Numéro thématique
- ABEL Oliver - Liminaire
- RICOEUR Paul - Le pouvoir politique : fin du théologico-politique ?
- MONOD Jean-Claude - Le dédoublement théologico-politique Un triangle Schmitt-Ricœur-Lefort ?
- MONTEIL Pierre-Olivier - Théologico-politique, démocratie, modernité
- DUMONT Aurore - Paul Ricœur ou le théologico-politique au miroir des Écritures. De déplacement en déplacement : décentrement d’un problème
- TETAZ Jean-Marc - L’autorité du pouvoir-en-commun. La nouvelle théologie politique de Paul Ricœur
Theoligico-Political duplication. A Schmitt-Ricoeur-Lefort triangle?
This study undertakes to place Paul ricœur’s conference “Political power: the end of the theologico-Political?” (1992), published in the present edition, between two poles: the thesis of a structural continuation between theological and modern political concepts, which echoes the comprehension of political theology advanced by Carl Schmitt, is balanced by the determination to take note of a rupture represented by the advent of cooperative and horizontal power. This second pole implies a discussion of Claude Lefort’s thesis of the end of the theologico-Political and a reinterpretation by Paul Ricœur of the various forms of political theology.
Theologico-Political, democracy, modernity
In this article, the author views Paul ricœur’s proposition in his 1992 conference, “Political power: the end of the theologico-Political?”, published in the present edition, with respect to other texts he published on the subject, at the same period or beforehand, in order to pick out continuations and discontinuations of his thinking on this theme. Apart from his concept of the theologico-Political, this study analyses the consequences it brings to his comprehension of democracy, with the rehabilitation of the horizontal link of power. This approach extends onto the subject of modernity, point on which the agreement with claude Lefort on the foundation void, in 1992, is later modified.
Rereading Paul Ricœur’s proposition in his 1992 conference, “Political power: the end of the Theologico-Political?”, published in the present edition, the author remarks that, simply by the use of hermeneutics implied in this text, the philosopher displaces the Theologico-Political coordinates and invites the reader to reply to the call sent to him, in the matter of politics, by the Scriptures. The implementation of a political theology that gives precedence to horizontality over domination supposes general and biblical hermeneutics, acknowledging and valorizing biblical polyphony. This is a necessary condition for the advent of a new subject and a new political community.
The authority of power-in-common. Paul Ricœur’s new political theology
Having pinpointed the difficulties in interpretation of Paul Ricœur’s conference “Political power: the end of the Theologico-Political?” (1992), published in the present edition, the author shows that Ricœur’s reflections on the Theologico-Political are part of a triangle defined by the names Claude Lefort, Hannah Arendt and John Rawls. The question resulting from the confrontation of the first two is the deficit in the legitimisation of democracy. Because Ricœur refuses Lefort’s position seeing in democracy a political form in which the place of power is void, he proposes the concept of a new form of political theology of which the subject would be the ecclesial community. This new political theology would show in its practices the power-in-common, the origin of political power. Following Rawls, Ricœur proposes finding in the specific “way of life” of the ecclesial communities the moral source of the concept of justice which organises democratic societies. This is why Ricœur’s new political theology is part of the consensus by overlap in which Rawls identifies the mode in which the different concepts of good present in pluralist societies contribute to the stabilisation of the concept of justice.