Recent critical theory has brought together two different traditions of political theology. An intellectual history of the concept traces both to the German 1920s and the German Jewish 1940s. Carl Schmitt, the reactionary "crown jurist of the Third Reich," initiated the fi rst tradition; a small group of German Jews who immigrated to Palestine forged the second. Both traditions grew from a severe political crisis: in the earlier case, it was the German defeat of 1918; in the latter, the outbreak of World War II and the persecution of the Jews. Such moments show that when everything collapses, when life itself cannot be taken for granted, politics is simultaneously strengthened and undermined. Quite recently we have seen the revival of both aspects of political theology in post-9/11 theory. As I show below, the history of political theology problematizes some current concepts used by Giorgio Agamben.
A Time of Decision: Buber, Schmitt, AgambenIn State of Exception (2005) Agamben writes: "The aim of this investigation into the urgency of the state of exception 'in which we live' was to bring to light the fi ction that governs this arcanum imperii [secret of power] par excellence of our time." 1 Agamben insists that the state of exception, concentration
The moment in which we live proposes a staggering new challenge to past, present, and future understanding of our existence: climate change in general, and the Anthropocene in particular, requires a recalibration of all temporal relationships. In this article, I propose to identify the agent of change with current forms of complicity, or, as I call it in the title to this piece, the Homo complexus. A focus on complicity, I will argue, suggests that any future analysis of our society will recognize a short-term investment in a threat hovering above different forms of existence, or a new "sense of an ending."
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