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Abstract
Much has been written about biopolitical sovereignty in the wake of Agamben's work, which relies, at least in the first volume of Homo Sacer, on Carl Schmitt's transcendental account of sovereignty. This article argues, however, that Foucault and Arendt rightly identify what Derrida once called the “changing shape and place of sovereignty” in modernity, which for them is horizontal and disseminated within a presupposed nation. For this reason, we will look to the source of modern philosophical immanentism, Spinoza, to show that he is not extrinsic to this modern biopolitics, and demonstrates how the sovereign exception and its nationalized version work hand-in-glove in the era of which he was a part – and thus is part of all thinking that would take this to form a new communitas. In this way, we argue that it is Spinoza's political theology, not Schmitt's, that is the better pass-key to what Foucault and Arendt identify as biopolitical. By doing so, we put in tension two trends in recent Continental philosophy: philosophical vitalism and the critique of biopolitics at the heart at any contemporary thinking of community.
Notes
1 Gilles Deleuze, Spinoza: Practical Philosophy, trans. Robert Hurley (San Francisco: City Lights, 1988) 12–13.
2 Jean-Luc Nancy, The Inoperative Community, ed. Peter Connor (Minnesota: U of Minnesota P, 1991) 12.
3 Michel Foucault, History of Sexuality, Volume 1: An Introduction, trans. Robert Hurley (New York: Vintage, 1990) 143.
4 See my State of Sovereignty: Lessons from the Political Fictions of Modernity (Albany: State U of New York P, 2012) chapters 3 and 4.
5 Carl Schmitt, Political Theology: Four Chapters on the Concept of Sovereignty, trans. George Schwab (Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1985).
6 This is most notable in the work of Giorgio Agamben. See, for example, Homo Sacer: Sovereign Power and Bare Life, trans. Daniel Heller-Roazen (Stanford: Stanford UP, 1998) esp. 1–25, as well as the middle sections of The Kingdom and the Glory: For a Theological Genealogy of Economy and Government, trans. L. Chiesa and M. Mandarini (Stanford: Stanford UP, 2011).
7 See Carl Schmitt, The Leviathan in the State Theory of Thomas Hobbes: Meaning and Failure of a Political Symbol, trans. G. Schwab (Chicago: U of Chicago P, 2008).
8 Spinoza, The Political Treatise in The Complete Works of Spinoza, trans. Samuel Shirley (New York: Hackett, 2002) 1.7. References to Spinoza's Political Treatise denote the chapter and paragraph, respectively.
9 Ibid. 1.1.
10 Roberto Esposito, The Third Person (London: Polity, 2012) 18.
11 Ibid.
12 In The Deleuze Critical Reader, ed. Paul Patton (London: Blackwell, 1996) 107–13.
13 Deleuze, Spinoza: Practical Philosophy 26.
14 Here is the relevant passage from Dickens's Our Mutual Friend:
A disreputable man, a rogue, held in contempt by everyone, is found as he lies dying. Suddenly, those taking care of him manifest an eagerness, respect, even love, for his slightest sign of life. Everybody bustles about to save him, to the point where, in his deepest coma, this wicked man himself senses something soft and sweet penetrating him. But to the degree that he comes back to life, his saviors turn colder, and he becomes once again mean and crude. Between his life and his death, there is a moment that is only that of a life playing with death. (Cited in Gilles Deleuze, “Immanence: A Life” in Pure Immanence: Essays on a Life, trans. Anne Boyman (New York: Zone, 2001) 28)
15 Ibid. 30.
16 Political Treatise 1.6.
17 This is at the heart of Negri's own Spinozism. See, for example, “Spinoza's Anti-Modernity” in Subversive Spinoza, ed. T.S. Murphy (Manchester: Manchester UP, 2004) 79–93.
18 See Gilles Deleuze, Expressionism in Philosophy: Spinoza, trans. M. Joughin (New York: Zone, 1990) 173.
19 Gilles Deleuze, Difference and Repetition, trans. Paul Patton (New York: Columbia UP, 1994) 40.
20 Spinoza, Principles Concerning Cartesian Philosophy in Complete Works 197.
21 Spinoza, Ethics, trans. S. Shirley (New York: Hackett, 1992) IV, prop. 22. References to the Ethics will denote the chapter and the proposition number, along with whether it's located in a proof or scholium, if applicable, as well as the page number for this edition.
22 Ibid.
23 Ibid. prop. 21.
24 Aristotle, Politics 1252b29–30.
25 Ethics IV, prop. 24.
26 Ibid. prop. 25.
27 Deleuze, “Immanence: A Life” 30.
28 See Spinoza, Œuvres complètes, eds. and trans. R. Callois, M. Francès, and R. Misrahi (Paris: Gallimard, 1972).
29 For more on this figure and the connections to Foucault and Arendt, see the introduction to my The State of Sovereignty (New York: State U of New York P, 2012).
30 Spinoza, Political Treatise 3.2.
31 Hobbes, Leviathan (New York: Hackett, 1992) Part II, chapter xix, par. 15, 124.
32 Ibid., Part I, chapter xiv, par. 8, 82.
33 See, for example, Theological-Political Treatise, trans. M. Silverstone and J. Israel (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2007) 16.17 and 16.18. References to Spinoza's Theological-Political Treatise denote the chapter and paragraph, respectively.
34 Theological-Political Treatise 17.4.
35 Political Treatise 6.6.
36 Even, of course, in the case of the penalty of death, which one can resist even as one has “consented to the law by which they are condemned” (Leviathan, Part I, chapter xiv, par. 29, 87).
37 Ibid., Part I, chapter xiii, par. 14, 78.
38 Ibid.; my emphasis.
39 The definition of a multitude below provided by Hobbes can be found in such writers as Dante in his De Monarchia.
40 Hobbes, Leviathan, Part I, chapter xvi, par. 13, 104.
41 Spinoza, Theological-Political Treatise 16.9.
42 Political Treatise 16.10.
43 Ibid. 3.5.
44 Ibid. 2.16.
45 Ibid. 5.2.
46 Ibid. 3.2.
47 Theological-Political Treatise 3.5.
48 Alexandre Matheron, “The Theoretical Function of Democracy in Spinoza and Hobbes” in The New Spinoza, eds. W. Montag and T. Stolze (Minnesota: U of Minnesota P, 2008) 215.
49 Hasana Sharp, “Eve's Perfection: Spinoza on Sexual (In)Equality” forthcoming in Journal of the History of Philosophy. My thanks to Sarah Kizuk for providing me with a copy of this.
50 Theological-Political Treatise 17.2.
51 Negri, Subversive Spinoza 37.
52 Ibid.
53 Ibid. 36.
54 Political Treatise 1.5.
55 Negri, Subversive Spinoza 28; my emphasis.
56 Political Treatise 11.4.
57 See her “Eve's Perfection: Spinoza on Sexual (In)Equality.”
58 Theological-Political Treatise 17.3.
59 Political Treatise 2.17.
60 Ibid. 4.4.
61 Deleuze, “Immanence: A Life” 30.
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