The chapter written by Stefano Sogari in the book Iustissima Tellus. Carl Schmitt e la Resistenza Filosofica alla Talassocrazia, published by Edizioni Arktos, contributes to a very specific debate on resistance against the geopolitical and cultural order imposed by the powers called “thalassocracies.”
Thalassocracies are defined as maritime powers, namely those characterized by the maritime domination of global spaces and by strategic expansion primarily across the seas through both mercantile means and naval force—even including piracy. These powers are viewed as antagonistic, in the modern world, to other civilizations with a territorial base, a theme that, as we know, is central to the thought of Carl Schmitt.
In his chapter of Iustissima Tellus, the idea that resistance to thalassocracy is not merely a geopolitical struggle but also a philosophical resistance against liberal abstraction and the neutralization of politics. Drawing on the thought of Carl Schmitt, Sogari emphasizes the need to recover concrete sovereignty and the Political as tools to preserve political and cultural identities in the face of a global order that tends to reduce every form of social life to a mere mechanism of economic exchange. In this sense, resistance becomes a reclamation of identity against a vision of world politics which, according to Schmitt, is destined to lose touch with the concrete realities of political life and the true interests of peoples.
The author under examination is significant in light of a journey that, starting from the Roman legal tradition, moved toward the formation of a distinctly German and “national” law in search of German specificity—an approach that also offers lessons for other state systems seeking national rebirth.
Carl Schmitt’s thought is analyzed not only on this traditional basis of European legal studies but also in the context of geopolitics.
The author of the chapter delves into Schmitt’s critique of Liberalism and Globalization, focusing particularly on thalassocracy as a force that threatens forms of political self-determination and national sovereignty. The “philosophical resistance” in question refers to both theoretical and practical opposition to the world order based on the control of maritime routes and on the hegemony of maritime powers, particularly modern liberal nations like Great Britain and the United States, which, according to Schmitt, exercise a form of global domination.
Thalassocracy and Schmittian Geopolitics
It is shown how the German jurist views thalassocracy as a form of power distinct from tellurocracy (the power of land-based states). Schmitt sees maritime powers as those dominating the global economy, international trade, and the world order. For Schmitt, maritime powers have a primary interest in commercial expansion and freedom of navigation, goals that reduce politics and sovereignty to mere instruments of economic management.
Resistance as a Return to “Political Sovereignty”
Within this framework, Schmitt theorizes the need for resistance against this form of global homogenization. Schmitt’s philosophical resistance is not only geopolitical critique but also a profound cultural resistance—a Kulturkampf—against the dogma of liberalism, which denies the reality of conflicts among states and reduces politics to mere administrative technique. Opposing the liberal idea of “global society,” Schmitt insists on the necessity of returning to the concreteness of sovereignty, territorial politics, and the interests of peoples who originally inhabit those territories. Resistance thus becomes a reclamation of concrete politics as a radical expression of law—the fundamental norm of a community—over and against the idea of a global, abstract law.
The Centrality of Sovereignty in Schmitt’s Political Philosophy
One of the key concepts in Schmittian thought is sovereignty, defined as the capacity to decide the state of exception, that is, the ability to suspend normal legal rules in response to emergencies. Schmitt regards sovereignty as a source of resistance against the universal normalization imposed by thalassocratic powers, which attempt to unify the world under an abstract and neutral law, based on trade and freedom of movement, essentially acephalous. Here, the profound meaning of political sovereignty is recalled: it is the expression of a community that has the right to determine its own existence independently through its own leaders, in the full responsibility of the latter. The state of exception can and must be declared, but not by an external force alien to the national community—rather by one that acts on behalf of that national community.
Critique of the Neutralization of Politics by Thalassocracy
Schmitt’s rejection of neutrality is essential: according to him, neither law nor politics can ever be neutral or disinterested; they must always be tied to the concrete interests of a political community. When this does not occur, there is certainly no genuinely neutral system but rather a system of power pursuing its own interests and political specifics, simply disguised as neutrality and liberalism.
The Theological-Political Dimension of Resistance
Another theme explored in the chapter is the theological-political dimension of Schmitt’s thought, highlighting how politics is always intertwined with sacred and existential questions. This concept of “sacred sovereignty” becomes crucial in defining a barrier against the internationalism that attempts to homogenize different cultures and political systems.
We know well how this author has proven indispensable for understanding the difficult, conflict-ridden history of the European continent, offering principles and concepts that remain relevant in the twenty-first century, since actual reality remains ever the same throughout the centuries in matters such as Politics, Power, and the relationship between those in power and the people—in short, the “quantity” of sovereignty exercised by a people in their struggle for survival, for their place in history and in life.