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March 29, 2006
Schmitt's The Concept of the Political provides a positive definition of the political, as against both the contrasting definitions of social scientists and philosophers by playing off the political against the economic, the moral, etc. This 'definition of the political,' Schmitt tells us, 'can only be obtained by discovering and defining the specifically political categories' (p. 25). Politics allows for the existential affirmation of who and what we are, both as individuals and as a potential 'fighting collectivity'.
Schmitt provides his readers with the following definition. Politics is about friend/enemy groupings and the antagonism between friend and enemy is connected to protecting the way of life of a particular people. The us/them grouping becomes the friend/enemy grouping precisely at the point where the way of life of a collectivity becomes threatened. The enemy 'is one who threatens one's own existence and way of life.'
The individual citizens of a particular state see their enemies and friends not as 'my enemy' and 'my friend', but rather as 'our enemies' and 'our friends'. In The Concept of the Political Schmitt says:
The enemy is not merely any competitor or just any partner of a conflict in general. He is also not the private adversary whom one hates. An enemy exists only when, at least potentially, one fighting collectivity of people confronts a similar collectivity. The enemy is solely the public enemy...(p. 28).
The friend is to be understood only in relation to the enemy, and no positive theory of friendship per se is developed in Schmitt's account.
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