Reflection: The Concept of the Political

I want to do a blog post here not necessarily comparing Carl Schmitt's work The Concept of the Political to any work of science fiction we've studied so far. The work, although easily compared to works of fiction, needs to stand on its own and be considered in its own context. That being said, I'd like to reiterate what Prof Jackson said during our class period: The Concept of the Political is a fascist work. Now, it's very easy to get caught up in the implications of calling it that. People see that label and tend to dismiss it outright. But the label itself doesn't dictate exactly what's contained inside - just because it's fascist doesn't mean there isn't anything to learn from the work. When working with The Concept of the Political, it's good to be mindful of George Orwell's essay "Politics and the English Language". We can understand Carl Schmitt if we read him for what he truly says; we cannot him if we instead read the implications of what kind of person he was and the language associated with him.

I wanted to address once specific issue brought up in class that I think never got answered clearly. Prof Jackson put forth a very pointed question after our discussion of what Schmittian political philosophy looks like: who makes the decisions in an alien encounter? Of course, the position is that of a human's - who calls the shots when the aliens land on Earth? There's two ways we can tackle it - how Carl Schmitt would of LIKED to see it handled, and how it might ACTUALLY be handled today. Schmitt's position is slightly easier to identify in this context. Schmitt was writing during the time of the League of Nations and a time of overwhelming liberal democratic spirit. The feeling during this period of the 20s was a great confidence in the processes of liberalism, in which talk and communication between nations could prevent wars. In reaction to this, Schmitt put forth a very realistic kind of view - that if nations continued to operate under these kind of liberal assumptions, they were liable to be stabbed in the back and taken advantage of. Schmitt deeply despised the talk and deliberation associated with these liberal nations, and instead called for a deference to a single leader to make important decisions (as he writes, to make the distinction between friend-enemy). So would a deference to a single leader actually occur if aliens landed in your backyard?

This is obviously a huge and multi-faceted question, one I'm sure has actually been given legitimate thought by at least some legislators in the course of history. And, of course, the question has a huge amount of variables. To bring it down to size for now, let's assume that the aliens literally land right on the White House lawn. At this point, I believe Schmitt would be satisfied with an American response, with general deference given to the Commander-in-Chief in a kind of logistical situation like that. However, I think Schmitt would have problems with the likely reaction of the US to the alien landing. In class we put together a grid of Schmittian philosophies: we should use Schmittian politics, and we do; we should use Schmittian politics, and we don't; we should not use Schmittian politics, and we do; and finally we should not use Schmittian politics, and we don't. The problem of course in deciding which category your situation falls into, is that you'll only know once the event has actually passed. Look at War of the Worlds, a situation where humanity was obviously too ignorant of the destructive power of aliens, and should have used a friend-enemy distinction. In modern times, I would hope our government is all too cognizant of the possible threats alien weaponry could pose. Considering the threats America has tackled before, I can only imagine a Schmittian response taking place on American soil. However, this doesn't necessarily mean throwing a bomb at the spaceship. Schmittian policy allows specific directions to be taken, but in the end prevents against possible destruction.