Halting the Progression of Catastrophe: On the Temporal Deconstruction and Transcendence of Schmitt's Political Theology in Benjamin
Abstract
Walter Benjamins critical interaction with and eventual separation from Carl Schmitts legal theory calls for an interpretive method that goes beyond the paradigm Giorgio Agamben has established as prevalent.In State of Exception, Agamben well-knownly framed the Benjamin–Schmitt exchange as a structural clash within a topology of law, a situation where law maintains itself via its own suspension.However, this way of presenting things conceals Benjamins real philosophical stances in at least two respects.On one hand, Agamben transfers the exception to an abstract legal boundary, a formalized spatial model that replaces the materially-based historical experience which is crucial to Benjamins thinking.On the contrary, he turns the exception into a general logic of sovereignty, replacing the radical power of Benjamins historical-materialist critique with a form of messianic nihilism. The contention put forward here is that Benjamin truly surmounted Schmitt by reinterpreting the state of exception from a legal-philosophical concept to a structure of just interruption placed in historical time, which can be called a Historical-Materialist Theory of Temporal Justice.At the heart of this theory lies the resistance to consolidating the productive conflict between materialist and messianic-ethical aspects into a flawless synthesis. Instead, their reciprocal tension forms the dynamic core of Benjamins political philosophy.
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