The republicanism of Philip Pettit in times of crisis

Abstract

The literature on the long tradition of republicanism has burgeoned in the past few decades. Republicanism with its distinctive theoretical and historical features distinguishes itself from other familiar political theories such as populism and liberalism. The idiosyncratic element in Philip Pettit’s idea of republicanism is its special concern for liberty as non-domination. The concept of domination simply denotes arbitrary interference of one’s affairs and differs from the liberal definition of liberty as non-interference. It is the central republican concept that determines many aspects of republicanism, including its understanding of the law. In western political theory on republican ideals, there are some missing points regarding the relationship between law and republicanism. Therefore, the theoretical relationship between domination and law should be established. I argue that this conceptual relation can only be understood in terms of critical thinking that could possibly be directed against both republicanism and its hegemonic rival, liberalism. In this respect, we must have recourse to a controversial figure, Carl Schmitt in order to assess the vulnerability of republicanism to his criticisms of liberalism. Thus, the thesis question is the following: To what extent Pettit’s republicanism is vulnerable to the two criticisms of liberalism addressed by Schmitt. The first one is that liberalism as a neutral worldview has no existential enemy. Second, liberalism has no ideological capacity to respond to the state of exception. From Pettit’s republican perspective, I will conclude that Pettit’s neo-republicanism is not as sensitive as liberalism to the Schmittian criticisms and has substantial theoretical resources to defy such criticisms via stressing its ideological and conservative character.