South Atlantic Quarterly

Felipe Martínez Marzoa

Space and Nomos

Space is to be divided. Perhaps we can assume

space is nothing but the pure possibility of
division, that in which no particular boundaries
are better than others. This indifference is the
reason why every attempt to match space with
nomos must be a seriously doubtful thing. Space
rather seems to be the absence of any nomos.
Space, as far as it really involves indifference as
to the option among particular divisions, cannot
be accepted as a primary phenomenon, for such
a primary condition would make every boundary
as valid as every other, with the consequence
that no division would be valid at all. It is not
adequate to argue in this context that speaking of
space need not refer to ‘‘mathematic’’ space; the
‘‘mathematic’’ character of space is basically its
being presupposed, and the indifference follows
from this.
Schmitt seems to have set a fundamental con-
cept of space as that which must be divided. This
assumption, which is no particular feature of
The Nomos of the Earth, conforms with Schmitt’s
conception of the type of entity which in the
division acts both as that to which a part is
adjudged and as the sort of thing that results
from the division itself. It refers to Schmitt’s

The South Atlantic Quarterly 104:2, Spring 2005.

Copyright © 2005 by Duke University Press.

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 South Atlantic Quarterly

308 Felipe Martínez Marzoa

concept of a political entity in general, which pretends to make compatible

the condition of being a particular community and the unlimited abstrac-
tion of which contents are required in order to delimit such a particu-
lar.1 In Schmitt’s conception it is essential to the definition of the concept
‘‘political entity’’ to leave it undecided which type of contents makes the
delimitation of a political entity, but at the same time it is established that
there must be particular contents, namely in each case those which are
really decisive for the constitution of a ‘‘we’’ and a ‘‘they’’ that, prevailing
over other divisions, would be effective in the casus belli. Schmitt endeav-
ors to give this notion of political entity a sense that in principle would not
depend on reference to any particular age of history and would in fact reach
much farther than the applicability of the notion of a state. The connection
between the concept of space and Schmitt’s concept of political entity seems
to be confirmed by the fact that, together with this prehistoricalness of the
notion of politics, Schmitt also sets the general supposition of space and its
being to be divided. The necessity of giving this complex a very initial place
brings Schmitt to speak of ‘‘primitive meaning’’ of a word, a very unrigor-
ous notion, whose opportune (and erroneous) application to nomos sets the
concept of a division of space at the basis of all. The spell of such a presti-
gious Greek word should preserve the secrecy of the compatibility between
space being the indifference as to the location of the boundaries and, on the
other hand, the fact that there should be qualified limits, space boundaries
that are nomos while others are not.
In fact, space as indifference to the limits began to be valid with the Hel-
lenistic epoch and is an essentially modern idea—not in the doctrines of
Hellenistic or modern philosophers, but in the functioning of structures
to which I will refer below. In any case, the presupposition of space in this
modern sense involves something like a contradiction, because being is
inseparable from limit. This contradiction appears in Schmitt’s concept of
the division of something whose nature is the accidental character (the arbi-
trariness) of every particular division (and thus of every division, because
every division is a particular one). From Schmitt’s powerful description of
the jus publicum Europaeum, the contradiction takes relatively stable forms
by the duplication in its expression of both an effectively indifferent space
beyond a certain line and, on this side of the line, a neutral acknowledg-
ment of parts with equal right ( justus hostis, no criminalization of the foe,
etc.). Keeping the rules seems to be motivated by the common interest in
keeping the specificity of this side—the common defense of the privilege

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Space and Nomos 309

of being Europeans. Such a scheme must be a transitory one, because the

dynamics it involves, namely of indifference as to the limits and therefore
of unlimitedness, cannot be controlled ad libitum. Thus we are induced to
ask where this dynamics is taking us; it seems, on the basis of the model
of jus publicum Europaeum itself, the suggested unlimitedness will involve
two aspects: gradual elimination, on the one hand, of the status ‘‘beyond
the line’’ and, on the other hand, also disappearance of the internal delimi-
tations (collective identities) on this side of the line; so, in both senses, no
collective identities at all. Therefore, if we accept the teaching of the jus
publicum Europaeum, the prospect is that there will not be sovereign com-
munities anymore, only individuals and rights of the individual—that is to
say, the classical principle (or, perhaps better, nominal definition of ‘‘right’’)
that I have the right to do what I decide, as far as this is not incompatible
with the fact that everyone else can do the same, which is tautologically
the rule in a situation in which the individual does not essentially belong
to any community. In that remain precisely the features of jus publicum
Europaeum Schmitt regards as relevant: for instance, the unacceptability
of basing on ‘‘moral’’ or ‘‘ethical’’ superiority, the fact that justa causa does
not generate right; justus hostis remains (it is the individual), though not
in the trivial sense of foe in material war, because from the general rule
(from the nominal definition above mentioned) follow consequences (e.g.,
the freedom of communication) that prohibit killing the hostis (and other
things).
It would be possible to join space with nomos if not only the assumed
meaning of both concepts but also their related historical and phenome-
nological territory were distinct enough from those Schmitt supposes. The
phenomenon would be not the division and allotment of space, but space
(now in the sense of distance, not of unlimited space) would be that which
is established by the allotment—by the difference between this and that as
far as it is this difference that makes this be this and that be that. From the
thematization of this allotment, from its growing relevance, arises the quan-
titative character of the distance with the consequent unlimitedness. This
type of process can be illustrated by classical analyses such as that of time
in Aristotle’s Physics, where an unlimited arises by the fact that a ‘‘from . . .
to’’ grows relevant in itself. Above all, this sort of process is what we call
the polis, in which the nomos becomes expressly present and acknowledged
(the laws are written); the acknowledgment of something that must be the
same for all generates a uniform space, whose uniformity makes arbitrary

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310 Felipe Martínez Marzoa

any location of the limits of this space itself and thus bursts the community
whose statute should have been established. Another way to say the same
thing: regular interchange within the community (‘‘you are you, I am I,’’
‘‘this is this, that is that,’’ the distance which makes this be this and that be
that) presupposes a community, so the fact that there are binding contents,
binding things, so also the fact that the interchangeability is not general
(i.e., that things are not exchangeable for other things without limitations
as to the type of things), and so on: this history has already been related.
When I said above space as indifference to the limits began to be valid
with the Hellenistic epoch, this ‘‘began to be valid’’ was a way to refer to the
situation that results from this bursting of the polis which I have just said is
the consequence of the fact polis itself. When immediately after that I said
space as indifference as to the limits belongs to the notion of validity itself
(of being) just in the Modern Ages, I meant that, in order to understand
certain things Schmitt seems to take for granted, we must assume a situa-
tion in which not only has that community ‘‘burst,’’ but also basic supposi-
tions operate that positively involve the absence of any community, namely
that there is, at least as ruling tendency, what we call the ware,2 the thing
as exchangeable for other things without limitation as to the type of things,
which, tautologically, can occur about a thing only in the case it occurs about
every thing; this, as we have already said, implies the absence of binding
contents. The concept of ware in this sense involves the whole structure we
call civil society, and thus it is this structure that I have meant when I spoke
of basic position of space as indifference to the limits.
So something we have found as consequent expression of the civil society
(the nominal definition of ‘‘right’’ alluded to above, which actually expresses
the system of one’s not belonging to any community) seems to be the same
thing as the prospect we had found on developing (the contradiction of )
Schmitt’s scheme of the jus publicum Europaeum. This seems to give the
alleged definition of right a very central position, perhaps in the sense that
a certain structure, which makes a situation intelligible, at the same time
generates the means of challenging this situation itself; in other words: that
the formula we have presented as a nominal definition of right, this formula
whose semantic development is the system of guarantees of the political
and civil liberties, at the same time as it expresses the nature of civil society
also lays the ground for criticism about it. Criticism always consists in show-
ing that civil society itself does not comply with that formula. I will not
argue whether political power today is a unique and global entity, nor how

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Space and Nomos 311

much this has to do with one’s not belonging to any community; what I say
is that the wrong lies not in uniqueness or global character, but in the fact
that this power, in its global doing, is no system of guarantees of political
and civil liberties but a tyranny; consistent criticism is based on this, not on
reference to particular communities. As to particular communities, if they
can do without denying others equal liberty, from this it follows by mere
logic that they entirely can do on the mere basis of the individual rights and
liberties of the individuals who will participate.
The nominal definition of ‘‘right’’ we have made use of is Kant’s concept of
right,3 including that no moral superiority can be alleged in judicial or politi-
cal questions, because Kant derives his concept of right from the consider-
ation that the object of moral judgment (tautologically) cannot be modified
by material coaction, which, as there is always material coaction, makes
it necessary to find a basis for the distinction between legitimate and ille-
gitimate material coaction, a basis which, for the reason we have adduced,
cannot be moral. It appeared to us that the way in which Schmitt’s concep-
tion conduces to what initially could be taken for its contrary is the abstract
character of his concept of the political entity or political community—the
fact that, as a matter of general principles, it must remain undecided which
types of links determine that something will or will not be a political com-
munity. In fact, this is a way (and it is Schmitt’s way) to acknowledge that
there are no obligatory contents (and thus no qualified boundaries) any-
more, which perhaps implies placing the underlying idea of right in the
region of the absence of community (so in the ‘‘Kantian’’ region).

Notes
1 Carl Schmitt, Der Begriff des Politischen (1932; Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1987).
2 See my articles ‘‘Estado y legitimidad’’ and ‘‘Estado y pólis,’’ in Los filósofos y la política, ed.
M. Cruz (Madrid: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1999), 85–115.
3 My interpretation of Kant’s philosophy has been developed in other publications. A re-
cent summary is my article ‘‘Reconsideración del concepto de ética autónoma,’’ in La
ortiga 33–35 (2002): 35–45.

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