Giorgio Agamben: Legal, Political and Philosophical Perspectives

262 Pages·2014·19.794 MB·English

by  Tom Frost

Giorgio Agamben
This book collects new contributions from an international group of leading
scholars - induding many who have worked closely with Agamben - to
consider the impact of Agamben's thought on research in the humanities and
social sciences.
Giorgio Agamben: Legal, Political and Philosophical Perspectives addresses the
potential of Agamben's thought by re··focusing attention away from his cri
tiques of Western politics and towards his scheme for a political future. Part 1
of the book draws upon a wide range of issues such as legal oaths, legal rea~
soning and Christian conceptions of love in order to examine the potential
for Agamben's work to impact upon future legal scholarship. Part II focuses
on political perspectives that include references to Marx, Rousseau and
Agamben's conception of the 'messianic'. Theology, biology, and the thought
of Gilles Deleuze, Walter Benjamin and Antonin Artaud are aIl drawn upon
in Part III to explore philosophical perspectives on Agamben's thought.
This book demonstrates the importance and originality of Giorgio
Agamben, who has articulated a vision of politics that must be recognised as
an influential contribution to modern philosophical and political thinking. It
is a book that will interest those working across the Humanities.
Torn Frost is Lecturer in Legal Theory at the University of Sussex. His
research interests include post-colonialism, critical theory and continental
philosophy. He has published work on Agamben in the journals Oxford
Journal ofL egal Studies and Critical Horizons.

Giorgio Agamben
Legal, political and philosophical
perspectives
Edited by
Tom Frost
~l Routledge
~ ~ Taylor & Francis Group
LONDON AND NEW YORK
a GlassHouse Book
First published 2013
by Routledge
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© 2013 10m Frost
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ISBN: 978-0-415-63758-9 (hbk)
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Contents
Acknowledgements vii
Notes on Contributors viii
List ofF igures x
The limit of thought 1
TOM FROST
PART 1
Before the law Il
1 The curse of the law and the coming politics:
on Agamben, Paul and theJewish alternative 13
ADAM KOTSKO
2 'A particular fetishism': love,
law and the image in Agamben 31
CONNAL PARSLEY
3 Agamben and the possibilities of tradition 54
TOM FROST
PART Il
Politics: or, on the vocation of man 73
4 The necessary critique of divine violence: notes on
Agamben, Benjamin and Sorel 75
FRANK RUDA AND JAN VOELKER
vi Contents
5 The purgatory camp: political
emancipation and the emancipation of the political 97
DAVID M. SEYMOUR
fi Exemplary subjects: camps and the politics
of representation 119
ANTHONY DOWNEY
7 'The king reigns he doesn't govern':
thinking sovereignty government with Agamben,
Foucault and Rousseau 143
JESSICA WHYTE
8 Paragraphs on modern cities 162
DAVID KISHIK
PART lUI
Philosophy: or, on the world-to-come 173
9 Agamben's 175
KEVIN ATTELL
10
189
COLBY DICKINSON
Il Blessed lire 207
00$
PAOLO PALLADINO
Bibliography 223
Index 235
Acl<nowledgements
As the editor, 1 wouldfirst and foremost like to thank the contributors to this
volume, who are the reason for the success of this pr~ject. In addition, 1
would like to thank the anonymous reviewers of the original proposaI, whose
feedback was very helpful in honing the scope and themes of this collection.
I would also like to thank the staff at Routledge, especially Colin Perrin,
Melanie Fortmann-Brown and RebekahJenkins, whose help and assistance
throughout this project has been invaluable.
1 would aiso like to thank Newcastle Law SchooI, and in particular Colin
Murray, Chris Rodgers, Richard Mullender and Patrick O'Callaghan. Their
support enabled the running of a symposium on Agamben's thought in
March 2011, from which this volume resulted.
Finally, 1 would like to thank my wife, Cara, whose support throughout
this project has been invaluable.
s on c ntri uto
Kevin Attell is Assistant Professor of English at Cornell University.
Colby Dickinson is Assistant Professor of Theology at Loyola University,
Chicago. He is the author of Agamben and Theology and Between the Canon
and the Messiah: The Structure ofF aith in Contemporary Continental Thought,
and editor of The Postmodern 'Saints' ofF rance and The ShaPing of Tradition:
Context and Normativity.
Anthony Downey is the Director of the Master's Programme in
Contemporary Art at Sotheby's Institute of Art, London. He is the editor
of Ibraaz (www.ibraaz.org), a research forum on visual culture in North
Africa and the Middle East, and the author of Art and Politics Now (Thames
and Hudson, forthcoming 2014). is currently editing Uncommon
Grounds: New Media and Critical Practice in North Africa and the Middle East
(LB. Tauds, forthcorning 2014), a volume on new media and critical prac
tices in the Middle East and North Africa.
Tom is Lecturer in Legal Theory at the University of Sussex. He was
previously Lecturer in Law at Newcastle University. He has published
widely on continental philosophy, critical theory and criticallegal studies .
is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Emerson College in
.... &.Ii'O. .....U II. ...J >..
Boston, and a Fellow at the Institute for Cultural Inquiry in Berlin. He is
the author of Wittgenstein 's Form ofL ift and The Power ofL ift: Agamben and
the Coming Politics, and co-translator of Agamben's Nudities and What 1s an
Apparatus? He is working on an ÎlIlaginary sequel to Benjamin's Arcades
Project, which is dedicated to New York, capital of the twentieth century.
Adam Kotsko is Assistant Professor of Humanities at Shimer College
(Chicago, USA). He is the author, most recently, of liVlzy We Love Sociopaths:
A Guide to Late Capitalist Television and Politics of Redemption: The Social
Logic of Salvation, and the translator of several of Giorgio Agamben's
works.
Notes on contributors ix
Paolo PalladÏno is Professor of History and Theory at Lancaster University.
He is the author of Plants, Patients and the Historian: (Re)Membering in the
Age of Genetic Engineering and Entomology, Ecology and Agriculture: The Making
ofS cientific Careers in North America, 7885-7985.
Connal Parsley is a Lecturer at Kent Law School. His doctoral work is a
jurisprudential reading of Giorgio Agamben, foregTounding his thought of
the image and law in order to narrate his specifi c intervention into the
juridical tradition of the person. He has published numerous articles in
critical legal theory in general and on the work of Giorgio Agamben in
particular. He is also currently preparing the English translation of Roberto
Esposito's Categorie dell'impolitico.
Frank Ruda is a Researcher at the Collaborative Research Center 626 at
the Free University, Berlin and a Visiting Lecturer at the Slovenian
Academy of Arts and Sciences, Ljubljana. His publications include Hegel's
Rabbie. An Investigation into Hegel 's Philosophy of Right, and For Badiou.
Idealism without Idealism.
David M. Seymour is Lecturer in Law at City University, London. His
current research areas include Critical Theory (with specific reference to
anti-semitism and the Holocaust), Law, Political Philosophy and Social
Theory and Law and the Arts.
Jan Voelker is a researcher at the Collaborative Research Center 626 at the
Free University, Berlin, and Visiting Lecturer at the Slovenian Academy
of Arts and Sciences, Ljubljana. His publications include Asthetik der
s
Lebendigkeit. Kant.~ dritte Kritik, [Aesthetics ofL iveliness, Kant Third Critique],
and with Uwe Hebekus, Neue Philosophien des Politischen zur Einfohru ng.
Laclau, Lefort, Nancy, Rancière, Badiou, [Introduction to New Philosophies oft he
Political. Laclau, Lefort, Nancy, Rancière, Badiou].
Jessica Whyte is a Lecturer in Cultural and Social Analysis at the University
of Western Sydney, Australia. She has published widely on theories of
sovereignty and biopolitics, criticallegal theory, critiques of human rights
and contemporary continental philosophy. She is the author of Catastrophe
and Redemption: The Political Thought of Giorgio Agamben (SUNY Series in
Contemporary Continental Philosophy, 2013).
Fi ures
Figures contained in Chapter 6, Anthony Downey, 'Exemplary Subjects:
Camps and the Politics of Representation':
6.1 Trevor Paglen, 'The Salt Pit, Northeast of Kabul,
Afghanistan' (2006). Courtesy of Trevor Paglen. 128
6.1 Film still from Episode 7, Renzo Martens (2003),
installation at FA CT(Foundation for Art and
Creative Technology), Liverpool as part of My War
(2010). Images courtesy of FACT. 132
6.3 Ursula Biemann, film from X-Mission:
A Video and Text by Ursula Biemann (2009).
Courtesy of Ursula Biemann. 134