the godfathers of truth_weber_schmitt

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Review of International Studies (1998), 24, 185–200 Copyright © British International Studies Association

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* I would like to thank Professor Fred Halliday for introducing Carl Schmitt’s ideas to me andencouraging me to write this article. Many thanks also to Dr Christopher Coker and Henrik Thunefor many fruitful discussions, and my parents, Karen Lüdtke, Elena Jurado and Anna Bertmar fortheir help.

1 Hans J. Morgenthau, Politics among Nations: The Struggle for Power and Peace, 3rd edn (New York,1960), p. 4 (my emphasis). Unless otherwise indicated, all subsequent quotations are from this edition.

2 Max Weber, The Methodology of the Social Sciences (New York, 1949). See also Wissenschaft alsBeruf, Politik als Beruf (Science as a Vocation, Politics as a Vocation), ed. W. J. Mommsen and W.Schluchter (Tübingen, 1992). I refer to this German edition since it was important for me to readWeber’s original text. Quotations in English are my own translations.

3 Hans J. Morgenthau, ‘Fragment of an Intellectual Autobiography: 1904–1932’, in KennethThompson and Robert J. Myers, Truth and Tragedy: A Tribute to Hans J. Morgenthau (New

Brunswick, NJ, and London, 1984), p. 7. The article was written in 1976 and first published in 1977.4 See, e.g., Morgenthau’s first book in the USA, Scientific Man vs. Power Politics (Chicago, 1946), and

his article ‘The Purpose of Political Science’, in James C. Charlesworth (ed.), A Design for Political Science: Scope, Objectives and Methods (Philadelphia, PA, 1966), pp. 63–79.

The godfathers of ‘truth’: Max Weber andCarl Schmitt in Morgenthau’s theory of power politics*H A N S - K A R L P I C H L E R

Abstract. The article uncovers the intellectual link between Morgenthau’s theory of powerpolitics and the German thinkers Max Weber and Carl Schmitt. Through this it sheds light onthe forceful claims to objectivity contained in Morgenthau’s theory of power politics. Theauthor reveals how, by combining Schmitt’s ideas of ‘the Political’ with Weber’s ideas on theobjectivity of social science, Morgenthau finds an elegant way to overcome the value-

determinacy of social science. This enables him to assert the objectivity of (international)political science. The same arguments allow Morgenthau also to formulate a moral defence of the state.

A striking feature of Hans Morgenthau’s books and articles is their extraordinarilypersuasive language. It seduces the reader to believe that the theories contained inthem are an ‘objective’ and ‘true’ reflection of the workings of international politics.Throughout the pages of his main work, Politics among Nations, Morgenthau inces-santly reminds the reader that his writing is about ‘the theoretical concern withhuman nature as it actually is, and with the historic processes as they actually takeplace’.1 Yet Morgenthau’s objectivity is more asserted than proven. He fails toprovide epistemological arguments for his claims to objectivity. The ‘objectivity’ of the social sciences had been criticized and qualified by Max Weber in his famousmethodological contribution made in the first decades of the twentieth century.2 Itseems peculiar that Morgenthau who, as we know from his writings, was a keenfollower of Weber3 asserts the existence of the perennial and objective laws of international politics without supporting or qualifying his claim.4

The aim of this article is to understand why and how Morgenthau, in Politicsamong Nations, throws the Weberian limitations on the objectivity of the socialsciences overboard and indulges in absolute statements. This investigation will show



that Morgenthau’s solution to the value-determinacy of social science lies in hisconception of politics as a realm of perpetual conflict and struggle for power anddomination. Interpreting international politics this way, the supreme valued end, i.e.,the national interest, pursued by all state-leaders becomes national self-preservation.The isolation of this single value, which constitutes a defining feature of inter-

national politics, allows Morgenthau to overcome the dilemma of the value-determinacy of social science, analyse international politics ‘objectively’ in theabstract and draw universal patterns from it. Morgenthau’s ideas on the nature of politics and ‘the Political’, as this article will show, were informed by the Germanpolitical thinker Carl Schmitt. Schmitt developed his conception of ‘the Political’ inthe 1920s, when Morgenthau was still a student. By the late 1920s Schmitt’s ideas onpolitics and ‘the Political’ had already reached a wide audience, includingMorgenthau who knew Schmitt personally and refers to him on several occasions.5

Max Weber and Carl Schmitt were two of the most influential thinkers in WeimarGermany, Weber as a philosopher of science and sociologist, Schmitt for his ideas

on the essence of politics and the role of the state. Morgenthau’s intellectual rootswere grounded in the Weimar Republic, where he studied law first at the Universityof Munich and later in Berlin. In Munich he was introduced to the teachings of Max Weber. He graduated in 1929 from Berlin after completing a doctoral thesis onthe nature and limits of international law.6 In 1932 he left Germany out of fear of the imminent Nazi regime and, together with his wife, moved to Geneva where hetaught at the university. Five years later they emigrated to the United States. Afterworking for a brief period at Brooklyn College in New York, Morgenthau gained alectureship in law and European politics at the University of Kansas City. In 1943 hefound a permanent position at Chicago University. It was here that he wrote Politics

among Nations, his most famous work and the one upon which most of the analysisof this article is based.

The intellectual link between Morgenthau, Weber and Schmitt has already beenidentified in IR literature.7 I would like to build on this research by tracing the simi-larities between Morgenthau’s thinking and that of Weber and Schmitt respectively,and by showing how, through his conception of ‘the Political’ and thus of inter-national politics, Morgenthau was able to overcome the value dilemma of

186 Hans-Karl Pichler

5 Morgenthau writes about his meeting with Schmitt in ‘Fragment of an Intellectual Autobiography’.Moreover, Christoph Frei, in his excellent intellectual biography on Morgenthau, has scrutinizedMorgenthau’s unpublished diaries and articles and discovered several manuscripts in which he talksabout Schmitt. See Christoph Frei, Hans J. Morgenthau: Eine intellektuelle Biographie, 2nd edn (Bern,Stuttgart and Vienna, 1994). Frei argues that Nietzsche also had a strong influence on Morgenthau’sthinking. Among the influences he attributes to Nietzsche are Morgenthau’s conception of the ‘tragic’in life, and the idea that politics, just like life in general, is a permanent struggle either for survival orfor recognition. As Frei reveals, Morgenthau’s diaries contain several references to Nietzsche. On oneoccasion Morgenthau writes: ‘One should make it a duty for oneself to read Nietzsche three times aday. Perhaps then one would live in a greater way and achieve greater and higher things’. Quoted inFrei, Hans J. Morgenthau, p. 102 (my translation).

6 Hans J. Morgenthau, Die internationale Rechtspflege, ihr Wesen und ihre Grenzen (The Nature andLimits of International Law) (Leipzig, 1929).

7 For a discussion see Alfons Söllner, ‘German Conservatism in America: Morgenthau’s PoliticalRealism’, Telos, 72 (Summer 1987), pp. 161–77. For Weber and Morgenthau see Jim George,

Discourses of Global Politics: A Critical (Re)Introduction to International Relations (Boulder, CO,1994); Stephen P. Turner and Regis A. Factor, Max Weber and the Dispute over Reason and Value(Tampa, FL, 1984); and Michael J. Smith, Realist Thought from Weber to Kissinger (Baton Rouge,LA, and London, 1986), pp. 134–65.



political/social science, as outlined by Weber. This article does not claim thatMorgenthau consciously tried to resolve this dilemma. It merely shows that it ispossible to make a strong case for the ‘objectivity’ of Morgenthau’s theory of inter-national politics from within the framework of his methodological thinking and thedefinition of ‘the Political’.

From a methodological point of view my analysis will consist mainly in drawingtheoretical and textual parallels between Morgenthau and Schmitt. These will besupplemented by biographical data on Morgenthau’s relationship to Weber andSchmitt.8 Most of my analysis is based on the claims contained in Morgenthau’s ‘SixPrinciples of Political Realism’ which can be seen as the theoretical manifesto of hisbody of thought.9 My attempt to lay out the intellectual origins of Morgenthau’sthought does not imply a defence or justification of his theory. Rather, the unearthingof Morgenthau’s intellectual origins makes it possible to embed his ideas in theGerman intellectual tradition, thereby denaturalizing him as an ‘American’ thinker.

The problem of objectivity and values

From the very beginning of Politics among Nations, Morgenthau overwhelms thereader with dogmas about realism’s quest for objectivity: ‘Politics, like society ingeneral, is governed by objective laws that have their roots in human nature.’ Hence,‘in order to improve society, it is first necessary to understand the laws by whichsociety lives’.10 After objectivity and objective laws we encounter a furthercontentious notion: truth. Political realism, Morgenthau states without further

clarification, ‘believes in the ability of distinguishing in politics between truth andopinion’.11 From ‘truth’ Morgenthau derives ‘theory’ which ‘consists in ascertainingfacts and giving them meaning through reason. It is the testing of this rational

Godfathers of ‘truth’ 187

8 I am indebted to Christoph Frei’s biography of Morgenthau for most of the evidence on therelationship between the two men.

9 Although the six principles do not appear until the second edition of Politics among Nations (1954),they constitute a summary of the epistemological and ontological assumptions on whichMorgenthau’s work is based. Excerpts from the six principles, taken from the second edition of Politics among Nations, pp. 4–14, are listed below.

1st principle: ‘Political realism believes that politics, like society in general, is governed by objectivescientific laws that have their roots in human nature.’

2nd principle: ‘The main signpost that helps political realism to find its way through the landscapeof international politics is the concept of interest defined in terms of power.’

3rd principle: ‘Realism does not endow its key concept of interest defined as power with a meaningthat is fixed once and for all. The idea of interest is indeed of the essence of politics and is unaffectedby the circumstances of time and space’.

4th principle: ‘Political realism is aware of the moral significance of political action. It is also awareof the ineluctable tension between the moral command and the requirements of successful politicalaction.’

5th principle: ‘Political realism refuses to identify the moral aspirations of a particular nation withthe moral laws that govern the universe. As it distinguishes between truth and opinion, so itdistinguishes between truth and idolatry’.

6th principle: ‘Intellectually, the political realist maintains the autonomy of the political sphere, asthe economist, the lawyer, the moralist maintain theirs.’10 Morgenthau, Politics among Nations, p. 4.11 Ibid.



hypothesis against the actual facts and their consequences that gives meaning to thefacts of international politics and makes a theory of politics possible.’12

Morgenthau believes that there is an ‘objective’ order in international politics. It is‘the concept of interest defined as power [that] infuses rational order into the subjectmatter of politics, and thus makes the theoretical understanding of politics

possible’.13 From this, Morgenthau draws the methodological definition of realismas a school of thought: ‘A realist theory of international politics, then, will guardagainst two popular fallacies: the concern with motives and the concern withideological preferences.’14 In other words, realism provides a value-free and objectiveanalysis of international politics.

Morgenthau’s acknowledgement of Weber’s influence is brief but compelling. He justified his admiration for Weber in the following terms: ‘While as a citizen he was apassionate observer of the political scene and a frustrated participant in it, as ascholar he looked at politics without passion and pursued no political purposebeyond the intellectual one of understanding.’15 As Christoph Frei shows,

Morgenthau was introduced to the teachings of Max Weber first in 1925, when heread Weber’s Science as a Vocation, Politics as a Vocation. More significant thanMorgenthau’s autobiographical references is the Weberian influence on his thoughton the methodology of the social sciences, discussed below.

Weber: science versus politics

Through science, Weber argues, it has become possible to understand the world

objectively. The price for this ability is, however, the ‘disenchantment’ of the world,the belief that ‘in principle there are no unaccountable and mysterious powers anylonger’ and that ‘one can, in principle, control all things through calculation’.16

Science, and by this term he refers to natural science as well as social science,destroys the religious and magical ideas about the meaning of life and the worldwithout being able to replace them. ‘Who—apart from a few big kids, as there areespecially in the natural sciences—still believes today that the discoveries inastronomy or biology or physics or chemistry can tell us something about themeaning of life, or better, could even just tell us: how one could go about finding thetraces of this “meaning”, if it exists at all.’17 Science is limited to telling people

about the facts of the world. Unlike religion, it cannot provide them with anultimate explanation for their existence. The ‘liberation from the rationality andintellectuality of science is the fundamental precondition for a life in communionwith the divine’.18 Scientists do not ask ‘whether the world they describe has a rightof existence: whether it has a “meaning” and whether it makes sense to live in it’.19 If


12 Morgenthau, Politics among Nations, p. 5.13 Ibid., pp. 5–6.14 Ibid., p. 6.15 Morgenthau, ‘Fragment of an Intellectual Autobiography’, p. 7.16 Weber, Wissenschaft als Beruf, Politik als Beruf , p. 87.17 Ibid., p. 92.18 Ibid.19 Ibid., p. 94.



they are real scientists, they concentrate exclusively on facts. They can only tell whatone must do in order to achieve a chosen end, not what one ought to do in a moralsense. The scientist must realize ‘that the ascertaining of facts, the identification of mathematical or logical facts’ and the formulation of an answer to the question ‘howone should act within the cultural community and the political associations are two

completely heterogeneous problems . . . Whenever the man of science introduces hispersonal value-judgement, a full understanding of the facts ceases.’20 Hence, thesocial scientist cannot give normative and ethical advice. To the ethical question,‘Does the end justify the means?’, Weber replies, ‘If he does not want to become ademagogue the teacher can only emphasise the necessity of this question.’21

Politics, on the other hand, is the realm where people pursue their personalinterests. Since politicians choose their actions according to their opinions(Gesinnungen) and opinions are always formed by personal values, politics cannot beobjective in its judgments. The social scientist must beware of political involvement,since ‘politics does not belong to the lecture hall, especially if the lecturer engages

scientifically in politics’.22 For Weber the search for value-free politics is futile. Anypolitical problem allows several solutions, depending on the number of availablevalued ends. Nevertheless, science and politics can support each other. It is the dutyof social science to assess critically the practical judgments of politicians throughrational and empirical methods, and of politics to expose itself to scientific criticism.‘All actions, the political ones in particular, must let themselves be irritated byscience through the debate about values and be corrected through the confrontationwith disagreeable facts.’23

In On Methodology, however, Weber takes a step back from this scientificenthusiasm. ‘The objective validity of all empirical knowledge rests exclusively upon

the ordering of a given reality according to categories which are subjective in aspecific sense, namely, in that they present the presuppositions of our knowledge andare based on the presupposition of the value of those truths which empiricalknowledge alone is able to give us . . . It should be remembered that the belief in thevalue of scientific truth is the product of certain cultures and is not a product of man’s original nature.’24 The analysis of social reality, Weber now argues, is not onlyculture-specific, but also influenced by the personal value orientations and interestsof the social scientist. Social reality is informed by the values held by the peopleinvolved. Since these values are difficult to detect in the analysis of social processes,any scientific analysis of these processes will be conditioned by these values and

unable to reach objectivity. Weber writes: ‘The “objectivity” of the social sciencesdepends rather on the fact that the empirical data are always related to thoseevaluative ideas which alone make them worth knowing and the significance of theempirical data is derived from these evaluative ideas.’25 To assess the validity of values, however, is beyond the powers of science. ‘These evaluative ideas are for their


20 Ibid., pp. 97, 98.21 Ibid., p. 103.22 Ibid., p. 96.23

W. Schluchter, Wertfreiheit und Verantwortungsethik: Zum Verhältnis von Wissenschaft und Politik bei Max Weber (Tübingen, 1971), p. 26.24 Max Weber, Methodology, p. 110.25 Ibid., p. 111.



part empirically discoverable . . . but their validity can not be deduced fromempirical data as such.’26

These statements seem to contradict those made in Science as a Vocation, Politicsas a Vocation. If values inform people’s interests as well as social scientists’ analysis,how can scientific analysis ever be more than a subjective and limited interpretation

of events? The puzzle can be solved by qualifying Weber’s conception of objectivity.Weber’s objectivity is directed only towards the past. If social reality is informed bythe changing values of a large number of players, it is impossible to predict in whichdirection it will evolve. With past events, history that is, objectivity is possible,because events can no longer change. They are thus open to the scrutiny of thesocial scientist, who, in patient labour, explores all facets of the different motiva-tional forces lying beneath a particular historical event until its dynamics and itssignificance become comprehensible. Moreover, with past events it is easier for thesocial scientist to evaluate the influence of his/her own value orientations on theoutcome of the analysis, as the event does not stand in such an immediate relation

to his/her own personal interests. Weber’s social science is historical science. It is notbased on scientific relativism. In Weber’s own words: ‘Now all this [i.e. what he hadsaid about the value-determinacy of social science] should not be misunderstood tomean that the proper task of the social sciences should be the continual chase fornew view-points and new analytical constructs. On the contrary: nothing should bemore sharply emphasised than the proposition that the knowledge of the cultural significance of concrete historical events and patterns is exclusively and solely the finalend which, among other means, concept-construction and the criticism of constructsalso seek to serve.’27 Social science, as long as it remains historical science, can beobjective. However, this objectivity is possible only with regard to a specific event

and never to social reality as a whole in a generalizing fashion.Morgenthau’s views on the possibility of objectivity in social science are almost

identical with those of Weber. And yet Politics among Nations is packed with claimsto absolute objectivity. The first of the ‘Six Principles of Political Realism’ openswith the statement: ‘Political realism believes that politics, like society in general, isgoverned by objective laws that have their roots in human nature.’28 The nextsubsection will try to explain this apparent contradiction.

Morgenthau: realism’s quest for objectivity

The similarity of Morgenthau’s views to those of Weber becomes apparent in somepassages of Scientific Man vs. Power Politics, published in 1946, two years beforePolitics among Nations. In this work, which can be seen as a critique of the positivisttradition of social science in the USA, Morganthau writes: ‘The social sciences can,at best, present a series of hypothetical possibilities, each of which may occur undercertain conditions. Which of them will actually occur is anybody’s guess.’29 Thesocial world, Morgenthau argues, is too complex to be analysed and understood


26 Ibid.27 Ibid.28 Morgenthau, Politics among Nations, p. 4 (my emphasis).29 Morgenthau, Scientific Man vs. Power Politics, p. 130.



through scientific laws. Because the social scientist is not fully informed about thevalue orientations of the people involved in the specific social process under investi-gation, he/she is necessarily limited to guessing the outcome. He shares Weber’s viewon the nature of values and the impossibility of judging them scientifically. Only theindividual can decide on these matters. In an unpublished manuscript, written in

1937 and carrying the illustrative title ‘Kann in unserer Zeit eine objektiveMoralordnung aufgestellt werden?’ (‘Can an Objective Moral Order Still Be Createdin our Times?’), Morgenthau writes: ‘We live in a crisis of metaphysical conscious-ness . . . This insight bans morality into that realm within which alone it can stillexist in objectivity today: the human soul.’30 Morgenthau also shares Weber’s viewthat the judgment of the social scientist is influenced by his/her own values and bythe social environment he/she lives in. ‘The mind of the political scientist is mouldedby the society which he observes . . . The truth which a mind thus sociallyconditioned is able to grasp is likewise socially conditioned.’31

In Power among Nations, however, Morgenthau speaks of the universal laws of

politics. How can this apparent contradiction be explained? I believe that the answerlies in Morgenthau’s conception of the nature of international politics and hisdefinition of ‘the Political’. The essence of ‘the Political’, and its determiningfeature, is conflict arising from the struggle for power. In ‘The Purpose of PoliticalScience’ Morgenthau argues: ‘Why is it that all men lust for power? . . . Aside fromfundamental philosophical questions such as these, the content of political sciencecannot be determined a priori and in the abstract.’32 The struggle for power con-stitutes a fundamental question of life and, since Morgenthau believes it to be aninnate urge in man, also a fundamental dynamic of social interaction. In the ensuingconflict, the weaker will be subjugated by the stronger. By defining the struggle for

power as a dynamic a priori and fundamental to political and social reality,Morgenthau finds a way to resolve the problem of objectivity in the analysis of social reality. On this ‘lowest level of social interaction’, he argues, a scientificanalysis of society is possible.33

International politics is also determined by the struggle for power. Due to theabsence of an international government, an anarchical condition defines interstaterelations. This reduces international law to little more than an accessory in a chaoticworld ruled by the fittest. In order to guarantee their self-preservation, states mustdirect all their resources towards power maximization. Since international politicsremains on the fundamental level of the struggle for power, an objective analysis is

possible. In Politics among Nations Morgenthau writes: ‘We assume that statesmenthink and act in terms of interest defined as power, and the evidence of history bearsthat assumption out. That assumption allows us to retrace and anticipate, as it were,the steps a statesman—past, present, or future—has taken or will take on thepolitical scene.’34


30 Hans J. Morgenthau, ‘Kann in unserer Zeit eine objektive Moralordnung aufgestellt werden?’,unpublished ms., Geneva, 1937, p. 114, quoted in Frei, Hans J. Morgenthau, p. 187 (my translation).

31 Morgenthau, ‘Purpose of Political Science’, p. 68.32

Ibid., p. 75.33 Morgenthau, Scientific Man vs. Power Politics, p. 130.34 Hans J. Morgenthau, Politics among Nations: The Struggle for Power and Peace, 2nd edn (New York,

1954), p. 5 (my emphasis).



However, there is a further way in which Morgenthau can justify his claims to theobjectivity of his theories. By isolating national self-preservation, and with it powermaximization, as the supreme valued end (the national interest) of all state leadersin international politics, Morgenthau is able to overcome the problem of the value-determinacy of social and political science because all state-leaders cannot but

pursue this one valued end. If this is so, the social scientist is not distracted by thecomplexity of value orientations present in social dynamics pursuing, for instance,such ends as a ‘good life’. The possible outcomes of the struggle for power and self-preservation are neither culturally relative nor dependent on the interpretation of the social scientist. Only two options exist: the state either survives or it perishes.Any analysis of international politics cannot but move between these two extremes,both of which are easily identifiable and unambiguous.

While this uncovers the logic behind Morgenthau’s calls for power maximization,it is still necessary to explain why Morgenthau defines international politics as arealm of perpetual struggle for power and argues so forcefully for the preservation of

the state. For answers to these questions one needs to look at the origins of Morgenthau’s ideas on the nature of politics. It is here that Carl Schmitt enters thepicture. Morgenthau was deeply influenced by Schmitt in his conception of politicsin general and ‘the Political’ in particular. This assertion is based on two facts.Firstly, Morgenthau’s and Schmitt’s definitions of ‘the Political’ are very similar.Secondly, Morgenthau knew Schmitt personally and tried, as we know from hisdiaries and articles, to expand on Schmitt’s ideas on the topic.35 Morgenthau andSchmitt met in Berlin in 1929. According to Morgenthau, the meeting was a disaster,with Schmitt talking incessantly and Morgenthau not really having a chance to putforward his views. Later Morgenthau writes: ‘The disappointment was total. When I

walked down the stairs from Schmitt’s apartment, I stopped on the landing betweenhis and the next floor and said to myself: Now I have just met the most evil manalive.’36

In an attempt to find answers to the questions raised above, the next section willillustrate Schmitt’s ideas and then compare them with Morgenthau’s.

The nature of the political

Schmitt’s ideas about ‘the Political’ are a response to the modern liberal state ingeneral and the difficulties of parliamentary democracy in the Weimar Republic in


35 See Morgenthau, ‘Fragment of an Intellectual Autobiography’. Further remarks on Schmitt arecontained in unpublished manuscripts. Among them are Morgenthau’s inauguration speech atGeneva University, ‘Der Kampf der deutschen Staatslehre um die Wirklichkeit des Staates’ (TheStruggle of German Political Science for the Reality of the State) (Geneva, 1932), and ‘Über den Sinnder Wissenschaft in dieser Zeit und über die Bestimmung des Menschen’ (On the Meaning of ScienceToday and the Vocation of the Human Being) (Geneva, 1934). All these are cited in Frei, Hans J.Morgenthau.

36 Morgenthau, ‘Fragment of an Intellectual Autobiography’, p. 16. It needs to be kept in mind,

however, that this strongly negative judgment is most certainly conditioned by Morgenthau’s attemptto distance himself from German acquaintances that had been involved with the Nazi regime.Schmitt was one of them, as he was nominated ‘Staatsrat’ (counsellor of the state) by Goering in1933.



particular. The difficulty in finding a stable government coalition for Germany afterWorld War I, as well as the alleged socialist threat and the social division resultingfrom it, created a sense of confusion among many political observers. They fearedthat Germany might not be able to regain the alleged internal unity and the great-power status it had possessed before World War I. Schmitt’s ideas should be read as

a very strong and often brilliant expression of a mood which prevailed among manyintellectuals who had been educated under the pre-World War I imperial order.Schmitt, just like Morgenthau, feared that politics was disintegrating, and attributedthis process to the negative influence of liberalism.

Schmitt: conflict as the essence of ‘the Political’

Schmitt’s reflections on the nature of politics are a product of his concern that, in

the modern state of the early twentieth century, the political element was beingsupplanted by liberal, that is legalistic and pluralist, forms of social organization.Against this, Schmitt identifies conflict and struggle as the essence of ‘the Political’.He writes: ‘The political can be understood only in the context of the ever presentpossibility of the friend and enemy grouping, regardless of the aspects which thisimplies for morality, aesthetics and economics.’37 While in economics the categoriesare profitable/unprofitable and in morality good/bad, ‘the definition of the notion of the political can only be arrived at through the discovery and determination of thespecifically political categories, since the political does have its own categories’.38 Thedetermining categories of politics are the opposites of friend and enemy. Wherever

and whenever there is an enemy, ‘the Political’ exists. Although the enemy is notnecessarily morally bad or evil, it is a foe not just in a figurative sense but in a veryexistential way. ‘He simply is the other, the alien, and it is enough that in a veryexistential sense he is something so different and alien that war with him is possiblein the extreme case . . . The notions friend and enemy are to be understood in theirconcrete, existential meaning, not as metaphors or symbols.’39

Schmitt’s conception of human nature is the ultimate source of his ideas aboutpolitics. ‘All real political theories’, he holds, ‘presume the human being to be a“dangerous” and dynamic being’.40 They ‘cannot take an anthropological“optimism” as their point of departure. By abolishing the possibility of an enemy

they would also abolish any specifically political consequences.’41 If human naturewere good, in other words, ‘the Political’ would disappear.

‘The Political’ exists only where the possibility of war, within and betweensocieties, is given. ‘A world within which the possibility of war is ultimatelyeliminated, a completely pacified planet in other words, would be a world withoutthe friend/enemy divide and hence a world without politics.’42 The fact that war


37 Carl Schmitt, Der Begriff des Politischen (The Concept of the Political) (Berlin, 1963), p. 36. Allquotes made from this text are my own translations.

38 Ibid., p. 26.39

Ibid., pp. 27, 28.40 Ibid., p. 61.41 Ibid., p. 64.42 Ibid., p. 35.



occurs only exceptionally does not diminish its determining character on politics.‘The ultimate consequence of the political bloc formation into friends and enemiesbecomes real only in actual conflict. It is from this most extreme possibility that thelife of human beings derives its specific political tension.’43 Although peacefulcoexistence during normal times makes it difficult to know the friend from the

enemy, the political tension is always present beneath the surface and ready to eruptin the case of an emergency.

These strong statements need to be read in the context of Schmitt’s critique of liberalism. He blames liberal thought for obfuscating ‘the Political’ by trying toreduce it to the status of other realms in society such as economics or culture. Theliberal argument for pluralism and the basic equality of all associations in the state,Schmitt argues, is derived from the observation that individuals, in their private lives,live in a whole variety of relationships and associations at any one time. For Schmittthis analogy is flawed because it neglects the difference between the individual andthe state and denies the political unity of the state.

Schmitt is not anti-democratic. His critique is directed against what he believes tobe the liberal conception of politics. While democracy makes everything political byincluding all facets of life and all people in the political process, liberalism tries toprivatize the public sphere. ‘In liberal thinking the political concept of conflict istransformed into economic competition and intellectual debate. In place of a cleardistinction between the two conditions “war” and “peace” appear the dynamics of perpetual competition and perpetual discussion. Hence the state turns intosociety’.44 Schmitt considers this process dangerous because it neglects thepossibility of an inner or outer enemy.

If liberalism were given a free hand, the state’s role would be reduced to ‘playing

one association out against the other in the name of the free individual and hisfreedom of relationships, whereby all questions are decided upon from theperspective of the individual’.45 By curtailing the realm of state authority, liberalismendangers the welfare of the people. In a world governed by liberal principles, ‘theremight be very interesting opposites and contrasts, competitions and intrigues of allsorts, but never an opposition of such force as to justify the demand on people tosacrifice their own life and to give people the inner strength to shed their own bloodand kill others’.46 The consequences of forgetting that struggle is the essence of ‘thePolitical’ may be lethal. ‘If a people is afraid of the risks entailed in a politicalexistence another people will easily be found which will relieve it from its troubles by

assuming the role of “protector” and thereby gain political power over it.’47This extreme situation Schmitt defines as the case of emergency

(Ausnahmezustand). In a situation of such imminent existential danger, there needsto be a sovereign able to defend society and restore order. In the modern era thisduty falls on the state since it alone can create the political unity necessary for thedefence of society. The state decides upon the existence or non-existence of theenemy and yields the jus belli , the right to decide upon the lives of the citizens. Forextreme cases of peril, Schmitt envisages a ‘commissarial dictatorship’ whose duty it


43 Ibid.44 Ibid., pp. 70–1.45 Ibid., p. 45.46 Ibid., pp. 35–6.47 Ibid., p. 53.



is to restore peace and order. Once the existential threat is over, however, thedictatorship is to hand executive power back to the constitutional government. ForSchmitt the emergency is never the rule, as it is with Fascism and Nazism.48

Schmitt criticizes liberalism for destroying political unity within the state byfragmenting society. ‘The political unity must, if necessary, demand the sacrifice of

life. For the individualism of liberal thought this claim is impossible to reach’.49 If unity within society ceases to exist, ‘the Political’ vanishes with it. This does notmean that all details of the life of the people in the state are determined by thesovereign and by ‘the Political’. Economic, social, cultural and moral associations allexist under the rule of law. However, ‘every religious, moral, economic, ethical orother antithesis transforms itself into a political one if it is sufficiently strong todivide human beings into friends and enemies’.50 In other words, the possibility of conflict and, ultimately, the case of emergency can never be excluded and lies behindall forms of social life.

However, in his theory of ‘the Political’ and the case of emergency Schmitt leaves

two fundamental questions unanswered: why is conflict the essence of ‘the Political’and why is it that ‘the Political’ is always present? Both these questions find ananswer in Morgenthau’s theory of ‘the Political’.

Morgenthau: ‘the Political’ as the key to objectivity

Some of Morgenthau’s earliest, and very ‘Schmittian’, comments on the nature of ‘the Political’ are contained in his doctoral thesis on international law, written in

1929. Herein, Morgenthau argues that ‘political questions in the area of interstaterelations are questions that influence the individuality of one state against that of others and are related to the preservation and assertion of that individuality withinthe community of states’.51 He argues that the scope of international law is neces-sarily limited because there is no political power to enforce it. According toMorgenthau, the belief that international law will solve the problems of inter-national politics is short-sighted and based on a wrong understanding of the natureof ‘the Political’. The struggle for power will push states into violent conflict witheach other.

Why is ‘the Political’ defined as struggle for power leading to conflict? In search

for an answer, Morgenthau turns to the individual. ‘The most basic fact of existencewhich cannot be subdivided further is the fact of life itself . . . Before and in allcombinations of human motivation there is one basic force: the impulse for lifewhich strives for survival and recognition.’52 The achievement of either aim, survivalor recognition, Morgenthau argues, requires power, but with one crucial difference.While the struggle for survival is the result of a lack of power, the search forrecognition is the product of an excess of power. Both are natural and innate urges.


48 Paul Hirst, ‘Schmitt: Enemy or Foe?’, Telos, 72 (Summer 1987), p. 21.49 Schmitt, Der Begriff des Politischen, pp. 70, 45.50

Ibid., p. 37.51 Morgenthau, Die internationale Rechtspflege, pp. 59–60.52 Hans J. Morgenthau, Über die Herkunft des Politischen aus dem Wesen des Menschen , p. 10, quoted in

Frei, Hans J. Morgenthau, pp. 132–3 (my translation).



In Morgenthau’s words, ‘the struggle for power is universal in time and space and isan undeniable fact of experience.’53 Apart from referring dogmatically to experience,Morgenthau delivers no proof for this anthropological statement. He merely assertsthat ‘it is the most convincing element of human motivation’.54 If the struggle forpower is an innate urge of human beings it follows that ‘the Political is to be under-

stood as a force that exists within the individual and is necessarily directed towardsother people in the form of “a desire for power”.’55

The meaning of the term ‘power’ is left open by Morgenthau. In Science: Servantor Master? he remarks that everyone always strives for power, the scholar seekingknowledge, the mountaineer climbing a rock-face, the poet trying to catch theessence of life in words. The struggle for power is thus omnipresent. Yet, not allthese manifestations of the struggle for power are also political. It is only ‘when they[the people] choose as their object other men that they enter the political sphere’.56

In opposition to the struggle for power, ‘the Political’ is not always present. Itappears only when the struggle for power is directed against other human beings,

not against the natural world. With this statement, the struggle for power acquires asocial dimension. It moves from the purely personal and individual level onto thesocial plain. As a dynamic between people, the struggle for power becomes socialconflict, i.e., politics. This explains why Morgenthau defines ‘the Political’ as ‘thepoint of reference of all social activity’.57 In defining ‘the Political’ this way,Morgenthau, unlike Schmitt, identifies both the origin of ‘the Political’ and theconditions under which it appears. Schmitt considers ‘the Political’ only in relationto the state and does not talk about its origins. Morgenthau realized this short-coming early on. In an unpublished article written in 1930, he remarks that thoughhe admires Schmitt’s ‘exceptional mental intensity and reliable instinct’, it was a pity

that ‘instead of penetrating to the deepest roots of the reality of the state, he stopshalf way’.58

Morgenthau defines ‘the Political’ not as something fixed, but as a property that iskept to a higher or a lower degree, just as bodies keep heat. However, there is adifference: one can measure the degree of a body’s temperature with the help of amercury column and a scale. In the area of ‘the Political’, such an objective standarddoes not exist. The specific political element thus consists ‘in the degree of intensitywith which a matter of state activity can be related to the individuality of the stateitself . . . Questions on which the preservation of the existence of the state depends,obviously stand in the closest imaginable relation to the individuality of the state.’59

The idea that ‘the Political’ manifests itself in varying degrees of intensity is anextension of Schmitt’s notion of ‘the Political’, which is confined to the criteria of the friend/enemy distinction. Schmitt was so impressed by this addition to his own


53 Morgenthau, Politics among Nations, p. 33.54 Morgenthau, Über die Herkunft des Politischen, p. 10, quoted in Frei, Hans J. Morgenthau, pp. 132–3

(my translation).55 Morgenthau, Über die Herkunft des Politischen, p. 9, quoted in Frei, Hans J. Morgenthau, p. 132 (my

translation).56 Hans J. Morgenthau, Science: Servant or Master? (New York, 1972), p. 31.57 Hans J. Morgenthau, diary entry, 31 May 1930, quoted in Frei, Hans J. Morgenthau, p. 180 (my

translation).58 Morgenthau, Über die Herkunft des Politischen, p. 25, quoted in Frei, Hans J. Morgenthau, p. 124 (my

translation).59 Morgenthau, Die internationale Rechtspflege, pp. 70–1.



theory that he congratulated Morgenthau on it in writing. This event was also thereason for their meeting in Berlin in 1929.60

Morgenthau’s thought on ‘the Political’ matches Schmitt’s on most other points.Firstly, both share the view that everything is potentially political. For Morgenthauthe precondition is only that someone’s search for power is directed towards another

human being. Whether this occurs in the field of art or of politics per se is irrelevant.Schmitt’s view is identical.61 Secondly, both thinkers use similar arguments in theircritique of liberalism. In words that could be taken from Schmitt, Morgenthauwrites: ‘Under the impact of nineteenth century liberalism, Anglo-American societyhas been strongly influenced, and at times dominated, by a philosophy that deniespolitics a prominent and honourable place in the order of things. Politics as conflictof interests decided through a struggle for power is here regarded as an ephemeralphenomenon, a kind of residue of either aristocratic or capitalistic society, for thetime being to be pushed into a corner fenced off by constitutional safeguards andultimately to be abolished altogether.’62 Finally, Morgenthau also shares Schmitt’s

negative view of human nature. ‘The drives to live, to propagate, and to dominateare common to all men.’

This claim to the universality of the struggle for power lends him the basicargument for defining international politics as a realm of power politics. Since thestruggle for power is a basic feature of human life, Morgenthau asks, ‘is it surprisingthat international politics is of necessity power politics?’63 where ‘the absence of anyform of rational regulation makes violence into the measure and the means of proof for the position of a state’.64 Hence, in interstate relations Schmitt’s case of emergency, defined as a situation of existential conflict, becomes the norm.

If the case of emergency is the norm in international politics, it follows that all

political thinking and advice for action in international politics must be orientedtowards the end of the preservation of the state. Since self-preservation is guaran-teed through power, it is justified to equate the national interest with the pursuit of power. National self-preservation through power maximization becomes both thekey value and the key end towards which all political resources are directed in allstates. Morgenthau writes, ‘In a world where a number of sovereign nations competewith and oppose each other for power, the foreign policies of all nations mustnecessarily refer to their survival as their minimum requirement.’65 Here lie the rootsof his famous formula, ‘International politics, like all politics, is a struggle forpower.’

Once all alternative values which state leaders might want to pursue are sub-ordinated to the maximization of power and the value of self-preservation,Morgenthau is able to claim objectivity in his analysis. As noted earlier, Weber’sargument against the objectivity of social science is that every end pursued in socialaction is informed by the values of the people involved. The social scientist canneither know all these different values nor give a judgment on them, as values are


60 Frei, Hans J. Morgenthau, p. 169.61 In Der Begriff des Politischen, p. 76, Schmitt writes, ‘[the fact] that economic differences have become

political . . . shows that the political can be reached from economics as well as from any other field’.62

Hans J. Morgenthau, The Restoration of American Politics (Chicago and London, 1962), p. 90.63 Morgenthau, Politics among Nations, p. 35.64 Morgenthau, Die internationale Rechtspflege, p. 77.65 Hans J. Morgenthau, Dilemmas of Politics (Chicago and London, 1958), p. 66.



part of the personal realm beyond the grasp of science. In Morgenthau’s theory of international politics, national self-preservation through the maximization of poweris a clear, universal value contained in the very definition of international politics.All actions in the international system exclusively serve the end of powermaximization in order to guarantee national survival. In contrast to such political

questions as ‘what is a good life?’, whose interpretation is open to a variety of different answers all conditioned by the values held by different people, national self-preservation is a fundamental and universally valid existential question which allowsonly one interpretation: the state either survives or it perishes. There is no solution inbetween. To preserve the state, state leaders must and will maximize the power of thestate. It is in their own interest to do so, because the state guarantees their personalsurvival just like that of society as a whole. Due to these conditions, all ambiguity inthe interpretation of social facts disappears.66 Like the state-leader, the socialscientist cannot but share the supreme value of self-preservation in his/her ownexistential interest. Since the social scientist’s analysis is thus informed by the same

value as that of the state leader and there is only one possible valued end, analyticalobjectivity is possible.

Finally, it is still necessary to explain why Morgenthau argues so forcefully for thepreservation of the state in Politics among Nations.67 I believe that the answer lies inhis conception of morality combined with his ideas about the nature of inter-national politics. Morgenthau believes in the existence of universal moral values andargues that ‘it is the moral duty of people of the mind today to preserve the eternalmoral ethical values in a clear conceptual order’.68 Yet, in the anarchic and violentinternational system dominated by the struggle for power, there is no room foraltruistic action and a moral life. Such a life is only possible within the state, where

sanctions guarantee the respect of moral norms and laws. Through the existentialsecurity it offers the individual and society, the state thus constitutes the only moralspace in an amoral world. If the state perishes, however, this moral realm alsodisappears. It follows that the preservation of the state is a moral act in itself.Indeed, for Morgenthau the state is not allowed to pursue any other end than itsown self-preservation, even if this can be achieved only by immoral means. In hisbook In Defense of the National Interest Morgenthau makes this point even more


66 For this logic to work it must be assumed that power maximization is a straightforward process andthat all actions of state-leaders during their public function are directed towards this goal at all times.Morgenthau is silent on this point. However, if the possibility is conceded that not all acts of thestate-leaders in international politics are directed towards the goal of power-maximization, thequestion arises how the social scientist can distinguish between those that are and those that are not.This dilemma poses a serious threat to the unity of Morgenthau’s theory of international politics andto his claims to analytical objectivity. It seems peculiar to me that Morgenthau does not expand onthis point. However, it is not within the scope of this article to investigate this question.

67 The reference to Politics among Nations is important here, as the state-centric nature of Morgenthau’stheories weakens in his later work. Already in Dilemmas of Politics, written in 1958, he makes clearthat the institution of the state is a not eternal but a particular historical manifestation of politicalorganization: ‘As long as the world is politically organized into nations, the national interest is indeedthe last word in international politics’ (p. 66, my emphasis). In ‘The Intellectual and PoliticalFunctions of Theory’, written in 1970, Morgenthau even adopts a radical critique of the state as aninstitution. In the nuclear age, he argues, the state is no longer able to protect its citizens adequately.Therefore, a new form of political organization needs to be found. See Hans J. Morgenthau, ‘The

Intellectual and Political Functions of Theory’, in James Der Derian (ed.), International Theory:Critical Investigations (London, 1995).

68 Morgenthau, ‘Kann in unserer Zeit eine objektive Moralordnung aufgestellt werden?’, p. 114, quotedin Frei, Hans J. Morgenthau, p. 187 (my translation).



resolutely: ‘And, above all, remember always that it is not only a political necessitybut a moral duty for a nation to follow in its dealings with other nations but oneguiding star, one standard for thought, one rule for action: THE NATIONALINTEREST.’ 69

If political action follows a predefined end, what is the responsibility of political

science? On this Morgenthau has a very clear prescription: ‘The task of politicalphilosophy in our age, then, is to apply the perennial truths of politics to thepolitical world for the dual purpose of understanding it and of solving itsproblems.’70 Political science is to take the role of a tutor reminding state leaders of the necessity of power maximization and trying to devise ways to escape the ‘lust’for power of other states. In sum, political science’s task is to aid the state in itsstruggle for survival.

Conclusion

This article pursued two related aims. Firstly, it uncovered the intellectual linkbetween Morgenthau, Weber and Schmitt. A close look at Morgenthau’s pre-decessors helps to shed some light on those dogmatic, power-political statementsthat are spread all over Politics among Nations. Secondly, this article showed howMorgenthau’s claims to the objectivity of his theory of international politics can be

justified from within the logic of his conceptions of social science and the nature of politics.

Morgenthau’s ideas of ‘the Political’ and international politics make sense as long

as they are seen in the context of the case of emergency, i.e., the struggle for nationalself-preservation within the international system. Beyond this they have little to say.They do not make up a general theory of international relations in terms of theeconomic, cultural, religious or social exchange between peoples and states. Today itis a truism that international relations is about more than relations between statesand their existential conflicts. For Morgenthau it was not. He never denied theexistence of relationships other than political ones within and across societies.Ultimately, however, they are all subordinated to the case of emergency. This pointallows Morgenthau to assert that international politics as a whole needs to beanalysed through the logic of the case of emergency which calls for power

maximization by any means.There are many problems with Morgenthau’s ideas about politics, and they have

been widely remarked upon.71 Most of these critiques, however, focus on theepistemological and ontological inconsistencies of Morgenthau’s theories and do notsearch for his philosophical godfathers. A genealogy of this kind inspires the readerto interpret Morgenthau’s ideas as part of a philosophical continuum, that of German political and social thought in the pre-World War II period, rather than inisolation. For instance, the idea that conflict constitutes the essence of ‘the Political’


69

Quoted in Söllner, ‘German Conservatism in America’, p. 171.70 Morgenthau, Restoration of American Politics, p. 66 (my emphasis).71 See, e.g., George, Discourses of Global Politics, and Justin Rosenberg, The Empire of Civil Society: A

Critique of the Realist Theory of International Relations (London, 1994).



was widely known and shared among German political thinkers of the 1920s and1930s, partly due to Schmitt’s influence. This explains why Morgenthau does notindulge in detailed proof of his forceful statements in this matter. As has beenshown, to him it was not only reasonable, but even obvious to argue this way.

Morgenthau has long been considered a theorist within the American positivist

tradition. The aim of this article was to cast doubt on this reading by showing howhis work was an attempt to transfer the ‘typically’ European philosophical problemsof power and domination into an American political system engulfed by liberalthought. How these ideas were transformed after being introduced into theAmerican liberal tradition is an interesting question for future research.


the godfathers of truth_weber_schmitt

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