The question of the animal in Carl Schmitt’s concept of the political: Between political theology and political zoology

Abstract

Is the animal a subject of interest to Carl Schmitt? Academic common sense presupposes that the question of the animal is alien both to Schmitt’s intellectual interests and to his conception of the political, the theological, and the relationship between the two. In this paper we suggest that this impression should be revised in the light of textual evidence that reveals Schmitt’s interest in the animal question and of interpreters of his work who, albeit tangentially, discuss the animal question.