CALL FOR PAPERS (closing date: 19 October 2025)
Organisers: Federico Filauri (ILCS, University of London) and Gregor Schäfer (University of Basel / ILCS, University of London)
Offers of papers are invited for a one-day workshop addressing the question of theocracy, with a focus on 20th-century continental debates on political theology. This workshop aims to bring together early and mid-career researchers along with established scholars who are engaged in exploring the nexuses, implications, underpinnings, and bearings of religiously informed political thought.
Theme and Focus
In the field of social and human sciences, it is currently generally accepted that the processes of secularization Western societies seemed to undergo following a linear trend not only display considerable differences, but appear to be questioned altogether by the resurgence of interest and importance of religious phenomena. In brief, to quote Habermas, we live in ‘post-secular’ societies – and any discourse ignoring the religious elements underpinning political theories, actions and language would fall short of understanding the complexity of the sociopolitical reality we live in.
Among the many configurations of the theologico-political tangle, the notion of ‘theocracy’ is striking in its multifaceted – and somewhat internally contradicting – features, lending the side to quasi-opposite readings, usages, interpretations. While on the one hand, ‘theocracy’ might refer to the institutionalised and accepted rule of the priestly class, on the other hand one may use the notion to point to the mystical rulership of God himself. This vagueness – or rather, proneness to opposed appropriations – is symptomatic of a notion that rightly sits at the core of the politico-theological battlefield, a theoretical and/or imaginative space that is increasingly open to contestations.
In the course of the 20th century, the problematic of political theology has been raised time and again by a series of notable thinkers. Schmitt’s 1922 seminal namesake essay first reopened the question of political theology framing it in terms of an analogous ‘systematic structure’ between the concepts of modern theory of the state and their theological antecedents, allegedly the basis of a secularisation process (Schmitt, Political Theology, 36). Around the same period – between the end of the First World War and the Nazi rise to power – the relation between two different frames of the politico-theological diptych came under the attention of German-Jewish thinkers such as Bloch, Benjamin, and Buber. While in Bloch’s Spirit of Utopia (149), the articulation between those levels calls for a ‘second truth’, a more substantial yet subjective plan of experience, in Benjamin’s Theologico-political fragment (Selected Writings, vol. 3, 305) one finds it pictured in the oft commented image of the arrow, pointing towards the consummation of history, yet promoting ‘the coming of the Messianic Kingdom’ – a ‘category of its approach’. If it is true that the longing and approximation of the coming of the Kingdom are but one of the most powerful images Bloch summons to present the nature of the utopian spirit, Benjamin seems to recognise in Bloch’s work a firm rejection of the political character of theocracy. Lastly, Buber’s later work Kingship of God, while presenting a historical treatment of the matter, also addresses the problem, raising it from another angle. In what several scholars recognised as an implicit rebuttal of Schmitt’s theses, one finds the distinction between the historical aspects of charismatic rulership – sociologically expounded – and the level exceeding covenant and statute, the level of the pure spiritual χάρις (charis). It is only through opening a communication to this level – the ‘theopolitical’ one – that one fully grasps the poignancy of theocracy and not only its potentially detrimental aspects.
The image and idea of a religiously imbued political command, once alien from political debates in the West, has once again become present, raising a new set of problems and questions, at a national and at an international level. Conflicts, uprisings, aggressions are often tinged with religious connotations, either embedding a religious imaginary inside the political discourse, or taking place against the backdrop of a theologically bent narrative. It is in view of this renewed centrally politico-theological tropes that we wish to reopen and resume the discussions kindled by 20th-century thinkers, in the hope of casting some new light on the overall political panorama, questioning its presupposes and foundations.
Topics for Discussion
We welcome contributions discussing the following questions:
•What exactly is political theology? Does it have a normative or descriptive character? Is it intrinsically polemical? Is there an atheist political theology?
•What is the relation between positive and negative political theology?
•How can we define and describe the distinguishing line between the secular and the religious, the profane and the messianic, immanence and transcendence?
•Are those categories and dichotomies still useful or do we need to devise new conceptual instruments? If so, which ones?
•How and why is it relevant to maintain such a lens to look at the political panorama today? What is instead outdated in these formulations and discussions?
•How can we make sense of current theories of secularisation? Is the notion of secularisation still helpful today?
Objectives
The workshop will critically examine the notions of theocracy, political theology, and their interrelated assumptions, providing a platform for discussion for scholars and researchers invested in the field.
A publication ensuing from the workshop is planned.
Submission Guidelines
Interested researchers are invited to submit abstracts (300–500 words) addressing the workshop theme by 19 October 2025. Abstracts should clearly outline the research question, methodology, and expected contributions to the field. Submissions should be sent to both mailto:mfederico.filauri@gmail.com and mailto:gregor.schaefer@unibas.chwith the subject line: Workshop Submission – Political Theology and Theocracy.
Important Dates
•Submission Deadline: 19 October 2025
•Notification of Acceptance: 10 November 2025
•Workshop Date: 12 December 2025, 10:00-17:00
Format
Accepted participants will present their papers in a series of panel discussions followed by Q&A sessions. The workshop will provide a platform for constructive dialogue and scholarly exchange among participants from diverse disciplinary backgrounds.
We look forward to receiving your submissions and to engaging in fruitful discussions on the intersections of philosophy, politics, and theology in the 20th century.
Bibliographical References
•Benjamin, Walter, Selected Writings, vol. 3, 1935-1938, edited by Howard Eiland and Michael William Jennings (Belknap Press, 2006)
•Benjamin, Walter, ‘Theologico-Political Fragment’ in Walter Benjamin: Selected Writings, vol. 3, edited by Howard Eiland and Michael William Jennings (Belknap Press, 2006)
•Bloch, Ernst, The Spirit of Utopia, translated by Anthony A. Nassar (Stanford University Press, 2009)
•Buber, Martin, Kingship of God (3rd newly enlarged German edn) translated by Richard Scheimann (Allen & Unwin, 1967)
•Schmitt, Carl, Political Theology: Four Chapters on the Concept of Sovereignty, translated by George Schwab ([Studies in Contemporary German Social Thought] MIT Press, 1985)