The appropriation of abandonment: Giorgio Agamben on the state of nature and the political

2009 ◽  
Vol 42 (3) ◽  
pp. 327-353 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sergei Prozorov
Keyword(s):  
The State ◽  
The Political ◽  
Giorgio Agamben ◽  
State Of Nature

scholarly journals The Nature of the State of Nature: Hobbes, Sovereignty and Biopolitics

Politik ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin Ask Popp-Madsen
Keyword(s):  
Political Thought ◽  
The State ◽  
The Political ◽  
Human Being ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Giorgio Agamben ◽  
Disciplinary Power ◽  
Political Subject ◽  
State Of Nature ◽  
Conception Of Man

The large amount of theoretical debates over the notion of biopolitics originally emerges from Michel Fou- cault’s discussions of sovereignty, disciplinary power and biopolitics. Here, biopolitics is conceptualised as a qualitatively di erent and modern regime of power developed in contrast to the model of sovereignty. e ultimate theorist of sovereignty in the canon of Western political thought is omas Hobbes, and in Leviathan two important transitions for the sovereign model takes place: the human being transcends his animal-like condition and becomes a subject, a transition from the image of homo homini lupus to the image of the political subject, and the relation between human beings changes from the of war of all against all to the politics of the state, thus the possibility of politics emerges. Interestingly, as the concept of biopolitics is developed against the backdrop of this theory of sovereignty, both Michel Foucault and Giorgio Agamben delivers detailed interpretations of Hobbes’ state of nature. By analysing these interpretations, the article tries to understand the emergence of a distinctively biopolitical conception of man and the political in contrast to the conceptions in the paradigm of sovereignty. 

scholarly journals Kongen hersker, men regerer ikke - Guvernementalitet, statificering og statspraksis hos Michel Foucault

2018 ◽  
pp. 89-108
Author(s):  
Nicolai Von Eggers ◽  
Mathias Hein Jessen
Keyword(s):  
Michel Foucault ◽  
The State ◽  
The Political ◽  
Modern State ◽  
Giorgio Agamben ◽  
The West ◽  
Historical Investigation ◽  
History Of ◽  
Way Of Thinking

Michel Foucault developed his now (in)famous neologism governmentality in the first of the two lectures he devoted to ’a history of governmentality, Security, Territory, Population (1977-78) and The Birth of Biopolitics (1978-79). Foucault developed this notion in order to do a historical investigation of ‘the state’ or ‘the political’ which did not assume the entity of the state but treated it as a way of governing, a way of thinking about governing. Recently, the Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben has taken up Foucault’s notion of governmentality in his writing of a history of power in the West, most notably in The Kingdom and the Glory. It is with inspiration from Agamben’s recent use of Foucault that Foucault’s approach to writing the history of the state (as a history of governmental practices and the reflection hereof) is revisited. Foucault (and Agamben) thus offer another way of writing the history of the state and of the political, which focuses on different texts and on reading more familiar texts in a new light, thereby offering a new and notably different view on the emergence of the modern state and politics.

Protodemocracy and the Fall of Sovereignty (Hobbes, Aristotle)

2021 ◽  
pp. 203-249
Author(s):  
Geoffrey Bennington
Keyword(s):  
The State ◽  
Language Theory ◽  
The Political ◽  
Close Reading ◽  
State Of Nature ◽  
Rhetorical Dimension ◽  
Models Of Reading

A close reading of Hobbes stresses the latter’s recognition of a democratic or proto-democratic moment at the root of the political, at the aporetic moment of transition from the state of nature to the political state. This rather effaced priority of democracy sits uneasily with Hobbes’s deep suspicion of it, and its constant association in his work with rhetoric and oratory. A reading of Hobbes’s language theory in light of Aristotle’s distinction between phonè and logos shows how this rhetorical dimension of language is in fact irreducible (and indeed exuberantly exploited in Hobbes’s own writing), and how, especially in Hobbes’s elaborate and fascinating discussion of counsel, it relates to the structural failing both of the sovereignty Hobbes is concerned to defend and of the models of reading he promotes in the Leviathan.

The developmental history of solitary and supermax confinement: toward a phenomenology of the state of exception

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Polizzi
Keyword(s):  
Supreme Court ◽  
The State ◽  
Political Order ◽  
State Of Exception ◽  
The Political ◽  
Developmental History ◽  
Giorgio Agamben ◽  
Attitudes And Behaviors ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
History Of

The phenomenology of solitary and supermax confinement reflects what Giorgio Agamben has defined as the state of exception. The state of exception is defined as the blurring of the legal and political order, which constructs a zone of indifference for those forced to endure this situation. This notion of the state of exception can be applied to the zone of indifference created by the Supreme Court, which seems unwilling to outlaw this harmful practice relative to 8th Amendment protections prohibiting cruel and unusual punishment and the political order which is all too inclined to continue use strategy. One of the central aspects of this “ecology of harm”, is the way in which the very structures of this type of confinement, helps to invite and legitimize abusive attitudes and behaviors in penitentiary staff.

“A Trespass against the Whole Species”: Universal Crime and Sovereign Founding in John Locke’s Second Treatise of Government

2018 ◽  
Vol 46 (4) ◽  
pp. 560-585
Author(s):  
Sinja Graf
Keyword(s):  
Natural Law ◽  
Private Property ◽  
Normative Theory ◽  
The State ◽  
The Self ◽  
The Political ◽  
State Of Nature ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Creation

This essay theorizes how the enforcement of universal norms contributes to the solidification of sovereign rule. It does so by analyzing John Locke’s argument for the founding of the commonwealth as it emerges from his notion of universal crime in the Second Treatise of Government. Previous studies of punishment in the state of nature have not accounted for Locke’s notion of universal crime which pivots on the role of mankind as the subject of natural law. I argue that the dilemmas specific to enforcing the natural law against “trespasses against the whole species” drive the founding of sovereign government. Reconstructing Locke’s argument on private property in light of universal criminality, the essay shows how the introduction of money in the state of nature destabilizes the normative relationship between the self and humanity. Accordingly, the failures of enforcing the natural law require the partitioning of mankind into separate peoples under distinct sovereign governments. This analysis theorizes the creation of sovereign rule as part of the political productivity of Locke’s notion of universal crime and reflects on an explicitly political, rather than normative, theory of “humanity.”

scholarly journals Death Stranding, Hobbes and the Problem of Social Order: Where (and How) Should we Haul the Sovereign?

2020 ◽  
Vol 32 (3) ◽  
pp. 142-164
Author(s):  
S.V. Kozlov ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Video Game ◽  
Social Order ◽  
Physical Capacity ◽  
The State ◽  
The Political ◽  
State Expansion ◽  
State Of Nature

In this article I describe the implicit conceptualization of social order which exists in Death Stranding — localized in both the setting and the mechanics of the game — and compare it with the conceptualization of Thomas Hobbes’s “Leviathan”. First, the theoretical tension between Death Stranding and “Leviathan” is traced: the speculative conceptualization of the Leviathan and the procedural conceptualization of Death Stranding are compared by clarifying the role that the concepts of action, authorization, right and sovereignty play in Hobbesian theory and the video game. Sec­ondly, the theoretical tension between the political and natural capacities of the Sovereign according to Hobbes is explicated; with the help of mate­rial from Death Stranding, a variant of its resolution is proposed, suggest­ing the conceptualization of the Sovereign-without-a-body: an instance devoid of physical capacity and materiality, yet still capable of maintaining social order as a product of its activity. Subsequently, attention is paid to the mechanics of state expansion in Death Stranding: I describe and analyze how the Sovereign-without-a-body’s messenger — the protagonist of the video game — interacts with people outside the Sovereign’s zone of influ­ence, convincing them to consent to return to the commonwealth. This theoretical move makes it possible to supplement Hobbes’s binary scheme of the state of nature and commonwealth with a third concept — the state of memory, in which the memory of the Sovereign turns out to be a deci­sive factor influencing whether the commonwealth will be restored to its former boundaries. By explicating the Hobbesian theory of imagination, I demonstrate that — in the state of memory — the Sovereign is contingent, not fully defined, and virtual.

The Politics of Global Constitutionalism

ICL Journal ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ekaterina Yahyaoui Krivenko
Keyword(s):  
The State ◽  
Political Community ◽  
Carl Schmitt ◽  
The Political ◽  
Giorgio Agamben ◽  
Political Dimension ◽  
Current State ◽  
Global Constitutionalism ◽  
Open Discussion ◽  
State Form

AbstractThe article argues that no understanding of global constitutionalism will be complete without a thorough discussion of its political dimension. The current state of scholarship on global constitutionalism is dominated by discussions of legal elements. However, any theory of global constitutionalism has an underlying vision of the political. Without discussing this underlying vision of the political global constitutionalism will remain incomplete. In particular the article demonstrates that the contemporary debates on global constitutionalism are plagued by a contradiction between its aims and its underlying vision of the political. Thus, global constitutionalism postulates individuals as central units of its concern. However, by maintaining states as central actors although in a changed form and with fewer powers global constitutionalism unwittingly subscribes to a vision of the political anchored in the state form and based on the exclusion/inclusion dynamic. This vision of the political is most clearly articulated by Carl Schmitt. The discussion of his view of the political demonstrates that the political based on the state form makes the project of global constitutionalism impossible. The only way forward is an open discussion of different visions of the political and a search for a more adequate vision of the political able to further the aims of global constitutionalism and its focus on individuals. The article discusses one of these alternative visions of the political, namely the concept of the coming politics and coming community as articulated by Giorgio Agamben. It demonstrates how with this vision of the political the project of global constitutionalism can conceive of a political community fully dedicated to the singularities of each individual human being without creating divisions. The article concludes that in order for global constitutionalism to continue as a viable project, an open and explicit discussion of the political is called for.

The Fool's Heart and Hobbes' Head

Dialogue ◽  
1981 ◽  
Vol 20 (4) ◽  
pp. 674-689
Author(s):  
Thomas Scally
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
Laws Of Nature ◽  
The State ◽  
Central Problem ◽  
The Political ◽  
State Of Nature ◽  
Self Interest

Chapter fifteen of Leviathan is concerned with what Hobbes calls “the laws of nature”; however, it is evident from the start that justice is the central problem of the chapter. Hobbes demonstrates a rather subtle sensitivity to a possible misunderstanding of his views on the state of nature and the function of natural reason by inventing the character of the fool who purports to use Hobbes' own principle of self-interest to deny the existence of justice. The fool may finally be a “straw man” who proposes precisely that argument which Hobbes can quickly refute, but even if this is so, the straw man has Hobbes' face, or one like it, because the line between the views of the fool and those of Hobbes himself is very fine indeed. This section of Leviathan is more significant than it would seem at first glance because it provides an avenue by means of which one can distinguish the political philosophy of Hobbes from that of classical “individualists” such as Callicles and Thrasymachus. It is all too easy to read Hobbes as an elaborate restatement of the sophistic position of Socrates' famous opponents; the example of the fool belies this facile identity and to a certain extent constitutes a refutation of the classical power theorists.

Prerogative and the Rule of Law in John Locke and the Lincoln Presidency

2005 ◽  
Vol 67 (1) ◽  
pp. 77-112 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sean Mattie
Keyword(s):  
Civil War ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
John Locke ◽  
The State ◽  
Political Community ◽  
Fundamental Importance ◽  
Executive Power ◽  
The Political ◽  
The Rule Of Law ◽  
State Of Nature

Locke's Second Treatise of Government argues for the rule of law as just and rightful politics, not only in the fundamental legislation that is the constitution but also in regular governance by the legislature. Locke also argues for executive prerogative, the power of doing good without or even against law during contingency and necessity. Rule by legislation and rule by prerogative each preserve the political community and reflect its foundation out of the state of nature. But they do not easily coexist in the constitution, which provides no means to judge the rightful use of prerogative. President Lincoln's strong, discretionary actions during the crisis of the Civil War illustrate Locke's argument about prerogative's fundamental importance and its problematic relation to ordinary lawfulness. However, as Lincoln recognized, both the Constitution and Congress formally provided for an executive power that was remarkably compatible with the rule of law—and that thereby responded to the Lockean problem.

States of Nature in Immanuel Kant’sDoctrine of Right

2019 ◽  
Vol 73 (3) ◽  
pp. 727-739
Author(s):  
Alan J. Kellner
Keyword(s):  
Indigenous Peoples ◽  
The State ◽  
Political Agency ◽  
Future Research ◽  
The Political ◽  
Indigenous Politics ◽  
State Of Nature ◽  
Global Vision ◽  
States Of Nature

From an analysis of Kant’s states of nature in each division of the Doctrine of Right—the state of nature in general and the international state of nature—this paper reinterprets Cosmopolitan Right and the duty to exit the state of nature as more colonial than previously recognized. Kant places “savages” in the state of nature, depicting them and their lawless condition as bellicose. As such, states may force them to exit the state of nature; those who encounter hostile peoples on foreign lands may be justified in aggressing. Having shown that colonial features of the Doctrine of Right cannot be wrested from the text, this paper unsettles the interpretive dominance of the established view that Kant is staunchly anti-colonial. Nevertheless, anti-colonial features of the text remain. The paper shows that interpreters must accept that Kant’s text is both colonial and anti-colonial. Kant’s global vision remained too statist to appropriately include indigenous politics. The paper closes by briefly indicating a path for future research whereby contemporary Kantian cosmopolitan projects become more attuned to—and modified in light of—the political agency and particular struggles of indigenous peoples.

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