This symposium considers the relation between political theology and critique. According to some theorists, religion is politically significant insofar as it legitimates political authority. Along these lines, Carl Schmitt argues that political sovereignty is modeled on the absolute authority of God. Stathis Gourgouris claims that political theology invests some things with sacred significance in order to bolster monarchical power. And Giorgio Agamben argues that religion reinforces mundane government by investing it with heavenly glory. On this view, insofar as political theology invests a given political order with divine authority, it is a danger to democracy.
This question carries particular urgency at a time when democracies around the world are under threat. In the United States and elsewhere, Christian nationalists have grown increasingly suspicious of democratic pluralism. In this context, religion often functions to legitimate the dominance of a certain group – such as white Christian men. In response, the essays in this symposium argue that it is not inevitable for political theology to function in this way. In their view, some forms of political theology refuse appropriation by any group through the practice of rigorous critique.
Each participant in this symposium has written a book (published or soon-to-be-published) arguing that some religious traditions model critical practices that undermine theocratic power. In conversation with each other, their contributions to this symposium will address the ways in which scholars of political theology offer a distinctive contribution to debates over democratic theory: bringing religious traditions into conversation with Afro-pessimist critiques of Being, feminist theorization of conflict, and philosophical accounts of citizenship. By recovering the critical potential of religious thought and practice, they aim to clarify the way political theology can support democratic institutions that are now under threat.