Ninon Grangé, The State and the Exception: Existence, Fiction, and Reality, November 14 2019

Thursday 14 October 2019, 5.30 – 7.00 pm
Room UG05, University of Westminster, 309 Regent Street, London W1B 2HW

The State and the Exception: Existence, Fiction, and Reality
Ninon Grangé (University Paris 8 Vincennes-Saint-Denis/LLCP)

The recent evolution of the state of emergency in France and the confusion between war on terrorism and social repression have required that we define the state of exception anew. The structure of the so-called “as if” (“as if we were at war”) seems to have pervaded our representations and our laws. Thus, the traditional challenges faced by the state (État), i.e. its preservation and the risk to collapse, have to be made more complex. The reality of the state should not be mistaken with its existence: it relies on a dialectical relation between power and powerlessness, on the one hand, and on belief and imagination, on the other hand. Through the study of contemporary French politics, the issue of political fictionalism will therefore be tackled.

Ninon Grangé teaches political philosophy at the University Paris 8 Vincennes-Saint-Denis and at the New College of Political Studies (NCEP). Her research focuses on war, political fictions, political identity, and political temporalities. Her publications include Emergency and Terror: The State of Exception, War, and Political Temporalities [French title: L’urgence et l’effroi. L’état d’exception, la guerre et les temps politiques, 2018], Forgetting Civil War? Stasis: Chronicle of a Disappearance [Oublier la guerre civile ? Stasis : chronique d’une disparition, 2015]; Carl Schmitt: Nomos, Law, and Conflict in International Relations [Carl Schmitt: nomos, droit et conflit dans les relations internationale, 2013]; and Of Civil War [De la guerre civile, 2009].

Part of the series French Politics: A Neighbour’s ‘History of the Present’, co-organised by the IMCC in collaboration with our friends in the Centre for the Study of Democracy, and with the support of the French Embassy and the Political Studies Association.

Free to attend, but booking via eventbrite is essential.