In Chapter 2, Section A above we saw how Schmitt in The Concept of the Political seeks to define the enemy with reference to his own ideal description of the jus publicum Europaeum as an epoch in which it was possible to tie the concept of the political to the state, despite the independence of these two concepts. War was, in other words, to be understood as a war between states and the enemy as the external enemy, who was not to be viewed with hatred, but treated with respect. Schmitt here already observed the demise of the state form as well as the threat of US imperialism and its dehumanisation of the enemy. In Chapter 2, Section B the focus was on the partisan who fights both against a foreign invader in defence of the homeland and as a world revolutionary in an international civil war. In the Theory of the Partisan Schmitt seeks to contain this civil war in a way similar to what was achieved with the jus publicum Europaeum, through his definition of the partisan as essentially telluric as well as through the idea of great spaces (Groβräume), an idea which he had developed since the late 1930s with reference to the Monroe Doctrine of 1823 and within the context of Hitler’s plans at the time for the expansion of German territory.
In the present chapter, Schmitt’s elaboration of the notion of great spaces within the context of an analysis of the so-called nomos of the earth will be the main focus point. This will take place by way of an analysis of Land and Sea (1942),1The Nomos of the Earth (1950) and a few smaller publications of Schmitt on the same theme. In these texts Schmitt sketches in broad terms the developments in international law since Antiquity, showing the movement from a first to a second and ultimately a new nomos of the earth in the twentieth century. Nomos in Schmitt’s reflections has the broad meaning of a law of law or a ‘constitution’ of the earth as a whole. Schmitt’s reflections thus resonate with current debates about the future shape of international law, which Derrida also engaged in, most prominently in Rogues: Two Essays on Reason. The intersection between Schmitt and Derrida in this respect will be enquired into here.
The chapter will proceed by first exploring the different meanings of nomos in line with Schmitt’s analysis. It will be shown that for Schmitt land appropriation is the most original meaning of nomos, but that he acknowledges that nomos is ‘preceded’ by what will later in the chapter be referred to as an a-nomos, which needs to be overcome in order for nomos to be established. This will be followed by an enquiry into the three ‘stages’ of nomos as identified by Schmitt, that is: (1) from Antiquity until the end of the Middle Ages; (2) from around the six-teenth century until the end of the nineteenth century; and (3) from the early twentieth century. The chapter ends with an enquiry into Schmitt’s conception of human nature, specifically the manner in which he contrasts land and sea from this point of view, as well as the way in which human nature is linked to nomos. The conception of human nature which appears from Schmitt’s analysis returns us to the notion of the a-nomos, which opens the door to alternative conceptions of nomos in contrast with Schmitt’s Groβraum theory.
Nomos, as Schmitt (NoE 325/VRA 489) points out, is usually translated by jurists and historians as law (Gesetz), custom (Sitte) or tradition (Gewohnheit). Schmitt (NoE 345/SGN 581) wants us to understand it in its original sense as a kind of law of law or original constitution (Urverfassung).2 In Chapter 4 of Part I of The Nomos of the Earth, he expresses his understanding of nomos as follows:
The Greek word for the first measurement [Messung] of all subsequent measures [Maβstabe], for the first land-appropriation [Landnahme] understood as the first partition and division of space [Raum-Teilung und –Einteilung], for the primeval division [Ur-Teilung] and distribution [Ur-Verteilung], is nomos.
(NoE 67/NdE 36)
With this definition, Schmitt (NoE 67/NdE 36) wants ‘to restore or give back to the word [i.e. nomos] its primal force and greatness [erste Kraft und Gröβe]’. He thus seeks to return to the original meaning of nomos as derived from the Greek verb nemein (German: nehmen),3 that is, taking, appropriation, seizure or the establishment or constitution of radical title (NoE 80–1/NdE 48–9).4 Here ‘law and order [Recht und Ordnung] are one’; ‘location and order [Ortung und Ordnung]’ are inextricably interwoven (NoE 81/NdE 50). Nomos for Schmitt therefore essentially means the constitutive act of taking possession, followed by the other meanings of nemein: division or distribution (teilen) and pasturage/production (weiden).5 This originary appropriation however tends to be quickly forgotten or suppressed into what he calls the ‘semi/half-conscious’ (ins Halbbewuβte abgedrängt) (NoE 341/SGN 577), in favour of the constituted order. Already in Antiquity, Schmitt (NoE 67/NdE 36) notes, nomos becomes ‘a designation for any normative regulation or directive passed or decreed in whatever fashion’. Something of the original meaning nevertheless always remains in place (NoE 68).6 At stake here is a distinction analogous to that found in constitutional theory between constitutive or constituent power, on the one hand, and constituted power, on the other (NoE 82).7 Jurists, Schmitt (NoE 82) points out, tend to focus only on constituted power and to regard the process through which such power came about, that is, by way of constitutive/constituent power, as non-legal. They find the source of legality in the constitution or in the will of the state, which is viewed as a person. The origin of the constitution or state itself is regarded as a mere fact (NoE 82). Schmitt, as he does in Constitutional Theory, insists that the manifestations of constituent power – here understood in an extended sense – also belong within legal discourse.
Nomos is thus to be understood as the foundational order, yet not only of a specific domestic legal order, but, as we will see, of the earth as a whole, that is, of the international legal order. Schmitt (NoE 82) points out in this regard that there are two forms of land appropriation from a legal-historical perspective: one kind which takes place within the given order of international law, and another which displaces the whole spatial order, thereby establishing a new nomos of the whole spatial sphere for neighbouring peoples and, in so doing, bringing about a radical change for international law. Land appropriation has moreover by no means come to an end after the era of colonialism, as is generally believed; it continues today (NoE 346–7).8 It is important for purposes of our analysis to note that Schmitt (NoE 82/NdE 50) distinguishes these two forms of land appropriation from instances of invasion or temporary occupation which do not ground a new order but amount to ‘mere acts of violence that quickly destroy themselves’ or, more literally, ‘mere rapidly self-destructive powers/forces [wenn wir von den bloβen schnell sich selbst zerstörenden Gewalttaten absehen]’.9 Schmitt hereby seems to suggest that in order for successful (new) land appropriations to take place within an existing nomos or for a new nomos of the earth as a whole to come about there has to be an overcoming of self-destructive forces or powers, such as those manifesting themselves in the twentieth century (see below).10Nomos, in its originary meaning, thus also and perhaps most importantly, involves the surmounting of forces of self-destruction.11
According to Schmitt, the first nomos lasted from Antiquity to the end of the Middle Ages and land dominates here. The world, as Schmitt (NoE 351/SGN 518) points out, was purely terrestrial (rein terran). Even though there were also river (potamic) and inland sea cultures (thalassic), the latter ultimately remained terrestrial. Man did not as yet have the audacity to risk sailing across the great oceans. A mythical image of land and sea and of the earth and the heavens dominated here (NoE 351). Furthermore, Schmitt (NoE 53/NdE 23) notes, ‘everything remained within the framework and the horizon of a spatial concept of the earth that was neither global nor all-encompassing, of an earth that had not been measured scientifically’.12 Every powerful nation, such as the Egyptian, Asian, Hellenistic, Roman and even the African and Incan Empires, considered itself to be at the centre of the world and its domain as a place where peace reigned, whereas the space outside was viewed as chaotic (NoE 51; SGN 518). The outside was furthermore perceived as being without a ruler and thus as ‘free’ for purposes of conquest, territorial acquisition and colonisation (NoE 51/NdE 21). In line with his analysis in The Concept of the Political, Schmitt (NoE 51/NdE 21) however rejects the view propagated in the nineteenth century that every stranger was regarded as an enemy, that all foreign territory was enemy territory unless a pact of friendship existed, and that all wars were wars of annihilation. In Roman law for example, a distinction was clearly drawn between the enemy (hostis), on the one hand, that is, those that declare war against us, and those against whom we declare war, and thieves and criminals, on the other (NoE 51/NdE 22).
The second nomos, dating from around the sixteenth century, came about due to a ‘change’ (Wendung) in the elements, of which England was in a certain sense the agent. England then took an elementary decision against the land in favour of the sea (SGN 396). This was not a methodical plan carried out by one or more persons, Schmitt notes, but rather the consequence of all the ‘unleashed maritime energies [entfesselten maritimen Energien]’, which were inherited by England (L&S 49/L&M 90; SGN 396).13 The ‘decision’ of England followed upon the invention of the compass, whale hunting and advancements in ship-building technology, especially by the Dutch, the actions and adventures of pirates, privateers, sea traders and other sea roamers (L&S 13–26; SGN 396), the war against Catholic Spain, the Calvinist notion of predestination14 and, as we will see below, perhaps most importantly, by changes in the conception of space. England, the strongest sea power since the eighteenth century managed to conquer all the world’s oceans (NoE 352; L&S 21). ‘Henceforth’ Schmitt (L&S 50/L&M 92) notes, ‘the land would be looked at from the sea, and the island would cease to be seen as a split chipped from the Continent, but as part of the sea, as a ship, or even more clearly, a fish’.15 This had important consequences for the nomos of the earth because the sea as compared to the earth (die Erde) ‘knows no such sense-perceptible unity of space and law, of order and location [Ordnung und Ortung]’ (NoE 42/NdE 13).16
The second nomos is characterised by the development of the modern state, accompanied by large-scale land appropriation, that is, the colonisation of what was regarded as ‘free space’, as well as the establishment of colonial protectorates. Schmitt (NoE 352) refers in this regard to the discovery and colonisation of a new continent (America) by European powers. In Asia, the Eurocentric structure of nomos only partially expressed itself by way of land appropriation; otherwise it found expression in the form of protectorates, leases, trade agreements and spheres of interest (NoE 352). Africa, Schmitt (NoE 352) notes, was not divided between the European powers until the nineteenth century. A distinction is drawn at this point between the fixed earth, on the one hand, which was divided into state territory, colonies, protectorates and spheres of interest, and the sea, which was free, on the other (NoE 352). The sea was open to all states for utilisation without being divided by boundaries, but also, and more importantly, for the waging of war (NoE 352). Ultimately, however, the sea belonged to England (L&S 46).
The second nomos is furthermore characterised by a double balance: between land (powers) and (the only) sea (power), as well as between European land powers, secured by England (NoE 172–5, 352–3). According to Schmitt (NoE 353), two completely different international orders coexisted here: one for the land and one for the sea. War between land powers was a bracketed war, where the enemy was only the enemy army, not the population. Wars were fought between the armies of European states, not the populations of states (NoE 353).17 The private property of the civil population could not be taken as booty.18 Sea war however amounted to trade war. Anyone who traded with an opponent/adversary was viewed as an enemy (NoE 353). The private property of the citizen of a state against which war was waged as well as of neutral states which traded with such states could be taken as booty. On land and sea, completely different concepts of war, enemy and booty thus applied, as if they were two separate worlds (NoE 353; L&S 47–8). For Schmitt there are also other profound differences between land and sea. In a highly evocative passage to which we will return, Schmitt notes that, although through labour the sea can provide one with many riches,
fields cannot be planted and firm lines cannot be engraved. Ships that sail across the sea leave no trace. ‘On the waves, there is nothing but waves [Auf den Wellen ist alles Welle].’19 The sea has no character, in the original sense of the word, which comes from the Greek charassein, meaning to engrave, to scratch, to imprint. The sea is free.
(NoE 42–3/NdE 13–14)
The open sea moreover and originally knows ‘no limits, no boundaries, no consecrated sites, no sacred orientations, no law, and no property’ (NoE 43/NdE 14).20 The freedom of the sea for Schmitt also means that it is ‘state-free’. The modern state, Schmitt (SGN 397) points out, developed on the European continent in line with Hobbes’s model, rather than in England. The choice for the sea was at the same time a choice against becoming a state (SGN 397). England, which as we saw earlier had, according to Schmitt, become a fish (or whale) through its maritime power, was because of the Industrial Revolution and modern technology in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, turning from a fish into a machine, thereby laying the basis for the third nomos of the earth (L&S 54).21 Technology meant that man was no longer directly engaging with the sea element (L&S 54). ‘The industrial revolution’, Schmitt (L&S 54/L&M 99) notes, ‘has transformed the children of the sea into machine-builders and servants of machines’.
England can, according to Schmitt, ultimately be said to have won a revolution: the revolution of planetary space (L&S 28). With the discovery of the Americas and with the first ship sailing around the earth, a new world was born. It could no longer be denied that the earth was a celestial body which revolved around the sun. Schmitt (L&S 34) contends that this was not however the most radical transformation of the age. What was really decisive was the cosmic dimension and the representation of an infinite void (eines unendlichen leeren Raumes) (L&S 34/L&M 65). From Newton’s theories a new concept of space comes to the fore. In terms of this conception, ‘[t]he stars, masses of matter, move while the forces of attraction and repulsion balance each other in an infinite void [in einem unendlichen, leeren Raum], by virtue of the laws of gravitation’ (L&S 34/L&M 66). There are no limits to space in this Newtonian conception. It was, according to Schmitt, this changing conception of space which made possible the ‘discovery’ of new continents and voyages around the world (L&S 35/L&M 67). Although certain philosophers had previously spoken of the empty or the void,22 people could now for the first time imagine an empty space. Schmitt (L&S 34–5/L&M 66) notes that people in earlier times had a fear of emptiness, the void or the abyss (the horror vacui). Now people were forgetting their fear and were not concerned about existing in an empty space (L&S 35). Some Enlightenment thinkers even mocked this horror vacui (L&S 35). Yet, comments Schmitt (L&S 35), to think a truly empty space is to think absolute nothingness. This ‘mocking’ was therefore ‘probably simply an understandable shudder in the face of the nothing and the emptiness of death [der Leerheit des Todes], in the face of a nihilistic idea and in the face of nihilism in general’ (L&S 35/L&M 67). It is important to note that the nothing or nihilism for Schmitt is not simply the void of death.23 Nihilism for him has a very specific ‘meaning’, as is evident for example from The Nomos of the Earth where Schmitt compares the bracketing of war during the reign of the jus publicum Europaeum with its alternative, as manifested in the twentieth century:
The essence of such [bracketed] wars was a regulated contest of forces gauged by witnesses in a bracketed space. Such wars are the opposite of disorder [Gegenteil von Unordnung]. They represent the highest form of order [Ordnung] within the scope of human power [Kraft]. They are the only protection against a circle of increasing reprisals, that is, against nihilistic acts of hatred and acts of revenge [nihilistischen Haβ-und Racheaktionen] whose meaningless goal [sinnloses Ziel ] lies in mutual destruction [gegenseitigen Vernichtung].24
(NoE 187/NdE 158–9)
Schmitt’s preferred conception of space, which we will encounter below, clearly aims at overcoming the nothing in this ‘sense’ of mutual destruction, as also appears from a passage in the Glossarium: ‘The magnificent sentence of Nietzsche: With sturdy shoulders space stands against the nothing. Where there is space there is Being [Der herrliche Nietzschesatz: Mit festen Schultern steht der Raum gegen das Nichts. Wo Raum ist, ist Sein]’.25 In the Glossarium Schmitt (GL 318) further-more links this tension between the nothing and a certain conception of space, with Freud and psychoanalysis. With reference to Gottfried Benn’s notion of man as a termite with space neurosis, Schmitt adopts a reading of Freud (of man as having a destructive and ultimately self-destructive drive) which suggests a familiarity with as well as remarkable insight into Freud’s contentions concerning the death drive in Beyond the Pleasure Principle (Freud 2001, XVIII: 1–64):
Termites with space-neurosis says expert Gottfried Benn.26 He seems to view this as fatal. The matter is however different. As long as the termites namely still have space neurosis, they also still have the feeling and the fear of transformation into termites. Only the termites without space-neurosis have become pure termites and insects. And the methods of the Freud-indexed neurosis-therapy indeed have in mind the consummation of this termitisation.27
(GL 318, entry of 20 July 1951)
The ‘ghostly’ and ‘originary’ nature of this truly empty space, the void or the nothing are mentioned in both Nomos and the Glossarium. Schmitt (NoE 178/NdE 149) refers to Thomas More’s book Utopia (1516) which testified to the possibility of a monstrous abolition or upliftment (einer ungeheuerlichen Aufhebung) of all locations (Ortungen) on which the first nomos of the earth was based. A word such as utopia, Schmitt (NoE 178) notes, would have been unthinkable for anyone in Antiquity. Schmitt (NoE 178/NdE 149–50) further points out that the u-in utopia does not simply negate space (topos) as the term a-topos would do, but in comparison with the latter term involves ‘a still stronger negative relation to topos [noch eine stärkere, negative Beziehung zum Topos]’. The word foretold, ‘as by a shadow [wie durch einen Schatten]’, the events of the nineteenth century with the replacement of maritime existence by an industrial-technical existence (NoE 178/NdE 150). Although it appears that Schmitt attaches a negative connotation to such truly empty space, elsewhere the latter takes on more explicitly an ‘originary’ role. In the Glossarium, for example, Schmitt notes that there is no movement without an empty space:
‘The ocean is free and even more free are sources/springs’28 … . There is no movement without empty space. There is no right without free space. Every rule-like capture and bracketing of space requires an outside, a free space which remains outside of the law … . How horrifying is a world in which there is no longer an abroad, and only a domestic; no path to the free; no scope for the free measuring and testing of power.29
(GL 37)
Although Schmitt can be read as referring here to free space in a phenomenological sense,30 that is, to the area outside of Europe during the second nomos, in view of our analysis above, this passage can also be read in a non-phenomenological sense, that is, as referring to an a-topology, a placeless place which gives place (Rog xiv), a spacing beyond metaphysics, as the latter’s condition of possibility (Chapter 5, Sections A and B above).
Towards the end of the nineteenth century, the United States, and in the twentieth century, Russia, become the dominant powers, coupled with the idea of infinite technological progress. Schmitt (NoE 353) points out that the earth is now (temporarily) divided into two parts, East and West, which are purely geographical concepts, and not easily distinguishable. Yet behind this purely geographical opposition (geographischen Gegensatz) appears a deeper, more elementary opposition (ein tieferer, elementarer Gegensatz) (NoE 353/SGN 520). Schmitt (NoE 353) invokes here the fact that what is referred to as ‘the East’ is characterised by a huge land mass, whereas ‘the West’ is characterised by great oceans. The United States can consequently be viewed as the new, bigger island, well-adapted to take the place of England, which had grown too small to be an imperial power in the technological era. Behind the opposition between East and West thus still stands an opposition between a continental and a maritime world, an opposition of land and sea (NoE 353; DPS 61).31 In times of the highest tension, as experienced during the Cold War, Schmitt (NoE 353) notes, the history of mankind rises to a pure opposition between the elements.
Although the opposition between land and sea thus remained in the twentieth century, modern technology, as we saw above, has robbed the sea of its elemental character (NoE 354). Towards the end of Land and Sea, Schmitt (L&S 57) notes that of the four elements in early Greek philosophy (earth, water, air and fire), the new nomos appears to entail a movement towards the dominance of the air.32 This leads to another spatial revolution (L&S 57). Schmitt (NoE 316–7/NdE 294) further points out that air war is a ‘war of pure destruction [reiner Vernichtungskrieg]’. Maritime war and land war can likewise be purely destructive, although the latter has a greater chance of being limited in nature because of the mutual relation between obligation and protection (NoE 318). Air war is however the furthest removed from this relationship (NoE 320). In view of the movement towards airspace, Schmitt (NoE 354) notes that many already believe that the whole of the earth is now only an airport or landing place, a storehouse for raw materials and a mother ship for space exploration. Yet we should not be too quick to jump to conclusions concerning the element that is set to dominate in the new nomos, Schmitt warns (L&M 105).33 If one takes account of the means and energies employed in exercising human power in airspace, as well as the functioning of the combustion engine through which aeroplanes are propelled, then it seems as if the new element at stake here is fire, which is likewise associated with destruction (L&M 105).34 Schmitt (L&M 105) ultimately decides to leave open the question as to which of these two elements is set to dominate the new nomos.
The new nomos, Schmitt (NoE 354) predicted, could ultimately be characterised by the victory of one power, that is, either the United States or the Soviet Union, leading to world unity. The victorious empire would, in line with the originary meaning of nomos explored by Schmitt, appropriate the whole world, including land, sea and air and divide and manage it in line with its own ideas and plans (NoE 354). This seemed at the time like the most plausible option in view of the dominant technologically inspired thinking, yet Schmitt (NoE 354–5/SGN 521) notes that irrespective of the monstrous force of modern technology, it would not be possible to destroy without remainder (restlos vernichten) human nature or the violence/power (Gewalt) of land and sea, without (technology and/or the land and sea powers) at the same time destroying itself/themselves (ohne sich gleichzeitig selbst zu vernichten).35 Stated in positive terms: world unity can be achieved only by way of total self-or mutual destruction, something which Schmitt likewise cautions against in The Concept of the Political (Chapter 2, Section A above).36 A second possibility would entail something similar to the second nomos with its balance of powers, yet adapted in line with contemporary technical means and dimensions. The United States, which as we saw earlier can be referred to as the bigger island (compared to England), would dominate the sea and the air, and would maintain and secure the balance of the rest of the world (NoE 355).
A third possibility would likewise copy the balancing of powers of the second nomos, but through the recognition of large sovereign spaces of hegemony and non-interference by space-alien powers (raumfremde Mächte) (NoE 355/SGN 521; Schmitt 2011b: 46/PB 335).37 Schmitt prefers the latter option, in view of the meaning of nomos as detailed above (specifically that of division (Teilung)),38 the demise of the nation state in the twentieth century, as well as his own opposition to a certain universalism which authorises the interference of space-alien powers, specifically the United States, into the affairs of Europe.39 This kind of universalism, typified by the League of Nations, according to Schmitt (2011b: 46/PB 335) destroys every reasonable or sensible (vernünftige) demarcation and distinction. Schmitt (2011b: 47/PB 336) further associates the United States with modern liberal capitalist imperialism, initiated by President Theodore Roosevelt, which, in a space-disregarding manner, transforms the earth into ‘an abstract world-and capital-market’. The aim of this imperialism is ultimately world domination by economic means (Schmitt 2011b: 47).40
Schmitt concludes Land and Sea (L&M 107), as well as the later short essay ‘The New Nomos of the Earth’ (NoE 355) by noting that current events do not point to the arrival of the end of the world, but rather to the transition to a new nomos which inevitably goes along with the lapsing of inherited measures, concepts and traditions.41 His last three sentences read as follows:
However that which is coming is therefore not only boundlessness or a nomos-hostile nothing. Also in the fierce42 struggles of old and new forces, just measures emerge and sensible proportions are shaped.43
Also here are Gods and powers
Vast/great is their measure.44
(L&M 107)
To be noted here are specifically the words ‘doch nicht nur’ (yet not only). In other words the nomos that is coming includes/excludes a lack of measure or the nothing as hostile to nomos. The gods and powers or forces of the future can indeed be viewed as a response to a certain lack of measure or to the nothing.45
In support of his notion of Groβräume, Schmitt (L&M 106; WoW 118/SGN 314) insists that, inter alia due to certain developments in the natural sciences, at stake in the twentieth century is no longer empty space but space as a force field of human energy, activity and performance. This new understanding of space, Schmitt (L&M 106) notes, only becomes possible in the present age. Schmitt then para-phrases Heidegger (1962: 146/2006: 111) as giving expression to this mode of thinking about space: ‘The world is not in space; rather space is in the world’ (L&M 106).46 This notion of space is dealt with in more detail in ‘The Groβraum Order’ where Schmitt (WoW 122–3/SGN 318–19) refers to the new conception of space developed in the field of biology which shows that the seemingly eternal ‘classical’ conception – of empty and neutral space – was simply a reflection of its time:
According to this theory, ‘movement’ for purposes of biological cognition does not take place in a pre-existing natural-scientific space, but space-time is rather conversely produced through movement. For this biological reflection, the world is thus not in space, but space is in and upon the world [die Welt nicht im Raum, sondern der Raum in und an der Welt].47
(WoW 123/SGN 319)
Schmitt further elaborates on this understanding of space as event as follows:
The spatial as such [Das Räumliche] is produced/generated [erzeugt] only along with and in objects, and the spatial and temporal orders are no longer mere entries in the given empty space [leeren Raum]; they correspond, rather, to an actual situation, an event [Ereignis]. It is only now that the conceptions of an empty dimension of depth [leeren Tiefendimension] and a merely formal category of space [bloβ formalen Raumkategorie] are conclusively overcome. Space becomes a performative space [Leistungsraum].48
(WoW 123/SGN 319)
The Groβraum is similarly a performative space, which, as Schmitt (WoW 120/SGN 316) notes somewhat ominously at the time (1939–1941), belongs ‘to a historically fulfilled and historically appropriate Reich that brings and bears in itself its own space, inner measures and borders’.49 The twentieth century conception of space as well as his own notion of Groβräume (WoW 118–20/SGN 314–16) seek to overcome in a calculated fashion (performatively, one could perhaps add) the mathematical, natural-scientific and neutral conception of space initiated by Newton which, as we saw earlier, according to Schmitt finds expression in normativism and ultimately determines how the state and its territory are viewed, that is, as an empty space with linear borders).50
What clearly comes to the fore in Schmitt’s analysis of nomos as well as his espousal of the idea of great spaces (Groβräume) is the importance he attaches to man’s earth-bound or telluric character.51 We can see Schmitt’s attachment to the telluric dimension perhaps most clearly in the opening words of Land and Sea:
Man is a terrestrial, a grounding. He lives, moves and walks on the firmly grounded earth. It is his standpoint and his base. He derives his points of view from it, which is also to say that his impressions are determined by it and his world outlook is conditioned by it. Earth-born, developing on it, man derives not only his horizon from it, but also his poise, his movements, his figure and his height.52
(L&S 1/L&M 7)
An example of the importance of the telluric dimension in Schmitt’s texts is the figure of the partisan, specifically as conceived of by Mao, which Schmitt likewise analyses in association with the idea of great spaces (Chapter 2, Section B above). The true (autochthonous) partisan, as compared to the world revolutionary partisan, raises the hope in Schmitt that there can ultimately be a return of the political (which is threatened by the universalism of the United States and the Soviet Union) towards a rootedness in the earth in an era in which the state is dissolving. Of the four Greek elements, Schmitt’s own preference is thus for the earth. The call of the present also does not come from the cosmos (to be conquered, like the sea by modern technology), but rather from the earth (DPS 80). This call entails capturing unbridled technology, binding it (sie zu bändigen) and inserting it within a concrete order (DPS 80/SGN 568).
Yet Schmitt does not fail to acknowledge man’s sea-bound nature, with water and sea said to lie at the origin of life, of which he notes ‘unconscious memories’ (unbewuβten Erinnerungen) are to be found: ‘In people’s deepest and often unconscious memories, water and the sea are the mysterious primordial source of all life [In tiefen, oft unbewuβten Erinnerungen der Menschen sind Wasser und Meer der geheimnisvolle Urgrund allen Lebens]’ (L&S 2/L&M 9).53 Whereas this passage seems to associate the sea with the Freudian unconscious, we saw earlier that in The Nomos of the Earth Schmitt (NoE 42–3/NdE 13–14) appears to go beyond the unconscious by associating the sea with a ‘place’ which keeps no memory and which erases all traces (Auf den Wellen ist alles Welle).54 Similarly, in ‘Dialogue on New Space’ Schmitt, with reference to the New Testament, refers to the sea as something uncanny and evil (etwas Unheimliches und Böses) (DPS 56/SGN 554).55 Of the four Greek elements, Schmitt chooses consistently for the earth or land against water (the sea), air and fire, which he associates with (self-)destruction.56 When Schmitt (DPS 80) therefore calls for the capturing or restraining of unbridled technology by way of the new nomos of the earth, this is clearly a reactive response to a certain dislocation. This dislocation is not however simply brought about by technology, but by a more originary dislocation, expropriation or deterritorialization,57 which Schmitt clearly alludes to in his texts.58 As we saw, in Land and Sea Schmitt refers to the Newtonian concept of empty space which for him represents death, absolute nothingness, understood here specifically as self-destruction. In the Glossarium we similarly saw that he views man, under the influence of Freud, as a termite without space neurosis. The performative conception of space (Leistungsraum) as event (Ereignis) which Schmitt endorses in certain of his texts can thus be said to be a reaction to his own recognition of a placeless place, a non-place of another event (Ereignis), that is, of the gift without return, a place characterised by expropriation, uprootedness, homelessness, dislocation, dissolution of identity, that is, a total exposure and giving of the self.59
What the above analysis shows is that a certain law lies at the foundation of international law. This law does not however simply entail appropriation, division and production, that is, the meanings of nomos identified by Schmitt. Nomos rather entails a reaction to a certain uncanniness, a pre-originary ‘not-at-home-ness’, a strangeness, which structures man and all living beings in general.60 The haunting of what Derrida (OH 79) refers to as a ‘lawless law, nomos anomos, law above the laws and law outside the law’61 is acknowledged by Schmitt,62 whilst seeking to ontologise it in outlining a new nomos for the earth.63 An affirmation of this a-nomos and its translation into an international or transnational politics should arguably64 align itself with the current processes of juridification, or perhaps rather of constitutionalisation,65 as well as calls for the radical transformation of international law66 rather than with the Schmittian notion of Groβräume.67 In both scenarios sovereignty would remain. Yet under constitutionalisation, coupled with the democratisation of international institutions, the disruption of sovereignty (also of global and transnational powers) by the force without power of the a-nomos (and thus also justice) arguably stand a better chance than with the Schmittian great spaces.68 The latter idea cannot however be completely ignored, especially in view of the fact that a number of states are showing signs of asserting themselves as such, and in view of the declining powers of the United States.69 In the event that these developments continue, these great spaces should nonetheless still operate within and be subjected to an international constitution. Although the a-nomos as a ‘perverformative’70 cannot be expressly included in an international constitution, it can find indirect expression by seeking to urgently address the causes and consequences of war, oppression, exploitation and inequality around the globe (‘Auto’ 121–3). National and transnational constitutions should be required to follow its cue.
1 The mythical nature of Land and Sea is often pointed to; see e.g. Dean (2006). It is nonetheless interesting to note that in GL 141 Schmitt refers to Land and Sea as taking ‘a step beyond the mythological into the mythical itself [ein Schritt über das Mythologische hinaus ins Mythische selber]’. As we will see in the analysis that follows, Schmitt with this statement appears to be hinting at going beyond the logos/mythos opposition towards that which gives place to this opposition. See also ON 90–1, 100–4, 112–13, 123–4 where a ‘myth within the myth … an open abyss in the general myth’ (ON 113) is likewise at stake; see further Chapter 5, Section A above; and see also Spitzer (2011).
2 In TTJT 50–1/DARD 14 Schmitt’s understanding of nomos already hints at such a foundational order when he argues (in a passage which is difficult to translate) for an understanding of Pindar’s nomos basileus (law as king) as follows: ‘One can speak of a true or real nomos as true king [einem wirklichen Nomos als wirklichem König] only if nomos means precisely the total, complete or absolute [den totalen – Bendersky chose to leave these words untranslated], a concrete order and community with a comprehensive concept of law [umfassenden Begriff von Recht]’.
3 In NoE 347/SGN 583 Schmitt compares the nehmen at stake in land appropriation and the naming which is an inherent part thereof with the taking of a wife in marriage, and the wife in turn accepting the (sur)name of her husband: ‘In those times, man took a wife [nahm der Mann die Frau]’. Schmitt also refers here (NoE 348/SGN 584) to Simon Weil who in her book Attente de Dieu reported that as she was reading a beautiful poem, Christ descended upon her and ‘took her’ (il m’a prise). It is perhaps noteworthy that Freud (2001, XV: 156, 158, 162/1991, XI: 158, 160, 165) associates a landscape (Landschaft), which appears in dreams, with the female sexual organs. The meaning of nomos which Schmitt insists on here, i.e. the taking or appropriation of land, in other words appears to be related to a certain pleasure which we came across in Chapter 5, Section B above; see further below.
4 In exploring the originary meaning of nomos, Schmitt (NoE 346/SGN 582) notes that ‘language passes down in its own way [tradiert auf ihre Weise] the continuing constitutive processes [Vorgänge] and events [Ereignisse], also when people have forgotten them. “Language still knows it”, says … the language philosopher Johann Arnold Kanne’.
5 See NoE 326–7/VRA 491; and NoE 345/SGN 581. Lossau (2011: 253–4) contends that for Schmitt land appropriation is ultimately characterised by arbitrariness; see also Minca and Rowan (2016: 220) who speak in this regard of ‘the ultimate groundlessness of order’ and of historical contingency. This makes the political and the conflict that is inherent in it, inevitable. Schmitt’s insistence on bracketed war (also in proposing the idea of great spaces, see below) would thus be an attempt to deal with the inevitability of the political.
6 Ulmen’s translation (NoE 68) misses out on the always/immer.
7 See further Chapter 3 above.
8 Schmitt (NoE 346–7) refers here specifically to the air and space appropriations of the time, and elsewhere to the attempts by the United States to establish a unified world order under its own dominance (NoE 335).
9 See also NoE 80/NdE 48: ‘Not every invasion or temporary occupation is a land-appropriation that founds an order. In world history, there have been many acts of force that have destroyed themselves quickly. [Selbstverständlich ist nicht jede Invasion oder jede vorübergehende Okkupation schon eine Ordnung begründende Landnahme. Es hat in der Weltgeschichte genug Gewaltakte gegeben, die sich sehr schnell selbst zerstört haben.]’
10 Schmitt’s statement in this regard can be read with his exploration in NoE 336/SGN 573 of three declarations about power (Macht) by P. Erich Przywara, the first of which is that power is the ‘secret uncanny ultimate [geheim unheimlich Letzte]’, which Przywara contrasts with the tendency of power to reveal itself. Schmitt (NoE 349/SGN 584) later refers to the latter tendency as overpowering the ‘satanic temptation [satanische Versuchung]’ towards a power that remains invisible, anonymous and secret. These passages tie in closely with what was said above about nomos having to overcome forces of self-destruction, to which we will return below.
11 See also Derrida B&S II 259–60.
12 Voigt (2005: 80) summarises the view of Aristotle on space, which, one could say, dominated during the first nomos, as follows: ‘Space, according to Aristotle, has its own reality, it is a ‘receptacle’ or ‘container’ (‘Behälter’), which assigns to the things contained their specific status (Stellenwert). Points (topoi) determine where ‘top’ and ‘bottom’ are. They give to space a fixed structure. Space was conceived as limited by fixed stars, as finite space, the centre of which is constituted by the immovable, spherical earth.’ See also L&S 34.
13 Of interest to our analysis here is a quotation by Schmitt, or Herr Altmann as he calls himself in the essay ‘Dialogue on New Space [Gespräch über den Neuen Raum]’ in SGN 561/DPS 69 of the English historian Seeley in response to a remark that the developments in England were not consciously planned, and with which Schmitt expresses his agreement: ‘In a fit of absence of mind we conquered the world [In einem Anfall von Geistesabwesenheit haben wir die Welt erobert]’).
14 See Palaver (1996: 115–16) who points to the opposition Schmitt posits between Protestantism (specifically the Puritans and Huguenots) and Catholicism, with the latter remaining rooted to the soil, whilst the former ‘seem[s] to be able to live on every soil without, however, becoming rooted’.
15 See also SGN 395 and 397.
16 Normativism and the Rechtsstaat Constitution are in Schmitt’s analysis in alliance with the second nomos.
17 In ‘TP’ 7/TdP 17 Schmitt acknowledges that the partisan, originating in the early nineteenth century in Spain, constituted an exception to this order.
18 See also L&S 47.
19 A quotation from Schiller’s tragedy of 1802–3, Die Braut von Messina (2016: 42): ‘Auf den Wellen ist alles Welle, Auf dem Meer ist kein Eigentum’.
20 See also SGN 564/DPS 73: ‘the midpoint and core of a terrestrial existence – with all its concrete orders – is the house [Mittelpunkt und Kern einer terranen Existenz – mit allen ihren konkreten Ordnungen – ist das Haus]’, which Schmitt (in the words of Herr Altmann) opposes to maritime existence where the ship is at the centre. The ship, he notes, is a much more intensive technical means than the house; the ship moves, while the house entails being at rest (Ruhe); at stake is a different space in which the ship moves, compared to the landscape in which the house stands. The ship for Schmitt represents ‘unleashed technology [entfesselte Technik]’ (SGN 564/DPS 74) or ‘absolute technology’ (SGN 541).
21 In NoE 178/NdE 149 Schmitt notes in this respect that the ‘English Isle became the agency of the spatial turn to a new nomos of the earth, and, potentially, even the operational base for the later leap into the total rootlessnes of modern technology’. See also GL 126–7 where Schmitt notes that ‘the transition from sailing ship to machine meant the destruction of this balance [der Übergang vom Segelschiff zur Maschine war die Zerstörung dieses Gleichgewichts]’, i.e. of land and sea during the second nomos.
22 Schmitt does not mention any specific philosopher here, but he is most likely alluding to the Atomists, specifically to Democritus.
23 Schmitt (GL 165) associates nihilism with the idea of one world state, which for him likewise necessarily involves civil war and self-destruction; see further below.
24 Schmitt (NoE 187) furthermore insists on drawing a distinction between anarchy and nihilism (see also NoE 56–7, 66). Anarchy, he points out, is not the worst scenario. Anarchy and law do not stand in a mutually exclusive relationship, referring to the right of resistance and self-help as perfectly compatible with (good) law. It is rather international law rules which seek to prohibit all such actions, which risk the ‘horrifying nihilistic destruction of all law [eine grauenhafte, nihilistische Zerstörung allen Rechtes]’ (NoE 187/NdE 159). Schmitt (NoE 66/NdE 36) furthermore seeks to restrict nihilism to the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. He sees nihilism as standing in close relationship with utopia (see also NoE 178: utopia announces a radical break with topos, and see below) and as breaching the inherent relationship between ‘order and location [Ordnung und Ortung]’. Legal positivism is said to have its origin in the nihilism of the same era; see NoE 76.
25 GL 317 (entry of 16 Jul 1951), repeated in SGN 494 n2.
26 See Benn (1971: 36): ‘Stimulus and repression. Today’s technology, yesterday’s mechanics. The first pirogue had greater sociological consequences than the submarine and the airplane; the first arrow was deadlier than poison gas. The people of Antiquity knew W.C.’s as well as elevators, pulleys, clocks, flying machines, automatons; they had a monomania about tunnels, passages, conduits, aqueducts – termites subject to space neuroses, grip compulsions.’
27 ‘Termiten mit Raum-Neurose, sagt sachverständig Gottfried Benn. Er scheint das für vernichtend zu halten. Die Sache liegt aber anders. So lange die Termiten nämlich noch Raum-Neurosen haben, so lange haben sie auch noch das Gefühl and die Angst vor der Verwandlung in Termiten. Erst die Termiten ohne Raum-Neurose sind reine Termiten und Insekten geworden. Und die Methoden der Freud-indizierten Neurosentherapie haben ja den Sinn, diese Termitisierung zu vollenden.’
28 A quotation from Däubler (1910).
29 ‘ “Der Ozean ist frei und freier noch sind Quellen” … . Es gibt keine Bewegung ohne leeren Raum. Es gibt auch kein Recht ohne freien Raum. Jede regelhafte Erfassung und Hegung eines Raumes erfordert einen drauβen, auβerhalb des Rechts verbleibenden freien Raum … . Wie ensetzlich ist eine Welt, in der es kein Ausland mehr gibt, und nur noch ein Inland; kein Weg ins freie; kein Spielraum freien Kräftemessens und freier Krafterprobung.’ See also Ojakangas (2007: 206); and Minca and Rowan (2016: 223–4).
30 See e.g. Debrix (2011: 223–5).
31 According to Schmitt L&S 5–6, maritime and land powers have been engaged in battle against each other throughout history.
32 A third animal (a great bird) is now added to the Behemoth and the Leviathan, representing respectively land and sea; see L&M 105.
33 L&S 58–9 are not included in the copy of the Draghici translation which I had access to. In what follows, where these pages are at stake, reference will be made only to L&M.
34 Zeitlin (2015: lxviii) ascribes this turn to fire in Schmitt’s text to the aerial bombardment of Germany at the time.
35 The ‘sich’ is ambiguous here and can refer to either modern technical means or to land and sea (powers). Minca and Rowan (2016: 243 n50) link Schmitt’s statement here to the concept of the political as understood with reference to human nature: ‘technology could only overcome the inherent conflictual nature of human nature by destroying humanity’.
36 See also FP 849: ‘When the world and humanity transform themselves through technology into a single unity, graspable with hands, that is to say, into a single person, a “great man” [magnus homo], then this “great man can, through the resources of technology, annihilate itself” [sich … selbst auszulöschen]. The Stoics of antiquity saw in the possibility of philosophical suicide a form of human sacrament. Perhaps it is fantastic, yet not completely unthinkable that humanity deliberately commits this act [daβ die Menschheit diesen Akt vorsätzlich begeht]. The technical unity of the world also allows the technical death of humanity and this death would be the culmination of universal history, a collective analogue to the Stoic conception, according to which the suicide of the individual represents his freedom and the only sacrament that man himself can administer.’
37 Neumann (2015: 469–71) further notes that only the dominant empire (Reich) within each Groβraum would have a monopoly over the political and thus possess sovereignty; the smaller states or entities within such a Groβraum would have no sovereignty.
38 Herrero (2015: 116) points out that nomos necessarily supposes limits or borders (see above; and see NoE 74–5 where Schmitt refers with reference to Trier to nomos as a fence-word) and thus the ‘differentiation of spaces’; see also Galli (2015: 114–15). At the time that Schmitt was writing, no new nomos was thus in place as both the two major powers (the United States and the Soviet Union) supported a universal order without fences.
39 A number of contemporary thinkers support the notion of great spaces, including Mouffe (2007); Zolo (2007); and Petito (2007); for criticism, see Rowan (2011).
40 In CoP 54–5, Schmitt had already spelt out the implications of this universalism – with its reliance on the notion of humanity and the idea of just wars – for the treatment of enemies; see also Odysseos (2007). Compare in this respect FWT 98–9 where Derrida seeks a more nuanced approach to the question of the humanitarian.
41 The contemporary relevance of Schmitt’s analysis appears from the fact that a battle between these options as outlined by Schmitt has been waging since the end of the Cold War; see Rech (2016: 158); Voigt (2015a: 195–6).
42 In NoE 355/SGN 522 the word ‘grausamen’ (cruel/savage) appears.
43 In NoE 355/SGN 522 this is posited as a possibility: ‘können gerechte Maβe entstehen und sinnvolle Proportionen sich bilden’.
44 ‘Aber das Kommende ist darum doch nicht nur Maβlosigkeit oder ein nomosfeindliches Nichts. Auch in dem erbitterten Ringen alter und neuer Kräfte entstehen gerechte Maβe und bilden sich sinnvolle Proportionen. Auch hier sind Götter und walten, Groβ ist ihr Maβ.’
45 See Galli (2015: 107), noting with reference to Schmitt that ‘measure is born from what is beyond measure’; and see further above.
46 See also Balakrishnan (2000: 244).
47 This sentence does not appear in the English translation in WoW 123.
48 See Tribe (1989) who seeks to develop an approach to constitutional decision-making which relies on a post-Newtonian conception of space, similar to that of Schmitt.
49 See similarly PT II 65/PT II (G) 41: ‘The church of Christ is not of this world and its history, but it is in this world. That means: it takes and gives space [sie nimmt und gibt Raum]; and space here means impermeability, visibility and the public sphere’.
50 In WoW 122 Schmitt views Kant’s conception of space (and time) as an a priori form of knowledge, as the philosophical highpoint of the classical conception.
51 See also Dean (2006: 7; 2007: 246); Björk (2016: 123); Ojakangas (2007: 213–14).This telluric force appears to be what also informs Schmitt’s insistence on concrete orders in his earlier works in respect of a legal system in general; see further SGN 396 where Schmitt notes that all our concepts unconsciously (unbewuβt) take their point of departure in fixed land; the sea is viewed from the land; and see likewise L&S 50–1.
52 See similarly DPS 81/SGN 569 where Schmitt speaks through Herr Altmann: ‘For me, the human is a son of the earth, and so he shall remain as long as he remains human [Für mich ist der Mensch ein Sohn der Erde, und er wird es bleiben, solange er Mensch bleibt]’; and see NoE 39/NdE 6 where Schmitt states in the ‘Foreword’ that ‘[h]uman thinking must again be directed towards the elemental orders of its terrestrial being’; and NoE 42 where Schmitt speaks of the earth as the mother of law.
53 See also L&S 2/L&M 9 where Schmitt quotes Goethe: ‘Everything is born of water,/Everything is preserved by water,/Ocean, bring us your eternal rule! [Alles ist aus dem Wasser entsprungen,/Alles wird durch das Wasser erhalten,/Ozean gönn‘ uns dein ewiges Walten!]’. Compare in this respect Zeitlin (2015: xlii–xlvi) who reads Schmitt as granting the status of human only to those who are land-based.
54 This passage resonates with Derrida’s thinking on the trace; see e.g. SP 156/Derrida (1972a: 25): ‘The trace has, properly speaking, no place, for effacement belongs to the very structure of the trace [La trace … n’a proprement pas lieu, l’effacement appartient à sa structure]’; see further Derrida (1982: 65–6; 2002d: 44).
55 In ‘Dialogue on New Space’ Schmitt (DPS 54–5/SGN 553) notes (speaking through Herr Altmann) that according to the Bible God gave human beings the land to live on and that this was made possible by repressing or forcing back (zurückgedrängt) the sea to the limits of this place of abode (Wohnsitz). There it lurks (lauert es) as a constant danger and threat to human beings. The sea is to human beings strange and hostile (fremd und feindlich). It is not a habitat (Lebensraum) for humans. The biblical creation story in other words makes it clear that only the solid earth (das feste Land) is the residence (Wohnung) or, even better, the home (das Haus) of human beings. ‘The sea on the other hand, the ocean, is an uncanny monstrosity on the edge of the inhabited world, a chaotic beast, a great serpent, a dragon, a leviathan [Das Meer dagegen, der Ozean, ist ein unheimliches Ungeheuer am Rande der bewohnten Welt, ein chaotisches Untier, eine groβe Schlange, ein Drache, ein Leviathan]’ (DPS 55/SGN 553). Insofar as the New Testament is concerned, Schmitt (DPS 56/SGN 554) points out that Jesus’s walking on the water points to the taming of the Leviathan (Er hat den Leviathan bezwungen). Yet precisely from this, Schmitt (DPS 55/SGN 553) notes, we can conclude that also for the New Testament, the sea is ‘something uncanny and evil [etwas Unheimliches und Böses]’. In the final book of the Bible, Revelation Chapter 21, John sees a new heaven and a new earth, the first heaven and earth had disappeared. With that it is declared that there was no more sea. The disappearance of the sea through the cleansing and transfiguring of the earth is here also associated with sin and evil.
56 See ECS 89: ‘all destruction is simply self-destruction’; and the discussion in Chapter 2, Section C above.
57 See ‘F&K’ 45–6; ET 79–80; SoM 103. The rootlessness which Judaism represents for Schmitt (WoW 121–2/SGN 317–18; TTJT 45/DARD 9) is thus not simply the characteristic of a certain nation or culture, but a fundamental structure of man in general; see also Chapter 6 above.
58 See e.g. GL 79–80 (entry of 11 Jan 1948) where Schmitt notes in a letter to Pierre Linn that the term ‘vagabondage’ applied to himself: ‘You speak of “vagabondage” and tell me you “detest this style”. I somewhat have the impression that this also concerns/looks at me personally [Vous parlez de “vagabondage” et me dites que vous “detestez ce style”. J’ai un peu l’impression que cela me regarde aussi moi même personellement].’ Schmitt furthermore comments that the phenomenon as well as the notion of ‘vagabondage’ were undergoing existential transformations especially in a place like Germany where the world’s opposing forces and tendencies tumultuously converge, or more literally ‘give themselves a tumultuous meeting [se donnent un rendez-vous tumultueux]’; see further Linder (2015: 6); and SGN 541 where Schmitt contends that the old, religious fear of man of the sea could be overcome only through ‘a peculiar drive [eines besonderen Antriebes]’, a technological drive (technische Antrieb), which is different from every other technological drive.
59 See Chapter 5, Sections A and B and Chapter 6 above. There is some resonance here with Nancy (1993: 85), who associates khōra with the sea, though this cannot be further explored here.
60 See AR 399–404; ON 104–11; Adieu 56.
61 The notion of the a-nomos, which is closely tied to the impossible in Derrida’s texts (see OH 79), can be compared to the notion of the a-legal or of a-legality in Lindahl (2013: 30–8, 156–86), which arguably remains located within the realm of the possible; as well as with Agamben (1998: 36–8) who seeks to establish an inherent link between Schmitt’s reliance on nomos and the state of exception. The a-nomos can indeed be understood in these terms, i.e. as exception, but then in Derrida’s sense of the exception as event (Ereignis); see further Chapter 2, Section A above.
62 Schmitt (L&M 107), as we saw above, calls it ‘a nomos-hostile nothing [ein nomosfeindliches Nichts]’.
63 In SoM 102–3/SdM 137 a topology of the Schmittian type (of sovereignty, borders, native soil and blood) is referred to as an ‘ontopology’, which Derrida explains as ‘an axiomatic linking indissociably the ontological value of present-being [on] to its location, to the stable and presentable determination of a locality (the topos of territory, soil, city, of the body in general)’.
64 Cf. Douzinas (2007: 226–33) who comes to a different conclusion, although his text is partly inspired by Derrida’s thinking.
65 Compare Grimm (2012b) and Preuss (2012) for different views on the appropriateness of speaking of a constitution on the international and transnational levels; see also Krisch (2012).
66 See SoM 104–7; ‘Auto’ 114–15; Rog 87. This would, as Derrida here and elsewhere (Neg 385; Rog 97–100) points out, need to include inter alia a restructuring of the United Nations (including the General Assembly and Security Council) with its own power and means of enforcement, also of the decisions of the International Court of Justice.
67 The way in which the concept of a constitution was defined in Chapter 3 and Chapter 5, Sections A and B above with reference to Schmitt, arguably opens the way for the use of this concept on both the transnational and the international levels. Derrida admittedly does not (at least in the texts I know of) speak of an international or transnational constitution, yet he does in Rog 87/Voy 127 support the ‘extension of the democratic beyond nation-state sovereignty, beyond citizenship’ by way of what he calls the ‘creation of an international juridico-political space’.
68 See further ‘Auto’ 119–21; Derrida and Caputo (1997: 11–12); and see Chomsky (2011: 25–43; 2016: 10–15, 19–20, 35) on US policy towards Latin and central America in the twentieth century as part of the United States’ ‘Grand Area’ in terms of the Monroe Doctrine.
69 See Voigt (2015a: 224–48); Chomsky (2016: 67–83, 239–58).
70 See De Ville (2011a: 54–6).