O racionalnostima i iracionalnosti: poruka liberalizmu u Schmittovim ranim radovima
On Rationalities and Irrationality: A message to Liberalism in Schmitt’s early works

Summary/Abstract: This paper aimed to further illuminate Schmitt’s critique of Marxism and liberalism by reconstructing his argument concerning the rational and the irrational within the two doctrines. Schmitt points to a shared rational foundation in both doctrines – namely, rationalist philosophy – which nonetheless manifests in different forms: Marxism exhibits absolute rationalism, while liberalism displays a relative form. Additionally, Schmitt analyzes the specific rationalism of the Catholic Church, suggesting that such rationalism is complemented by the irrational and mythical – elements that are crucial for the political, given that rationalism alone cannot provide a sufficiently strong political authority. Schmitt concludes that liberalism has yet to recognize this, and thus uses Marxist doctrine to, first, highlight the importance of the irrational, and second, to demonstrate that the irrational cannot be derived from the economic sphere. He argues that Marxism became a powerful political force in Russia because the myth of the bourgeois as the fundamental enemy acquired a national dimension by merging with Russian hatred of Western European values. In other words, had the myth remained confined within the economic limits set by Marx, Marxism would have failed to achieve political mobilization anywhere.

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