Taking Modernity to Extremes: On the Roots of Anti-Politics

Abstract

The term anti-politics has been used in recent years as never before. However, the concept is used to describe political phenomena and actors that appear at first sight to be mutually exclusive. Starting from the difficulties in defining anti-politics, the main goal of the article is to elucidate its intellectual roots, showing that it is a kind of shadow of modern politics, mirroring its many forms. From an examination of Thomas Hobbes’ political philosophy, it will be shown that anti-politics was born at a moment when politics was no longer seen as a natural condition of social life, but an artificial construct that can be dismantled and reassembled. By no means coincidentally, the main manifestations of anti-politics are nothing but the radical and destructive reinterpretation of what Max Weber identifies as the three “inner justifications” of political authority (i.e. tradition, charisma, competence). Although Weber lays down those principles as underpinning political authority in ancient and modern times, the contention of this article is that they can only be used to deny the legitimacy of politics once this comes to be seen as an artifice that can be taken to pieces and put together again: in short, in the modern era.