2006/03/01 by CHRISTOPH BURCHARD, Christoph Burchard
Arts and Humanities · Social Sciences · #Humanities and Social Sciences #Political Theology and Sovereignty #Seventeenth-Century Political and Philosophical Thought
paper · doi:10.1017/s092215650500316x
openalex publication_date 2006/03/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/05/21
Carl Schmitt's Der Nomos der Erde allows us to rethink his interlinked proposals for the organization of the Weimar Republic, namely his theory of ‘democratic dictatorship’ and the ‘concept of the political’. Connecting the domestic homogeneity of an empowered people with the pluralism of the Westphalian state system, Schmitt seeks to humanize war; he objects to the renaissance of the ‘just war’ tradition, which is premised on a discriminating concept of war. Schmitt's objections are valid today, yet their Eurocentric foundations are also partially outdated. We are thus to argue with Schmitt against Schmitt to reflect on possibilities for the humanization of war.