Politics Versus the Political

In the rich and highly debated oeuvre of Carl Schmitt The Concept of the Political is one of the least ideological pieces, although his friend-enemy distinction has caused several misunderstandings. Nonetheless, The Concept of the Political by the creation of the notion of ‘the Political’ primarily seeks a theoretical answer to the question of what is the essence of late-modern politics and how it can be interpreted and defined. This essay infers that the interpretation has three parts: the concept of categorization and distinction, the intensity criterion, the state of exception and the borderline definition. The essay reconstructs Schmitt's original question and shows that his discussion of the concept of the political is, above all, the appearance and clarification of a new interpretation of politics.