Political Theology: Four Chapters on the Concept of Sovereignty

Schmitt, Carl. Political Theology: Four Chapters on the Concept of Sovereignty. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005.

问题：如果说主权国家（利维坦）是基督教传统的一种世俗化，那么利维坦的三一性是什么？

Chap.1

Definition: "Sovereign is he who decides on the exception." (p.5) It is a borderline (precise) concept because sometimes decisions cannot be derived from a general norm which does not encompass the exception (extreme emergency).

Jean Bodin thought the mark of sovereignty is the authority to suspend valid law. His question: "To what extent is the sovereign bound to laws, and to what extent is he responsible to the estate?" (p.8)

The decision (sovereignty) determines legal order. The development and practice of the liberal constitutional state repress the question of sovereignty by a division and mutual control of competence. (p.11) 【此处的问题不如说在于，一个宪政民主国家如何应对急难状态？】【宪政：限制政府权力，保障人民权利。宪政强调一种（消极）自由。】【民主侧重于政府的权力来源（产生方式），认为人民拥有平等参与公共政策的参与权。Wiki: Three characters of democracy are legal equality, political freedom, and rule of law.】

    

The right of state's self-preservation > ultimate authority (the suspension of laws) > entire existing order. "All law is situational law. The sovereign produces and guarantees the situation in its totality." (p.13) 【“自我保存”是霍布斯的口气。作者强调法的处境性以及决断，显得理性不足。】

    

"The rule proves nothing; the exception proves everything: It confirms not only the rule but also its existence, which derives only from the exception. " (p.15) 【Exception已被视为一种本体论了（它给予出规则的存在），并且在文末还引用了相关的克尔凯郭尔的话。】

Chap.2

Distinction: sociology and jurisprudence (is and ought). Kelsen: the state is purely juristic (nothing else than the legal order itself). (p.18-19) Criticism: (1) monistic metaphysics rather than dualism, so "everything that contradicts the system is excluded as impure" (p.21); (2) any normative things are based on the jurist's own free will which makes value assessments.【类似于Leo Strauss的价值中立批判】

    

Objection: Sovereignty is the law (norm, objectivity, eternal) rather than decisions (monarch, subjectivity, personal). Schmitt: The law does not know to whom it gives authority. "The legal prescription, as the norm of decision, only designates how decisions should be made, not who should decide. " (pp.32-33)

    

Thomas Hobbes rejected the idea that concrete sovereignty of the state (state power) is subordinate to an abstract valid order (spiritual power). "autoritas, non veritas facit legem. " (权威，而非真理制定法律) See Leviathan chap.26 and 42. 一个比喻：马具制造者确实要根据骑手的技艺来制造（一个秩序阶梯），但是这并不意味着每个马具制造者都要单独服从每个骑手的要求。【这个比喻很妙，注意抽象与具体的过渡。】

    

The concept of "form". (1) Legal form; (2) Technical form: material and impersonal because of utilitarian calculation (having a goal-oriented interest); (3) Aesthetic form: no decision; (4) Form in transcendental philosophy: a priori emptiness.

Chap.3

    

Modern politics is the secular version of theology. "All significant concepts of the modern theory of the state are secularized theological concepts not only because of their historical development - in which they were transferred from theology to the theory of the state, whereby, for example, the omnipotent God became the omnipotent lawgiver-but also because of their systematic structure, the recognition of which is necessary for a sociological consideration of these concepts. The exception in jurisprudence is analogous to the miracle in theology." (p.37) "The idea of the modern constitutional state triumphed together with deism, a theology and metaphysics that banished the miracle from the world. This theology and metaphysics rejected not only the transgression of the laws of nature through an exception brought about by direct intervention, as is found in the idea of a miracle, but also the sovereign's direct intervention in a valid legal order. The rationalism of the Enlightenment rejected the exception in every form. Conservative authors of the counterrevolution who were theists could thus attempt to support the personal sovereignty of the monarch ideologically, with the aid of analogies from a theistic theology." (pp.37-38) 【注意君主主权论者和有神论，理性主义和自然神论的关系。】

    

Pay attention to the theodicy and the justice of the monarch. (p.46) When Rousseau identified the general will with the will of sovereignty, "The decisionistic and personalistic element in the concept of sovereignty was thus lost." (p.48)

    

17th-18th centuries, "conceptions of transcendence will no longer be credible to most educated people." (p.50) 19th century, the theory of the state eliminated all theistic and transcendental conceptions and formed a new concept of legitimacy. (p.51)

Chap.4

    

All the anarchist theories think the people are good but the magistrate is corruptible. For De Maistre, he combines the sovereignty with infallibility. 【主权和无错，神正论】

    

Liberalism relies on the discussion which is opposed to dictatorship.

    

The modern state becomes a huge industrial plant. It focuses on economic interests.

    

The significance of counterrevolutionary philosophers lies in their emphasis on the notion of decision.【施米特以决断论来衡量当代政治学理论发展】