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CONCLUSION
Religion in politics can play different and even contrary roles. It can
serve authoritarian repression but also causes of liberation (Casanova
1994). Even the secular state needed the help of religion to be first insti-
tuted in North America (Witte 1999). With pohtical theology we face a
potentially more dangerous enemy of freedom. It would be an exagger-
ation to claim that all modem pohtical theology serves and disguises
authoritarian politics. Margaret Canovan's sophisticated analysis ofthe
concept ofthe people, which ends vwth a surprising rehabihtation of
myth and a frankly poUtical theological appeal to faith and redemption
in "secular" politics, receives its inspiration from Arendt rather than
Schmitt, from council communism rather than Lenin (Canovan 2005,
137-138). Her theology is that ofthe miraculous mptures of freedom
for which the admiring analyst can only wait, in hopeful expectation.
Not only is there no way to facilitate or engineer these revolutionary or
quasi-revolutionary breaks in the continuum of institutional time but
there is little hope in their permanent institutionalization or overcom-
ing the straitjacket of normal politics. (While the conception is influ-
enced by Arendt, who was no political theologian and did not beheve in
any myth ofthe people, it can be traced back to Walter Benjamin who
was one.)
The best that can be done from this posture is to recommend a
normalization of the role of the extraordinary in an ultimately proce-
dural model, such as Bmce Ackerman's (Canovan 2005, 118-121). But
when one totally rejects even this version of proceduralism and opts
for an interventionist pohtical posture, as do Schmitt and Laclau, the
authoritarian consequences of political theology may be unavoidable.
NOTES
1. The term "sovereign dictatorship" and the emphasis ofthe dictato-
rial pattem of constitution making do return in Verfassungslehre even
if now less frequently, given the change of topics. (Schmitt 1993,
59-60).
2. This is still called omnipotence in Political Theology I (Schmitt 2002,43)
but to be replaced already in that work by a theology ofthe miracle,
understood as the exception.
3. This formulation is slightly altered in Verfassungslehre (Schmitt
1993, 79).
4. He has made this point himself in the Concept ofthe Political, after again
denouncing the "superficial poMcal theology" ofthe omnipotence
ofthe state (Schmitt 2002, 42-13). Also see Political Theology I, where
he presented the theological conception of universal guilt, impl5ng
the division [Einteilung] ofthe saved and the damned, a model for the
friend enemy concept ofthe political (2002, 63-64).
5. In Concept ofthe Political this idea is maintained in terms ofthe declara-
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