamben, an Italian 20th century philosopher. The reading concerns with the three chapters which are Homo Sacer, The Ambivalence of The Sacred, and The Sacred Life, and also the preface of chapters. Generally, this article proposes two main things. First, Agamben’s description on Western modern political practice, developed from the Greek until today. Second, writer’s reflection on educational system in Indonesia, especially the higher education level in nowadays, through Agamben’s perspective. Structurally, article is divided into three parts. First, the Preface, is a general view to Agamben’s political thought which will stand as a background to the second part from this article, Homo Sacer. On the third part, Education as Bare Life, is writer’s reflection on higher education system in Indonesia borrowing the political perspectives from Agamben.    

scholarly journals Estado de exceção como regra: a vida nua sob o “eclipse político” em Giorgio Agamben / State of exception as a rule: the bare life under the "political eclipse" in Giorgio Agamben

Profanações ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 269
Author(s):  
Maria Do Socorro Catarina de Sousa Oliveira
Keyword(s):  
Social Order ◽  
The State ◽  
State Of Exception ◽  
Sovereign Power ◽  
Bare Life ◽  
Giorgio Agamben ◽  
Homo Sacer ◽  
The Social ◽  
Legal Security ◽  
Original Objective

Um dos temas de maior relevância abordado por Giorgio Agamben diz respeito ao estado de exceção como paradigma político, ou seja, o estado de exceção não se restringe aos Estados totalitários, mas a uma prática governamental que vem se propagando rapidamente, inclusive nas sociedades democráticas. Assim, o presente artigo tem como objetivo analisar, a partir de duas obras que compõem o Projeto Homo Sacer, a saber, Homo Sacer: o poder soberano e a vida nua I (2002), e Estado de Exceção: homo sacer II (2004), os principais elementos que formatam a teoria agambeniana do estado de exceção como paradigma de governo e como o delineamento de suas teses nos permite falar em “eclipse político”, o qual está concretizado na impotência do cidadão diante do poder soberano, a figura híbrida que tem a sua disposição não apenas a máquina governamental, mas o próprio ordenamento jurídico desvirtuado de seu objetivo original de proteção e segurança jurídica para um complexo e malicioso mecanismo de manutenção da “ordem social”. AbstractOne of the most relevant topics addressed by Giorgio Agamben is the state of exception as a political paradigm, that is, the state of exception is not restricted to totalitarian states, but to a government practice that is spreading rapidly, even in democratic societies. Thus, this article aims to analyze, from two works that make up the Homo Sacer Project, namely Homo Sacer: sovereign power and naked life I (2002), and State of Exception: homo sacer II (2004) ), the main elements that form the agambenian theory of the state of exception as a paradigm of government and how the delineation of its theses allows us to speak in "political eclipse", which is concretized in the impotence of the citizen before the sovereign power, the hybrid figure which has at its disposal not only the governmental machine, but the legal system itself distorted from its original objective of protection and legal security for a complex and malicious mechanism of maintenance of the "social order".

scholarly journals Borgerkrig fra Athen til Auschwitz:

2015 ◽  
pp. 37-54
Author(s):  
Mikkel Flohr
Keyword(s):  
Civil War ◽  
Ancient Greece ◽  
Vantage Point ◽  
The State ◽  
State Of Exception ◽  
Sovereign Power ◽  
Western History ◽  
Sovereign State ◽  
Homo Sacer ◽  
Starting Point

The starting point of this article is the concept of civil war in Giorgio Agamben’s Homo Sacer-series. In spite of its relative obscurity, Agamben insists that civil war is the fundamental political structure, which has characterized all of Western history since Ancient Greece. As such it constitutes a privileged vantage point from whence it is possible to discern the limitations of his political thought. These limitations originate in his deployment of Carl Schmitt’s state of exception, which serves to include civil war in the sovereign order – this entails that classical modes of political contestation and conflict e.g. revolution, are always already internal to the sovereign state, and can therefore only serve to reaffirm it. The state of exception thus produces an inherent incapacity to think or move beyond the sovereign state. Agamben subsequently attempts to challenge the state of exception albeit with varying degrees of success. This suggest the necessity of taking exception to the exception and explode the conceptual coupling of civil war and sovereign power, in order to create a space where it is possible to think political contestation within or beyond the works of Agamben.

scholarly journals NALAR POLITIK KEDAULATAN NEGARA-BANGSA DALAM NOVEL LAYALY TURKISTAN KARYA NAJIB AL-KAILANI THE POLITICAL REASON OF THE SOVEREIGNTY OF THE NATION STATE IN THE NOVEL "LAYELY TURKISTAN" BY NAJIB AL-KAILANI

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Agus Sunarto
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
State Of Exception ◽  
Material Object ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Sovereign Power ◽  
Bare Life ◽  
Giorgio Agamben ◽  
Cultural Aspects ◽  
Homo Sacer ◽  
Textual Data

Abstrak Penelitian ini mencoba untuk memahami politik kolonial yang dilakukan terhadap bangsa Turkistan dalam novel Nights in Turkistan karya Najib Al-Kailani melalui perspektif filsafat politik Giorgio Agamben. Lokus utama penelitian ini dengan perspektif tersebut mencoba menyibak proses normalisasi paradigma politik kolonial yang terdiri dari kekuasaan berdaulat, state of exception, bare life (ketelanjangan hidup), dan homo sacer. Penelitian ini menggunakan metode kualitatif deskriptif. Metode ini digunakan karena sumber data dalam penelitian ini berupa data tekstual yang terdiri dari kata, kalimat, paragraf dari objek material penelitian. Praktik kolonial yang dijalankan oleh pihak Cina dan Rusia menjadikan bangsa Turkistan mengalami degradasi eksistensinya baik dari aspek sosial, politik, maupun budaya. Karena itu penelitian ini akan menyibak lebih dalam proses kolonial yang dilakukan oleh Cina dan Rusia dari kritik filsafat politik Giorgio Agamben. Hasil penelitian ini menunjukkan bahwa pertama, praktik kolonialisme membawai konsekuensi kekuasaan berdaulat yang mencari legalitas hukum sekaligus penangguhan hukum terhadap aksi koloni; kedua, bangsa Turkistan yang tereduksi dan terdegradasi eksistensinya rentan terhadap tindakan koersif kolonial sehingga mereka tidak memiliki aksesibilas yang sempurna. Kata kunci: State Of Exception, Homo Sacer dan Layaly Turkistan Abstract This paper examines to understand the colonial politics that was carried out against the Turkistan people in Najib Al-Kailani's novel Nights in Turkistan through the framework of Giorgio Agamben's political philosophy. The main focus of this research with this perspective is trying to uncover the process of normalizing the colonial political paradigm, which consists of sovereign power, state of exception, bare life, and homo sacer. This research uses the descriptive qualitative method. This method is used because the data of this research is textual data consisting of words, sentences, paragraphs by the material object. The colonial practices carried out by the Chinese and Russians made the Turkistan nation experience a degradation of its existence from both social, political, and cultural aspects. Thus, this research will reveal more deeply the colonial process carried out by China and Russia than Giorgio Agamben's critique of political philosophy. The results of this study indicate that first, the practice of colonialism carries the consequences of sovereign power seeking legality as well as legal suspension of colony actions; second, the Turkistan peoples who were reduced and degraded in existence were vulnerable to colonial coercive action so that they did not have perfect accessibility. Keyword: State Of Exception, Homo Sacer dan Layaly Turkistan

Simone Weil

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Beatrice Marovich
Keyword(s):  
Political Thought ◽  
The Political ◽  
Sovereign Power ◽  
Bare Life ◽  
Intellectual Curiosity ◽  
Creation Theology ◽  
Simone Weil

Few of Giorgio Agamben’s works are as mysterious as his unpublished dissertation, reportedly on the political thought of the French philosopher Simone Weil. If Weil was an early subject of Agamben’s intellectual curiosity, it would appear – judging from his published works – that her influence upon him has been neither central nor lasting.1 Leland de la Durantaye argues that Weil’s work has left a mark on Agamben’s philosophy of potentiality, largely in his discussion of the concept of decreation; but de la Durantaye does not make much of Weil’s influence here, determining that her theory of decreation is ‘essentially dialectical’ and still too bound up with creation theology. 2 Alessia Ricciardi, however, argues that de la Durantaye’s dismissal of Weil’s influence is hasty.3 Ricciardi analyses deeper resonances between Weil’s and Agamben’s philosophies, ultimately claiming that Agamben ‘seems to extend many of the implications and claims of Weil’s idea of force’,4 arguably spreading Weil’s influence into Agamben’s reflections on sovereign power and bare life.

Homo Sacer: Sovereign Power and Bare Life (review)

SubStance ◽  
2000 ◽  
Vol 29 (3) ◽  
pp. 124-131 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kalliopi Nikolopoulou
Keyword(s):  
Life Review ◽  
Sovereign Power ◽  
Bare Life ◽  
Homo Sacer

scholarly journals Exceção e vida nua: diálogos entre a literatura de Nassar e a de Sófocles / Exception and life nua: dialogues between the literature of Nassar and of Sophocles

Profanações ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 122
Author(s):  
Elijames Moraes dos Santos
Keyword(s):  
The State ◽  
State Of Exception ◽  
Bare Life ◽  
Giorgio Agamben ◽  
Homo Sacer ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
The Relationship

Este artigo propõe analisar como as categorias do estado de exceção e da vida nua são dramatizados nos textos Antígona, de Sófocles, e Lavoura Arcaica, de Raduan Nassar. Para alcançar o objetivo estabelecido, consideramos os estudos sobre esses conceitos propostos no projeto Homo Sacer, de Giorgio Agamben (2007; 2014), entre outras fontes que respaldam este estudo. Seguindo a proposta agambeniana, enfatizamos a relação de soberania com o estado de exceção, culminando, muitas vezes na eliminação do vivente. Aspecto este que fica evidente no desenrolar das ações presentes em ambas as narrativas em análise.AbstractThis article proposes to analyze how the categories of the state of exception and bare life are dramatized in the texts Antigone, by Sophocles, and Ancient tillage¸ by Raduan Nassar. To reach the established objective, we consider the studies on these concepts proposed in the project Homo Sacer, by Giorgio Agamben (2007, 2014), among other sources that support this study. Following the Agambenian proposal, we emphasize the relationship of sovereignty with the state of exception, culminating, often in the elimination of the living. This aspect is evident in the unfolding of the actions present in both narratives under analysis.

The generalised bio-political border? Re-conceptualising the limits of sovereign power

2009 ◽  
Vol 35 (4) ◽  
pp. 729-749 ◽  
Author(s):  
NICK VAUGHAN-WILLIAMS
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
The Other ◽  
Political Life ◽  
Sovereign Power ◽  
Bare Life ◽  
Giorgio Agamben ◽  
Relative Simplicity ◽  
Political Border ◽  
The One

AbstractThis article is a response to calls from a number of theorists in International Relations and related disciplines for the need to develop alternative ways of thinking ‘the border’ in contemporary political life. These calls stem from an apparent tension between the increasing complexity of the nature and location of bordering practices on the one hand and yet the relative simplicity with which borders often continue to be treated on the other. One of the intellectual challenges, however, is that many of the resources in political thought to which we might turn for new border vocabularies already rely on unproblematised conceptions of what and where borders are. It is argued that some promise can be found in the work of Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben, whose diagnosis of the operation of sovereign power in terms of the production of bare life offers significant, yet largely untapped, implications for analysing borders and the politics of space across a global bio-political terrain.

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