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

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Abstract

The paper addresses Giorgio Agamben’s affirmation of post-sovereign politics by analyzing his critical engagement with the Hobbesian problematic of the state of nature. Radicalizing Carl Schmitt’s criticism of Hobbes, Agamben deconstructs the distinction between the state of nature and the civil order of the Commonwealth by demonstrating the ‘inclusive exclusion’ of the former within the latter in the manner of the state of exception, which functions as a negative foundation of any positive order. Since the state of nature is no longer cast as spatially external and temporally antecedent to the former, it cannot be escaped by the perfection of the legal order, nor can it itself be posited in an essentialist manner as a pre-political site uncontaminated by sovereign violence. While denying any way out of the state of exception, Agamben nonetheless argues for the possibility of its appropriation in the way that dissociates anomie from the locus of sovereignty and reclaims it as an attribute of free social praxis. The paper analyzes three central features of this ‘post-sovereign’ politics and concludes with a discussion of the differences between Schmitt and Agamben with regard to the fate of Hobbes’s Leviathan in late modern politics.

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Notes

  1. See Agamben (1998, 2005a).

  2. See Agamben (2000, pp. 4–11, 114, 115, 139–142).

  3. See e.g. Norris (2005) and Calarco and DeCaroli (2007).

  4. See e.g. Laclau (2007), Connolly (2007), Fitzpatrick (2005) and Deranty (2008).

  5. See Agamben (2000, p. 114).

  6. Agamben (1998, pp. 15–29).

  7. Ibid., p. 35.

  8. Ibid., p. 36.

  9. Prozorov (2006, pp. 80, 81).

  10. Strauss (1976, p. 87).

  11. Ibid., pp. 88–90.

  12. Hobbes (1985, p. 186).

  13. Schmitt (1976, pp. 27, 28, 33–38). Cf. Derrida (1996, pp. 114–136).

  14. Strauss (1976, p. 88. Emphasis original).

  15. Schmitt (1976, pp. 26, 27).

  16. Hobbes (1985, p. 187).

  17. Schmitt (1976, pp. 27, 28).

  18. Strauss (1976, p. 91).

  19. Schmitt (1976, pp. 45–51).

  20. Hobbes (1985, pp. 189, 190).

  21. Ibid., pp. 257, 375, 376.

  22. Ibid., p. 189.

  23. Strauss (1976, p. 90. Emphasis original).

  24. Cf. Ranciere (1998, pp. 21–42).

  25. Schmitt (1996 [1938]).

  26. See Hobbes (1985, Chap. 37).

  27. Schmitt (1996, pp. 65–78).

  28. Cf. Strauss (1976, pp. 90–94).

  29. Agamben (1998, pp. 105, 106).

  30. See Agamben (1998, p. 36).

  31. Hobbes (1985, pp. 186, 187).

  32. Foucault (2003, p. 90).

  33. Hobbes (1985, p. 186).

  34. Agamben (1998, p. 37).

  35. Rasch (2007, p. 101).

  36. Cf. Hobbes (1985, p. 187).

  37. Agamben (1998, p. 105).

  38. Foucault (2003, p. 270).

  39. Ibid., p. 93.

  40. See Foucault (2003, pp. 97–111).

  41. Ibid., p. 97.

  42. Ibid., p. 92.

  43. Cf. Williams (2005, pp. 32–36).

  44. Hobbes (1985, pp. 186–188).

  45. Rasch (2007, p. 101).

  46. Cf. Agamben (1998, p. 181). See also Mills (2005, p. 219) and Ziarek (2008, p. 90).

  47. See Ojakangas (2004, pp. 23–29) and Rasch (2000).

  48. Foucault (2003, p. 93).

  49. Agamben (1998, p. 35).

  50. Hobbes (1985, p. 354). Emphasis added.

  51. Schmitt (1985). See also McCormick (1997), Freund (1995) and Ojakangas (2004, pp. 33–47).

  52. Schmitt (1985, p. 12).

  53. Agamben (2005a, p. 51).

  54. Agamben (1998, p. 35).

  55. Agamben (2005a, p. 80). See also Agamben (1999a, pp. 181–184, 250–259).

  56. For a critique see e.g. Laclau (2007), Fitzpatrick (2005) and Deranty (2008).

  57. Agamben (2005a, pp. 65–73).

  58. Agamben (1998, p. 38).

  59. Agamben (2005a, pp. 85–88).

  60. Agamben (1998, pp. 37, 38; 2004, pp. 76, 77).

  61. Agamben (2005a, p. 86).

  62. Agamben (2004, p. 76).

  63. Agamben (1998, p. 51).

  64. Rasch (2007, p. 102). Emphasis original.

  65. Schmitt (1976, pp. 58–68).

  66. Rasch (2007, pp. 102–108).

  67. Rasch (2007, p. 102). Emphasis original.

  68. Ibid., pp. 102, 103.

  69. Schmitt (2003, pp. 59, 60).

  70. Agamben (2005b, p. 109).

  71. See Ibid., pp. 95–107.

  72. Ibid., p. 111.

  73. Ibid., p. 110.

  74. ibid.

  75. Rasch (2007, p. 106).

  76. Rasch (2007, p. 107).

  77. Ibid., p. 107.

  78. Agamben (2005b, p. 111).

  79. Rasch (2007, p. 106).

  80. Cf. Laclau (2007, pp. 20–22).

  81. 2 Thessalonians 2, 7; cited in Agamben (2005b, p. 110).

  82. Benjamin (1986).

  83. Agamben (1998, p. 59). See also Mills (2004) and Kaufman (2008).

  84. Rasch (2007, p. 102).

  85. Agamben (2005a, p. 87).

  86. See Ziarek (2008), Ojakangas (2009) and Mills (2004, p. 2005).

  87. Agamben (2005a, p. 88).

  88. Agamben (1999b, pp. 132–135).

  89. Agamben (2007a, pp. 50–70).

  90. See also Agamben (1999b, pp. 115–123).

  91. Agamben (1991).

  92. Ojakangas (2009).

  93. Agamben (1998, p. 188).

  94. Ibid.

  95. Agamben (2005a, pp. 64, 86–88).

  96. See Wall (1999, pp. 154–162) and Mills (2008), Deranty (2008) and Kaufman (2008).

  97. Agamben (2000, p. 11).

  98. Ibid., p. 9.

  99. Agamben (1998, p. 188).

  100. Ibid.

  101. Ibid., p. 182.

  102. Agamben (1991, 1995, 2007a).

  103. Agamben (1991).

  104. Agamben (1991, p. 25).

  105. Agamben (1999a, pp. 128–137).

  106. Agamben (1991, p. 108).

  107. Mills (2005, p. 219).

  108. Agamben (1998, p. 60).

  109. Agamben (1999a, pp. 183, 184).

  110. Agamben (1995, p. 98).

  111. Agamben (1999a, p. 135). Emphasis original.

  112. Franchi (2004).

  113. See Ibid., pp. 32–35.

  114. See also Wall (1999, pp. 115–138).

  115. Agamben (2000, pp. 94, 95).

  116. Agamben (2004, pp. 76, 77).

  117. Agamben (1998, p. 111).

  118. Agamben (2000, pp. 141, 142).

  119. Badiou (2001).

  120. Nancy (1991).

  121. Agamben (1999a, p. 47).

  122. Agamben (1993, pp. 1–4, 89–105).

  123. Agamben (1993, p. 93).

  124. Ibid., p. 87.

  125. Agamben (1993, p. 29).

  126. Ibid.

  127. See Edkins (2007).

  128. Agamben (1993).

  129. Ibid., p. 86.

  130. Ibid., p. 85.

  131. Agamben (1995, p. 82).

  132. Agamben (1998, p. 181).

  133. Rasch (2007, p. 108) and Laclau (2007, p. 22).

  134. Schmitt (1996).

  135. Schmitt (1976, pp. 36–45; 1996, pp. 73, 74).

  136. Agamben (1993, pp. 63–65, 79–86; 2000, pp. 73–90, 109–120).

  137. See Passavant (2007, pp. 149–153).

  138. Agamben (1993, p. 83).

  139. See Prozorov (2009).

  140. See Smith (2004).

  141. Agamben (1993, p. 65).

  142. Cf. Derrida (1996, pp. 112–136).

  143. Cf. Schmitt (1996, p. 31).

  144. Agamben (2005a, Chap. 4).

  145. Benjamin (1986).

  146. Agamben (2005a, pp. 56–59, 85).

  147. Agamben (1999a, p. 270).

  148. Schmitt (1996, pp. 82, 83).

  149. Agamben (2004).

  150. Agamben (2004, p. 1).

  151. Schmitt (1996, p. 8).

  152. Agamben (2007b, p. 77).

  153. Agamben (2007b, p. 86).

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    Sergei Prozorov

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Prozorov, S. The appropriation of abandonment: Giorgio Agamben on the state of nature and the political. Cont Philos Rev 42, 327–353 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11007-009-9115-z

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