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  • Theology and the Political: The New Debate
  • Clayton Crockett
Theology and the Political: The New Debate. Edited by Creston Davis, John Milbank, and Slavoj Žižek. Duke University Press, 2005. 476 pages. $29.95.

The new debate referenced in this rich, lengthy, and important collection is a desperately urgent debate. The debate does not necessarily refer to a disagreement between theology and politics, but more specifically represents a theological–political engagement with the crisis of liberalism. Liberal democracy, philosophical liberalism, and liberal theology are all in a situation of life support, at best, and therefore the question becomes what can provide a viable alternative to liberalism that would avoid the brutality of neoconservativism, or a naked embrace of American capitalism along with its economic and military imperialism. In this context the nature of the debate revolves around the significance of Christianity and Marxism, as Kenneth Surin claims in one of the chapters. Surin says that Slavoj Žižek, who is also a contributor to and editor of the book, is "quite right to insist that Christianity and Marxism are the only two real metaphysical alternatives to liberalism" (259–260). If this is the case, then a number of other questions may be raised, including (1) whether or not a rejuvenated Christian theology provides a legitimate alternative to liberalism; (2) whether or not a post-Marxist Marxism is possible that is supple and strong enough to take postmodern ideas and developments into account; and finally (3) whether or not Christianity is ultimately compatible with Marxism, or more generally whether or not a Christian materialism is a viable form of political theology.

The book does not necessarily resolve these questions, but it is a welcome contribution toward the fashioning of a new political theology, composed of a range of significant interventions. The only drawback concerns the relative brevity of the introduction by Rowan Williams, in contrast to the density of the book and its large number of chapters. The introduction functions minimally to orient readers to the content of the essays that make up the book. On the other hand, at nearly 500 pages, there is not much room for a lengthy introduction, but perhaps a couple of the chapters could have been sacrificed for a more substantial overview of the fundamental issues involved. As it stands the debate must be constituted by the reader in the process of working through the book. [End Page 554]

This minor criticism aside, the work itself functions as a symphony, building between and among chapters to orchestrate a complex and fruitful investigation of some of the most crucial theoretical issues we face in our contemporary world and includes some of the most influential contemporary philosophers and theologians working today. I cannot do justice to the specificity of the individual chapters, although all of them are strong, and most of them are very valuable and worthwhile essays. In general, however, it is possible to divide the book between a major voice or key and a minor one to appropriate a distinction made by the French philosopher Gilles Deleuze. The major key is composed of contributions to a more explicit and consistent theological vision and its political implications and includes the essays by Rowan Williams, Creston Davis, Conor Cunningham, William Desmond, Daniel M. Bell, Jr., Catherine Pickstock, Graham Ward, John Milbank, and Phillip Blond. Many of these authors are closely associated with Radical Orthodoxy that emerged in the UK in the 1990s and that has become an influential theological movement. According to Radical Orthodoxy, Christianity provides the only alternative to capitalism in the wake of liberalism's demise and the breakdown of secularism as an ideology.

On the other hand, a minor key plays through the chapters representing the major key, and throughout the book, including the essays by Terry Eagleton, Slavoj Žižek, Regina Mara Schwartz, Philip Goodchild, Simon Critchley, Antonio Negri, Kenneth Surin, Eleanor Kaufman, and Hent de Vries. This minor key is less explicitly Christian and more intensively and philosophically focused. Read as a whole, these minor essays comprise a less overarching theological vision, but they are often richer in depth. At the same time they need the more visionary major essays...

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