Schmitt in Guantánamo: a reading of the outlaw of humanity
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.30612/mones.v14i28.19664Keywords:
Carl Schmitt, enemy, United States, terrorism, outlaw of humanityAbstract
Inspired by Jacques Derrida, this article offers a reading of Carl Schmitt that traces the “outlaw of humanity” through the U.S. legal-political architecture established in the aftermath of September 11, 2001. By revisiting Schmitt’s unconventional categories, it contributes to a better understanding of the conceptual construction of a specific category of enmity, (re)articulated in key memoranda and executive orders issued by different U.S. administrations from 2002 to 2025. We argue that the specter of Schmitt’s “outlaw of humanity” haunts the contemporary world order, legitimizing exceptional forms and spatiotemporal manifestations of violence, thereby exposing the limits of the modern international system, and envisioning an international political theory/a political theory of the international.
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