‘순수하게’ 정치적인 것에 대하여 — 칼 슈미트의 결단주의와 그 비판자들 —

Abstract

Most readers find Carl Schmitt’s decisionism rather a perilous stance, considering it to have pernicious anti-democratic tendencies. His decisionism is, however, far more complex than it appears at first sight. To appreciate it rightly, we should take a careful look at the context to which he applied it, as well as at its origins. Schmitt’s political theology, which derives from his decisionism, is actually similar, in many respects, to the philosophy of history represented by Walter Benjamin, among others. When it comes to the notion of time, however, Schmitt diverges from such thinkers by his emphasis upon the singularity [Einmaligkeit] of historical events. His fascination with the uniqueness of historical and political vicissitudes is expressed most clearly in his idiosyncratic conception of the act of keeping a diary, i.e., buribunkology [Buribunkologie]. Seeing himself as a Buribunk who was solely concerned with ‘the concept of the political’, Schmitt had a great many opponents who condemned his decisionistic notion of jurisprudence. In this regard, two Jewish intellectuals are worthy of notice, among many others: the jurist Hans Kelsen and the political philosopher Leo Strauss. In fact Schmitt only disseminated his own concept of a ‘state of exception’ after Kelsen had proposed the idea of a ‘pure theory of law’, which derives from a positivist idea that Schmitt detested. And Strauss very perceptively pointed out that the anthropological premise upon which Schmitt’s political theology depends is unsustainable in the face of what Strauss called ‘innocent evil’. Indeed, after Strauss’demolition of Schmitt’s political theology, Schmitt was deeply perturbed, struggling for decades to overcome the resulting trauma. In the end, however, Schmitt admitted that he had been vanquished from the outset. In a diary entry he intimated that he contrived his political theology in response to the nihilistic philosophy of Max Stirner. Yet, Stirner’s nihilistic egoism could not wholly absorb Schmitt, who considered himself a devout Catholic, whatever he meant by that.