Review: Schmitt Reconsidered

Author(s): Donald Schoonmaker

Source: The Review of Politics, Vol. 50, No. 1, Special Issue on German Politics (Winter, 1988),
pp. 130-132
Published by: Cambridge University Press for the University of Notre Dame du lac on behalf of Review of
Politics
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130 THE REVIEW OF POLITICS

SCHMITT RECONSIDERED

Translated with an introduction by Guy

Carl Schmitt: PoliticalRomanticism.
Oakes. (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1986. Pp. 177. $20.00.)

The mosaic which represents the writing and political life of the polit-
ical and legal theorist, Carl Schmitt, has been incomplete for some time,
especially for the English-reading public. This translation of one of his
earliest works (originally published as PolitischeRomantik, 1919, 1925, by
Duncker & Humboldt, Berlin) provides us with a valuable piece of the
mosaic: the basic cultural and philosophical assumptions which informed
his critique of the liberal bourgeoisie and parliamentary democracy. Con-
struction of this mosaic has not been an easy task. Schmitt's recent death
(1888-1985) brought forth commentaries that praised his brilliance as a
perceptive critic of the constitutional problems of Weimar Germany and
the inadequacies of liberalism as well as assessments that described him
as the chief jurist of the Nazi state, the scholar as intellectual chameleon,
and the opportunist who not only wrote legal opinions to justify Hitler's
seizure of power in 1933 and his arbitrary use of violence in 1934, but
who also developed a heretofore unknown streak of anti-Semitism in his
writings to suit the party in power.
Both judgments are correct. An exceptional work of balanced scholar-
ship by Joseph Bendersky, Carl Schmitt: Theoristfor the Reich (Princeton
University Press, 1983), speaking of the 1933-36 period, notes that "his
writing and actions during these years were indeed reprehensible" (p. 282).
Bendersky also notes: "Toallow Schmitt's Nazi collaboration to overshadow
all other aspects of his life and work would create a distorted image of
an important historical figure" (p. 282). All the more reason to be indebted
for this graceful translation by Guy Oakes of a work written substantially
in 1917-1918 which offers the gist of Schmitt's critical attack on modernity,
a critique which the later works on sovereignty, parliament, and liberal
democracy draw on.
In PoliticalRomanticism,which could have been aptly subtitled "The Need
for Traditional State Authority in a Mass Society," Schmitt described po-
litical romanticism as the disease of the atomized mass society. The car-
riers of this debilitating malady are the liberal bourgeoisie; they lack realism
in facing political conflict at home and abroad, and they support a polit-
ical value system with no core: pluralism without hierarchy, political
cacophony without strong state orchestration. In his words: "In the liberal
bourgeois world, the detached, isolated, and emancipated individual be-
comes the middle point, the court of last resort, the absolute" (p. 99). The
remedy which Schmitt offered was to remind the intellectual elite of Ger-
many's new republic that the political thinkers of conservative Catholi-
cism - de Maistre, Bonald, and Burke - had also faced the undisciplined
demands of the sovereign ego in the turbulent times of post-1789 Europe
and had offered sound advice. Schmitt clearly saw a parallel between the
challenge to traditional authority of the French revolutionary period,
and the unstructured nature of the political experiment of Weimar.
 REVIEWS 131

Schmitt'sCatholicism in this work and others should not be underplayed.

It helpsexplainthe fusillade-natureof his defensivepolemicsagainstsecular
intellectuals and his attitude that Catholics were more sober realists and
careful restorerswhile rebellious Protestantism was part of the threat of
modernity.
Schmitt's argument in this work is cleanly stated. In the preface, he
asserted:"Romanticismis subjectifiedoccasionalismbecausean occasional
relationshipto the world is essential to it.... Because the final authority
is shiftedfrom God to the genius of the ego,'the entire foregroundchanges"
(p. 18).ForSchmitt,the forcesof individualism,subjectivism,and privatism
havebeen hurriedalong by industrializationand democracy.The problem
of constructing a national community is normally difficult in bourgeois
societies, but it is doubly difficult in Germany where, in Schmitt's anal-
ysis, the romantic style in politics is the classic example of style over sub-
stance, mehrScheinals Sein.Early on in his argument he laments, "theroot-
lessness of the romantic, his incapacity to hold fast to an important idea
on the basis of a free decision . . ."(p. 51).
The prefaceoffersnot just a compact summary;it is also where Schmitt
sets up his target: the aestheticization of experience which undermines
the hierarchy of values crucial for political choice. The action-oriented
Schmitt is dismayed by the romantic as a free floaterwed to the Hegelian
ideal of "eternal becoming." Intellectually this leads to caprice, fancy,
whimsy, and opportunisticfeints. Politicallyit leads to passivity,the "end-
less conversation"of Novalis, a fatal posture in Schmitt'sview for a weak
German state with contentious social forces.
The argument moves forward with Schmitt as accuser and judge in
a debate in which he contrasts the inadequacies of Adam Mueller
(1779-1829) and FriedrichSchlegel (1772-1823)with the received wisdom
of de Maistre, Bonald, and Edmund Burke. Guy Oakes is certainly cor-
rect in his introduction when he notes that Schmitt "embracesthe j'accuse
role with an unqualifiedenthusiasm"(p. xiii). The polemical,prosecutorial,
and dogmatic tone, developed to a fine art by Schmitt, is a familiar strain
of the characteristicWeimar style of debate in political, intellectual, and
social life. The chargeagainst Mueller is especially unrelenting, and much
of it is deeply ironic given Schmitt'slater political actions. Mueller "is a
zealous student of whatever system happened to be in power"(p. 45); he
is an "amoralappreciatorof everything""withouthis own center of gravity"
(p. 128). He lacks Burke'sappreciation of the "great,superindividual na-
tional reality, independent of all the power and volition of the individual
person"(p. 63).
Schmitt's amalgam of historical, philosophical, literary, and political
analysis is extremely well done. Yes,the tone is polemical, but the scholar-
ship, for the most part, is solid and the writing is forceful. There are prob-
lems where he grinds his axe too intently. Burke did fear an individualism
fueled by materialismand disdainful of community, but he also promoted
parliamentarygovernmentwith its endless discussion and toleranceof dis-
sent. For all of Schmitt's wide reading, he does not seem to have come
across Alexis de Tocqueville. Here one could read the appreciationof the
aristocraticvirtues with the qualified hope in more widespreadparticipa-
132 THE REVIEW OF POLITICS

tion which Schmitt could not balance. Another problem with Schmitt's
analysis has to do with his definition of romanticism. The romantic for
him is devoid of any commitment to principle and is completely domi-
nated by short-term feelings. Other writers, including Jacques Barzun,
see romanticism as revising rationalism not replacing it, and many
romanticsdid notjust engage in endlesstalk, they created.WhereasSchmitt
in Hobbesian fashion is skepticalof man'sreason and fearfulof his undis-
ciplined feelings, another view of romanticism warns of an exclusive at-
tachment to either emotion or reason. What is most problematical in
Schmitt'sdiatribe is that all romantics are politically passive. "Wherepo-
litical activity begins, political romanticism ends" (p. 159). This injudi-
cious remarkwould havedifficultymaking sense of either a Heinrich Heine
or a Heinrich B11. What you essentially get in Schmitt'sbook is an over-
dramatic caricatureof a serious political problem in Germany: the polit-
ical estrangement of many intellectuals.
The introductionby Guy Oakes admirablysummarizesthe framework
of Schmitt'sarguments and providesvaluable historical and biographical
information, but severalcriticisms should be advanced. The relationship
of this text to the works of Schmitt in the later 1920'sneeds more discus-
sion. A long footnote on p. xxxv aims at that task, but it needs elaboration
in the introduction. The beginning student of Schmitt could use a glance
at the road ahead. A second comment is that the intellectual influences
which were working on Schmitt at the start of the Weimar regime need
comment. These include the political sociology of Weber and Michels,
the literatureof Musil and ErnstJuenger,and the action theoriesof George
Sorel. Schmitt was a political theorist who took art and literature seri-
ously. Musil's DerMannohneEigenschaften with its rootless individual and
Juenger's Stahlgewittern with its germ of the friend-enemydistinction were
important influences on Schmitt.
Jiirgen Habermas is no doubt correct that Schmitt was not at home
with the overly robust pluralism of Weimar and the challenge this posed
for the powerof the state. In an recentessayon Carl Schmitt,"DieSchrecken
der Autonomie: Carl Schmitt auf englisch"in EineArtSchadensabwicklung
(Suhrkamp, 1987), Habermas analyzes Schmitt's intellectual debt to
Hobbes and Schmitt'sfascination with the aesthetic of force. Habermas
states in this essay: "Carl Schmitt's polemical argument with political
romanticism hides the aestheticizing oscillations in his own political
thought"(p.111).This essay adds another important piece to the mosaic
of which we spoke earlier.
Students of German history and politics should be deeply grateful to
the series, Studies in Contemporary Social Thought, and to its general
editor, Thomas McCarthy,for bringing this workout. Schmitt'sother im-
portant works are now available in English, and a larger public can now
better judge his views on the crisis of authority in the modern age. This
volume is an indispensable part of that task, and it deserves widespread
and careful scrutiny.
- DONALD SCHOONMAKER