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The Politics of the Real
Liberalism is on the defensive. The past few years have seen the emergence of various “postliberalisms” and even a resurgence of Catholic “integralism.” The notion that liberalism and justice, let alone liberalism and Catholicism, are compatible has finally lost its credibility—even lip service to it is no longer required. The postliberal discussion is shifting from “what’s wrong with liberalism” to “what’s true about politics”—to the question of what exactly must displace liberalism. But the answer to this question must not be another (essentially liberal) policy prescription. Liberalism’s vision of the world must be replaced by another one, a broader one that can explain liberalism but cannot be explained by it. In The Politics of the Real, D. C. Schindler squares up to this daunting task, shifting the discussion to its definitive metaphysical the modern reversal of the priority of act over potency; the modern privileging of empty possibility over flourishing perfection. This reversal is the root of modern error—and re-prioritizing act is the basis for the alternative. Schindler shows that liberalism is wrong, not because it has simply “relegated God to the private,” but because it has inverted the giving us power without authority, in what becomes a closed, necessarily totalitarian, horizon. Here, nothing else can be done with the transcendent God but to find a quiet little place to keep him, harmless and out of the way. When we let God out, a cosmic hierarchy of act—of participation in Being Himself—explodes into view. And this changes everything. A true integralism, a true postliberalism, moves politics back into a cosmos that is itself analogically ordered to participation in the life of God. With The Politics of the Real, Schindler has elevated the postliberal conversation. — Andrew Willard Jones Director of Catholic Studies at Franciscan University of Steubenville and author of Before Church and State
349 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2021
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About the author
D.C. Schindler
17 books66 followersProfessor David Christopher Schindler is Professor of Metaphysics and Anthropology at the Pontifical John Paul II Institute, Washington, D.C. He received his Ph.D. from The Catholic University of America in 2001, with a dissertation on the philosophy of Hans Urs von Balthasar. He taught at Villanova University from 2001-2013, first as a teaching fellow in the Philosophy Department, and then in the Department of Humanities, where he received tenure in 2007. He received an Alexander von Humboldt fellowship to do research in Munich from 2007-2008. Professor Schindler is a translator of French and German and has served as an editor of Communio: International Catholic Review since 2002.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
April 7, 2021
D.C. Schindler has just written one of the most thought-provoking, challenging, and masterful works of political philosophy that has been written in decades. But the value and originality of this work is also more than that. It is also important because it is a beginning to the kind of constructive work that desperately needs to be done. Excellent critiques of modernism and liberalism have been written, and it is fundamental to ensure that you familiarize yourself with the basics of what is introduced in works such as Alasdair MacIntyre’s 'After Virtue,' Charles Taylor’s 'A Secular Age,' and Patrick Deenen’s 'Why Liberalism Failed.' But we need more than only critiques of the current crisis. We need thought and time to be spent on what to do and to build as we move out of the modern liberal age. This is the rare and needed constructive work that Schindler is beginning.
The foundations for 'The Politics of the Real' are right where they should be. Name one single other book where, in just the opening 25 pages alone, you will find Plato, Aristotle, Plotinus, Virgil, Dante, and Aquinas, along with C.S. Lewis, Charles Péguy, Eric Voegelin, T.S. Eliot, Hannah Arendt, Henri de Lubac, Hans Urs von Balthasar, Ferdinand Ulrich, William J. Courtenay, Benedict XVI, Pierre Manent, David Bentley Hart, Michael Alan Gillespie, and John Milbank. They are all here, and they are all contributing to the whole. Schindler’s premise is that “at the theological core of liberalism is the most radical rejection of Christianity possible, because it posits and enacts an undoing of the very thing that defines Christianity, that makes Christianity Christian, namely, the Incarnation of the Son of God, so to speak, into time and space, through an assumption of nature in its deepest reality, an extension-through-assumption that aims ultimately to embrace the whole of reality: the cosmic liturgy.” That liberalism’s rejection of the implications of the incarnation has practical consequences for political philosophy is a fact that we need to understand more clearly.
Schindler devotes himself to articulating this for us, and he builds upon his past work, exploring how modernity has prioritized potency over actual reality, and what this means for politics. There is a difference between a political philosophy and an attempt at community that prioritizes maximizing the possibility of power, and one that values “the reality and intrinsic goodness of things.” The consequences of incarnational embodiment, both physically and culturally, have deep implications not only for what we can know about the nature of God, but also for how we define and know human good and flourishing, and our relations to each other. Logically, this excludes liberalism’s separation between the Church and the political sphere. But it also excludes integralism’s attempt to flip the coin, so that the Church would wield the temporal power of the political sphere. That these are not the only two alternatives is not obvious to you if you operate under liberal assumptions (as many of us do by default). What is far more interesting, richer, older, and deeper than either liberalism or integralism is that which is built on the grounds that the great tradition gives us, and Schindler begins the project of working from that foundation.
It has been a privilege to read this book, and it will be a privilege to re-read it. Now we just need everyone else to read it so that we can talk about it.
The foundations for 'The Politics of the Real' are right where they should be. Name one single other book where, in just the opening 25 pages alone, you will find Plato, Aristotle, Plotinus, Virgil, Dante, and Aquinas, along with C.S. Lewis, Charles Péguy, Eric Voegelin, T.S. Eliot, Hannah Arendt, Henri de Lubac, Hans Urs von Balthasar, Ferdinand Ulrich, William J. Courtenay, Benedict XVI, Pierre Manent, David Bentley Hart, Michael Alan Gillespie, and John Milbank. They are all here, and they are all contributing to the whole. Schindler’s premise is that “at the theological core of liberalism is the most radical rejection of Christianity possible, because it posits and enacts an undoing of the very thing that defines Christianity, that makes Christianity Christian, namely, the Incarnation of the Son of God, so to speak, into time and space, through an assumption of nature in its deepest reality, an extension-through-assumption that aims ultimately to embrace the whole of reality: the cosmic liturgy.” That liberalism’s rejection of the implications of the incarnation has practical consequences for political philosophy is a fact that we need to understand more clearly.
Schindler devotes himself to articulating this for us, and he builds upon his past work, exploring how modernity has prioritized potency over actual reality, and what this means for politics. There is a difference between a political philosophy and an attempt at community that prioritizes maximizing the possibility of power, and one that values “the reality and intrinsic goodness of things.” The consequences of incarnational embodiment, both physically and culturally, have deep implications not only for what we can know about the nature of God, but also for how we define and know human good and flourishing, and our relations to each other. Logically, this excludes liberalism’s separation between the Church and the political sphere. But it also excludes integralism’s attempt to flip the coin, so that the Church would wield the temporal power of the political sphere. That these are not the only two alternatives is not obvious to you if you operate under liberal assumptions (as many of us do by default). What is far more interesting, richer, older, and deeper than either liberalism or integralism is that which is built on the grounds that the great tradition gives us, and Schindler begins the project of working from that foundation.
It has been a privilege to read this book, and it will be a privilege to re-read it. Now we just need everyone else to read it so that we can talk about it.
October 25, 2021
One of the most profound books I have ever read. D.C. Schindler helps us break out of the liberal-horizon and imagine a different way of doing politics.
January 5, 2022
D.C. Schindler quotes George Burns, who writes "It is very strange to watch grown adults who enjoy liberalism's blessings appear to fantasize about rejecting those blessings. And rejecting them in favor of what, exactly? Believable answers are rarely forthcoming."
Behold, a believable answer.
Three years after Deneen's Why Liberalism Failed and Mitchell's The Limits of Liberalism, Schindler brings the most comprehensive Christian response to the contemporary liberal order that I have ever read. His is not a mere reaction to that order. Rather, the The Politics of the Real is the work of one who, in Schindler's words, "actually enters the cave and, through questioning and argumentation, allows the truth to show itself as itself even there, where it has been excluded." It is in this sense that he cuts "between liberalism and integralism": rather than imposing onto the current order a vision of the good entirely alien to it (as integralism tries), he calls us to evaluate our particular decisions within that order in terms of the highest good.
Expect from this book the following:
1. A clear account of the "real" in terms of the very "thingness" of the things ("res") we encounter , and a profound articulation of the concrete implications of this account of being. If he is right to see all things as "open" to history and defined by their relations to everything else, it means that we should expect that the compartmentalization of our politics into "private" lives, property, beliefs, and speech; and the "public" space will ultimately deteriorate. Schindler does not merely call us to develop a political theory that acknowledges this "thingness," but makes the effort the central task of his book.
2. A bolstering of recent critiques of the founding of America. Schindler goes beyond a mere critique of the logic of the founders' arguments or the thinkers from which they drew their beliefs. Rather, he focuses on what a "Christian founding" would have actually looked like, and the institutional obstacles that the American founders placed to achieving that Christian founding. Especially illuminating is his discussion of the founding revolves around "Nature's God," a deity robbed of any positive claim about which a person or tradition may disagree—a view of God that, when actualized in our Constitution, led us on the path to modern liberalism.
3. A positive recovery of the true meaning of rights, property, and religious freedom. Too many post-liberal thinkers take liberal "rights" for granted and thus reject them, or assume that a modern account of instrumentalized property or religious-liberty-as-mere-choice is exactly what a Christian should affirm in a modern age. Schindler refreshingly cuts through this by rooting these concepts in the rich theological tradition of the Catholic Church. He breaths into them meaning that renders them compatible with the social teaching of the Christian religion.
4. A post-liberal critique of integralism. Armed with Aquinas and the ancients, Schindler dives deeply into the ways integralism has appropriated modern assumptions and makes a strong argument that this appropriation undermines their ability to develop a clear, theologically-grounded alternative to liberalism. Rather than discard it out of hand, he gathers what is best about integralism into the "politics of the real," and then uses it to connect that account more firmly than integralism to what are normally considered to be key integralist texts.
But what Schindler does best, perhaps, is build a bridge between the Platonist and Aristotelian impulses in contemporary conservatism. Some, in their desire to bring the forms to earth, have been overly zealous and utopian about forcefully applying the Good in this world. Others, in their attempt to be cautious and "prudent," have oriented their political ideals to lesser goods instead of pursuing the whole. The former ignores the tragic in politics. The latter ignores the unity of the Good. Schindler ignores neither.
His synthesis, his clear positive account of the political order in light of the Good, and his willingness to acknowledge the tragic without falling into despair, are what make this book outstanding. I hope that it will become a starting point for future discussion on what it means to be post-liberal in this contemporary age.
Behold, a believable answer.
Three years after Deneen's Why Liberalism Failed and Mitchell's The Limits of Liberalism, Schindler brings the most comprehensive Christian response to the contemporary liberal order that I have ever read. His is not a mere reaction to that order. Rather, the The Politics of the Real is the work of one who, in Schindler's words, "actually enters the cave and, through questioning and argumentation, allows the truth to show itself as itself even there, where it has been excluded." It is in this sense that he cuts "between liberalism and integralism": rather than imposing onto the current order a vision of the good entirely alien to it (as integralism tries), he calls us to evaluate our particular decisions within that order in terms of the highest good.
Expect from this book the following:
1. A clear account of the "real" in terms of the very "thingness" of the things ("res") we encounter , and a profound articulation of the concrete implications of this account of being. If he is right to see all things as "open" to history and defined by their relations to everything else, it means that we should expect that the compartmentalization of our politics into "private" lives, property, beliefs, and speech; and the "public" space will ultimately deteriorate. Schindler does not merely call us to develop a political theory that acknowledges this "thingness," but makes the effort the central task of his book.
2. A bolstering of recent critiques of the founding of America. Schindler goes beyond a mere critique of the logic of the founders' arguments or the thinkers from which they drew their beliefs. Rather, he focuses on what a "Christian founding" would have actually looked like, and the institutional obstacles that the American founders placed to achieving that Christian founding. Especially illuminating is his discussion of the founding revolves around "Nature's God," a deity robbed of any positive claim about which a person or tradition may disagree—a view of God that, when actualized in our Constitution, led us on the path to modern liberalism.
3. A positive recovery of the true meaning of rights, property, and religious freedom. Too many post-liberal thinkers take liberal "rights" for granted and thus reject them, or assume that a modern account of instrumentalized property or religious-liberty-as-mere-choice is exactly what a Christian should affirm in a modern age. Schindler refreshingly cuts through this by rooting these concepts in the rich theological tradition of the Catholic Church. He breaths into them meaning that renders them compatible with the social teaching of the Christian religion.
4. A post-liberal critique of integralism. Armed with Aquinas and the ancients, Schindler dives deeply into the ways integralism has appropriated modern assumptions and makes a strong argument that this appropriation undermines their ability to develop a clear, theologically-grounded alternative to liberalism. Rather than discard it out of hand, he gathers what is best about integralism into the "politics of the real," and then uses it to connect that account more firmly than integralism to what are normally considered to be key integralist texts.
But what Schindler does best, perhaps, is build a bridge between the Platonist and Aristotelian impulses in contemporary conservatism. Some, in their desire to bring the forms to earth, have been overly zealous and utopian about forcefully applying the Good in this world. Others, in their attempt to be cautious and "prudent," have oriented their political ideals to lesser goods instead of pursuing the whole. The former ignores the tragic in politics. The latter ignores the unity of the Good. Schindler ignores neither.
His synthesis, his clear positive account of the political order in light of the Good, and his willingness to acknowledge the tragic without falling into despair, are what make this book outstanding. I hope that it will become a starting point for future discussion on what it means to be post-liberal in this contemporary age.
October 28, 2021
I have always asserted privately that one can not have a Republican/liberal government if one is not first guided by moral transcendent principles. I have also asserted that those principles will only be found in the Christian tradition. The church must stand out from and in opposition to all liberal political parties for at their core they stand in opposition to the church. Up to now, that has been an intuitive argument from history and a hodgepodge of theologians (Kuyper among them). D.C. Schindler if nothing else provides a theoretical and philosophical argument for why this is the case in more articulate terms. Liberalism as expressed through Locke, Hobbes, and Descarte is a very subtle but genuine anti-christian worldview. It seeks to assert its immanent framed (Charles Taylor) view of the world on the church making it the judge of what is valued and real. Schindler does not have to go far to make this case stick.
Positively speaking Schindler argues that the Christian synthesis of Jewish, Greek, and Roman cultures within the frame of the Church provides the necessary foundation for all subsequent political engagements leading to human flourishing and the common good. It is this set of beliefs and practices that are able to hold the one Church and the many nations together in a transcending reality. The Church holds goodness not happiness the ultimate value of the human condition and that will only be found in the transcendent. As a bought and sold protestant (Anglican in particular), I chafe at his assertion that it is only within the Roman Catholic Church specifically that has the proper and one true synthesis of the triune foundation of western culture. But I appreciate the general contours of the argument.
The more practical this book attempts to be the less coherent and convincing this project becomes. His only historical model is the high middle ages which he leaves others to discuss in detail. This is a book for the academic and the theoretician. I doubt many could make on-the-ground local choices based on this book though I would like to see them try. That reality is a shame.
Positively speaking Schindler argues that the Christian synthesis of Jewish, Greek, and Roman cultures within the frame of the Church provides the necessary foundation for all subsequent political engagements leading to human flourishing and the common good. It is this set of beliefs and practices that are able to hold the one Church and the many nations together in a transcending reality. The Church holds goodness not happiness the ultimate value of the human condition and that will only be found in the transcendent. As a bought and sold protestant (Anglican in particular), I chafe at his assertion that it is only within the Roman Catholic Church specifically that has the proper and one true synthesis of the triune foundation of western culture. But I appreciate the general contours of the argument.
The more practical this book attempts to be the less coherent and convincing this project becomes. His only historical model is the high middle ages which he leaves others to discuss in detail. This is a book for the academic and the theoretician. I doubt many could make on-the-ground local choices based on this book though I would like to see them try. That reality is a shame.
December 3, 2022
Very dense, but well worth the effort to read. One salient point: real things are better than ideal things in so far as they are realized in the world. Conversely, ideal things are better than real things in their purity of form unadulterated by particularities. The lesson, we must live in the world and change it through our real actions, guided by our ideas.
Also, it contains a clear breakdown of the reasons integralism (as conceived by many conservatives) won't work.
Also, it contains a clear breakdown of the reasons integralism (as conceived by many conservatives) won't work.
July 30, 2025
I’m on the last chapter, but I have to write a review now. Echoing one of the other reviewers, this is one of the most profound books I’ve ever read. It put words to hints and thoughts that I’ve had for so long, but struggled to articulate. I hope more people are introduced to Schindler’s works, especially this book.
November 25, 2024
Great, thought provoking read.
However, his own construction of an "ideal" politics was clouded in ambiguity and lacked praxis.
However, his own construction of an "ideal" politics was clouded in ambiguity and lacked praxis.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews