Ex Captivitate Salus: Experiences, 1945 - 47

by Carl Schmitt, Matthew Hannah (Translator), Andreas Kalyvas (Introduction)

When Germany was defeated in 1945, both the Russians and the Americans undertook mass internments in the territories they occupied. The Americans called their approach ?automatic arrest?. Carl Schmitt, although not belonging to the circles subject to automatic arrest, was held in one of these camps in the years 1945-46, and then, in March 1947, in the prison of the international tribunal in Nuremberg, as witness and ?possible defendant?. A formal charge was never brought against him. Schmitt's way of coping in the years of isolation was to write this book, clarifying his own position on certain fundamental questions.

In Ex Captivitate Salus, or Deliverance from Captivity, Schmitt considers a range of issues relating to history and political theory as well as recent events, including the Nazi defeat and the new emerging Cold War. Schmitt often urged his readers to view the book as though it were a series of letters personally directed to each of them. Hence there is a decidedly personal dimension to the text as Schmitt expresses his thoughts on his own career trajectory with some pathos, at the same time he is at pains to emphasise that ?this is not romantic or heroic prison literature?.

This reflective work sheds new light on Schmitt's thought and personal situation at the beginning of a period of exile from public life that only ended with his death in 1985. It will be of great value to the many students and scholars in political theory and law who continue to study and appreciate this seminal theorist of the 20th century.

Genres: Politics, Philosophy, History

120 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1950

About the author

Carl Schmitt's early career as an academic lawyer falls into the last years of the Wilhelmine Empire. (See for Schmitt's life and career: Bendersky 1983; Balakrishnan 2000; Mehring 2009.) But Schmitt wrote his most influential works, as a young professor of constitutional law in Bonn and later in Berlin, during the Weimar-period: Political Theology, presenting Schmitt's theory of sovereignty, appeared in 1922, to be followed in 1923 by The Crisis of Parliamentary Democracy, which attacked the legitimacy of parliamentary government. In 1927, Schmitt published the first version of his most famous work, The Concept of the Political, defending the view that all true politics is based on the distinction between friend and enemy. The culmination of Schmitt's work in the Weimar period, and arguably his greatest achievement, is the 1928 Constitutional Theory which systematically applied Schmitt's political theory to the interpretation of the Weimar constitution. During the political and constitutional crisis of the later Weimar Republic Schmitt published Legality and Legitimacy, a clear-sighted analysis of the breakdown of parliamentary government Germany, as well as The Guardian of the Constitution, which argued that the president as the head of the executive, and not a constitutional court, ought to be recognized as the guardian of the constitution. In these works from the later Weimar period, Schmitt's declared aim to defend the Weimar constitution is at times barely distinguishable from a call for constitutional revision towards a more authoritarian political framework (Dyzenhaus 1997, 70–85; Kennedy 2004, 154–78).

Though Schmitt had not been a supporter of National Socialism before Hitler came to power, he sided with the Nazis after 1933. Schmitt quickly obtained an influential position in the legal profession and came to be perceived as the ‘Crown Jurist’ of National Socialism. (Rüthers 1990; Mehring 2009, 304–436) He devoted himself, with undue enthusiasm, to such tasks as the defence of Hitler's extra-judicial killings of political opponents (PB 227–32) and the purging of German jurisprudence of Jewish influence (Gross 2007; Mehring 2009, 358–80). But Schmitt was ousted from his position of power within legal academia in 1936, after infighting with academic competitors who viewed Schmitt as a turncoat who had converted to Nazism only to advance his career. There is considerable debate about the causes of Schmitt's willingness to associate himself with the Nazis. Some authors point to Schmitt's strong ambition and his opportunistic character but deny ideological affinity (Bendersky 1983, 195–242; Schwab 1989). But a strong case has been made that Schmitt's anti-liberal jurisprudence, as well as his fervent anti-semitism, disposed him to support the Nazi regime (Dyzenhaus 1997, 85–101; Scheuerman 1999). Throughout the later Nazi period, Schmitt's work focused on questions of international law. The immediate motivation for this turn seems to have been the aim to justify Nazi-expansionism. But Schmitt was interested in the wider question of the foundations of international law, and he was convinced that the turn towards liberal cosmopolitanism in 20th century international law would undermine the conditions of stable and legitimate international legal order. Schmitt's theoretical work on the foundations of international law culminated in The Nomos of the Earth, written in the early 1940's, but not published before 1950. Due to his support for and involvement with the Nazi dictatorship, the obstinately unrepentant Schmitt was not allowed to return to an academic job after 1945 (Mehring 2009, 438–63). But he nevertheless remained an important figure in West Germany's conservative intellectual scene to his death in 1985 (van Laak 2002) and enjoyed a considerable degree of clandestine influence elsewhere (Scheuerman 1999, 183–251; Müller 2003).

Unsurprisingly, the significance and value of Schmitt's works

Reviews

[Joris van de Riet · Rating 2 out of 5]

In which Carl Schmitt wallows in self-pity about his internment after World War II while offering some hot takes on international law along the lines of "modern theories of war are bad because they are a return to just war theory which allows other states to attack Germany and commit such horrific crimes as locking up Nazi legal scholars, unlike my own theory of the Ius Publicum Europaeum which permits Germany to attack other countries while definitely not committing any atrocities at all."

[Enrique · Rating 5 out of 5]

It’s a wonderful memoir. The main issue is the lost: Germany was defeated and with them Carl Schmitt.

Carl Schmitt is a wonderful researcher, he found the sovereignty concept in Bodin and made it alive again. In this short memoir he talks again about Bodin, but specially of Hobbes.

I suspect that Hobbes wasn’t too important for Schmitt (at least not that important if the nazi Germany had won the war) but once he saw himself as a prisioner he found affinity with Hobbes (his “brother”)

Schmitt was very carefully in his research, and he found a lot of marvelous things that only a master of detail (like a Walter Benjamin or a Tocqueville) could perceive, specially the technology risks and the solitude of the modern era.

Excellent book!

[Rodrigo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Is quite interesting to see an author that one just reads around law and political theory going mental over German poetry, suicide and civil war

[Joshua Benevides · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is one that’s hard to rate. Schmitt was a repulsive man with repulsive ideas, but it is undoubtedly fascinating to read the attempts of an incredibly intelligent and educated man to justify his complicity with one of history’s greatest crimes using his vast knowledge of philosophy and history.

If this were a fictional character study of such a man, I’d give it a high rating for exploring such dark depths and striking contradictions with such eloquence, but since it is a real justification by a real monster of his real crimes, I’ll give it 1 star because f him and it’s a shame that they ever let him out of prison at Nuremberg.

[Luis Agustín Txanpongile Münasteriotar · Rating 5 out of 5]

Buenos años para escribir desde una celda en Berlín y Núremberg.

[Shulamith Farhi · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is Schmitt's prison diary. It's gorgeous. There's a lot to like about this book, including thoughtful studies of Tocqueville, Bauer, Kleist. The analysis of Kleist's suicide is insightful: his companion wasn't a witness and was "in the end merely the helpless echo of male despair." The best chapter, in my opinion, is Wisdom of the Cell. Here, Schmitt lucidly dissects self-deception. It's bracing.

I wish I could end my review here, having only said positive things. Unfortunately, Schmitt is a (very charming) fascist. At no point does he apologize for his explicit endorsement of Hitler. The natural question is, does this affect his actual arguments negatively? Sadly, it does. Pessimism is very edgy and cool but I would rather stick to educated hope. I kind of like knowing I have a future, don't you?

[Maurizio Manco · Rating 3 out of 5]

"L'autoinganno fa parte della solitudine. Il solitario pensa con se stesso e parla con se stesso, e nel soliloquio, com'è noto, parliamo con un pericoloso adulatore." (p. 89)

[JJS. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Schmitt, upon the end the World War II, was arrested and placed in internment, as he was a member of the Nazi party and therefore his allegiance was on the losing side of the war. These 'letters' as he calls them are quite fascinating musings largely on other authors who influenced his thinking as well as the shifting realities of the world immediately coming out of the war. The letters, while not providing a reasonable explanation for his party allegiance (we can make strong, educated guesses though: opportunistic desire for influence; belief that allegiance meant safety under the new regime), they are quite fascinating personal thoughts, and they are communicated in beautiful prose as translated by Matthew Hannah.

[Ahmad Awad · Rating 3 out of 5]

الإفلات من الأسر، لكارل شميت، النسخة المُعرَّبة صدرت عن الشبكة للعربية للأبحاث والنشر.

كارل شميت في زنزانة الحلفاء، عارٍ تمامًا، من دون بدلته السوداء، من دون نظرياته، من دون الرايخ الذي كان يُلبسه هيبةً ويُخفي عريَه الأصلي.

هنا لم يعد فيلسوف السيادة، بل صار هو نفسه «الاستثناء» الذي يُقرّر عليه الآخرون. يكتب أوراقه كمن يُخرج أحشاءه على الورق، وكمن يكتشف أن كل ما بناه من «مفهوم السياسي» و«حالة الاستثناء» و«الصديق والعدو» لم يحمِه لحظة واحدة حين أصبح هو العدو المُعلن.

«الإنسان الأكثر عريًا هو من تُنزع عنه ملابسه أمام آخر في كامل ملابسه، من يُجرد من سلاحه أمام مسلح، العاجز أمام صاحب السلطة.»

..
الكتاب 33 بعد وفاة والدي رحمه الله.

[Pinky 2.0 · Rating 5 out of 5]

"The last asylum of the person tormented by other human beings is always a prayer, a prayer cried out to the crucified God. In the shearing of pain we recognize Him and He recognizes us. Our God was not stoned by Jews as a Jew and was not beheaded by Romans as a Roman. He could not be beheaded. He no longer had a head in the legal sense, because he had no longer had any rights. He died by crucifixion, the death of a slave imposed upon him by a foreign conqueror."

[Lorién Gómez · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Ay de quién no tenga amigo, porque su enemigo le hará justicia.

Ay de quién no tenga enemigo, porque yo seré su enemigo en el juicio final"

Un Schmitt derrotado, vencido; capturado por las fuerzas aliadas por su colaboración con el nazismo. Un libro autojustificativo y autocomplaciente, penoso y nostálgico: se llega a comparar con Platón y sus viajes a los tiranos de Siracusa. Pero asimismo un libro profundo, que recoge de primera mano la experiencia de la noche más oscura del siglo XX.

[imaculata form · Rating 5 out of 5]

Aber den modernen Leviathan, der in vier Gestalten erscheint, die vierfache Kombination von Gott und Tier und Mensch und Maschine, hat er noch nicht begriffen. Dafuer war seine Verzweiflung noch nicht gross genug.

[Bere Tarará · Rating 5 out of 5]

Estas cartas escritas por Carl Schmitt durante su cautiverio en un campo de concentración norteamericano son melancólicas, en ellas, el autor ya preconiza el nacimiento de una élite que los excluirá del progreso y se refiere a cómo los peores a veces vencen

[Sebastián del Pino · Rating 5 out of 5]

Es un libro esencial para comprender ciertos aspectos más personales de CS.

[A L]

Dark and punchy thoughts.

[Descabellos · Rating 5 out of 5]

«El deber de desencadenar una guerra civil, de sabotear y de hacerse mártir tiene sus límites».

[Paul O'Leary · Rating 2 out of 5]

Carl Schmitt without footnotes is a Carl I can scarcely recognize. I guess I can hardly blame him: Ex Captivitate Salus is hardly a book at all. Schmitt “penned” the works contained in this slim volume onto paper smuggled into his cell by a Boston physician while he was incarcerated by the Allies at the end of World War Two. Its thoughts aren’t developed in any muscular fashion, much less buttressed by his usual intricate and artistic footnotes which adorn almost all of his other writings. Anything that may grab your fancy has likely been developed far better elsewhere, such as in his formidable Nomos Of The Earth. Sure; there are a couple of shiny baubles amid the bare and often unseeingly apologetics: “Only he who knows his prey better than it knows himself can conquer.” Or, with regard to his bête noir, civil war: “More dangerously than in any other kind of war, each party is forced ruthlessly to presuppose its own rightness and, just as ruthlessly, the wrongness of the opponent. One side asserts a legal right, the other a natural right. The former confers a right to obedience, the latter a right of resistance.” And of course this rather famous snippet: “Adam and Eve had two sons, Cain and Abel. Thus begins the history of humankind. This is what the father of all things looks like. This is the dialectical tension that keeps world history moving, and world history has not yet ended.” Still, the pickings are slight; and Schmitt’s attempt to excuse away his association with National Socialism comes across as particularly ill-advised, if only from the legal perspective. Schmitt may “have spoken of myself here”, perhaps even “for the first time in (his) life”, yet the reader well may depart from Ex Captivatate Salus musing over the irony that one of the most famous and brilliant German jurists in the world was dumb enough to actually take himself on before the global public as a client, and in the end walk away merely certifying the most basic of legal platitudes in its breach.
“World history is not the soil of happiness”, Carl? Indeed.

[noblethumos · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Ex Captivitate Salus" is a book written by Carl Schmitt, a German jurist and political theorist, and published in 1950. The title of the book, which translates to "Salvation from Captivity," refers to Schmitt's experience of being held as a prisoner by Allied forces after World War II.

The book is a reflection on the political and intellectual climate of post-war Germany, and an exploration of the themes that Schmitt had developed in his earlier works. Schmitt argues that the defeat of Germany in the war was a result of the breakdown of traditional political structures and the rise of a global, liberal order that threatened the sovereignty and identity of nations.

In "Ex Captivitate Salus," Schmitt also reflects on his own role in the political and intellectual developments of his time, and the challenges he faced as a political theorist in post-war Germany. He defends his controversial political ideas, including his critiques of liberalism and parliamentary democracy, and argues that his work remains relevant and necessary in the face of new political challenges.

The book has been influential in political theory and philosophy, and has been the subject of much debate and criticism. Schmitt's ideas have been seen as both insightful and dangerous, and his legacy continues to be a topic of discussion among scholars and intellectuals.

GPT

[nonegloga]

Talvolta, nel più profondo avvilimento, ci coglie l'orgoglio della nostra origine divina. È un momento di beatitudine. Non sogno o ricordo d'infanzia e non paradiso, ma un'immagine della più intensa simultaneità di secoli di storici sforzi, nei quali, con il povero lavoro della nostra vita, noi stessi ci troviamo. Udiamo il contenuto delle discussioni di tutta un'epoca in parole chiare e semplici, e vediamo la nostra propria realtà nell'attimo in cui troviamo una concreta collocazione e angolazione. Un solo attimo, e noi sappiamo dove propriamente siamo, donde veniamo e dove va il nostro doloroso cammino.