Carl Schmitt
A German jurist and political theorist known for his controversial work on sovereignty, the concept of the political (friend-enemy distinction), and the state of exception.
Quotes by Carl Schmitt
Sovereign is he who decides on the exception.
The concept of the state presupposes the concept of the political.
The specific political distinction to which political actions and motives can be reduced is that between friend and enemy.
A world in which the possibility of war is eliminated, a globally pacified world, would be a world without the distinction of friend and enemy and therefore a world without politics.
Every religious, moral, economic, ethical, or other antithesis transforms into a political one if it is sufficiently strong to group human beings effectively according to friend and enemy.
The enemy is not the criminal, not the personal opponent, but the other, the stranger; and it is sufficient for his nature that he is, in a particularly intense way, existentially other and alien, so that in the extreme case conflicts with him are possible.
The state as the specifically political entity is the decisive entity, and its essence is the friend-enemy grouping.
All significant concepts of the modern theory of the state are secularized theological concepts.
The exception is more interesting than the rule. The rule proves nothing; the exception proves everything.
The essence of liberalism is negotiation, a hesitant half-measure, hoping that the most extreme decision, the bloody earnestness of the friend-enemy grouping, can be avoided.
The political is the most intense and extreme antagonism, and every concrete antagonism is the more political the closer it approaches the extreme point, the grouping of friend and enemy.
The political entity is by its nature not universal in the sense of embracing all humanity and the entire world.
The political is not a domain, but the degree of intensity of an association or dissociation of human beings.
The political is the total, and it is the total that decides on the friend-enemy grouping.
The state is not a neutral technical apparatus, but a concrete order of human existence.
The decision is the specific element of the political.
The political is the ultimate intensity of any association or dissociation of human beings.
The essence of the political is not struggle, but the possibility of struggle.
He who says humanity wants to cheat.
The political is not a sphere of life, but the existential possibility of life and death.