Tag: the political

Essay on political theatre – Part 5

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In “Essay on Political Theatre – Part 4,” Hans-Thies Lehmann’s essay “How Political Is Postdramatic Theatre?” was analyzed.

Aftermath of Lehmann’s theory

The influence of Lehmann’s approach on theatre theory should not be underestimated. His formula that theatre is political precisely when it cannot be translated back into political discourse led to all kinds of theatre productions being classified as “political theatre.” In fact, all productions that exhibited the characteristics of post-dramatic theatre as analyzed by Lehmann were called political, from Rimini Protokoll 1 via Pollesch to Holzinger.2

An example:

“If Pollesch’s theatre can be called political, … then it is because of its playful questioning of what is considered normal reality.” 3.

With the same justification, one could call Pollesch’s work “philosophical.”

Or

“Making political theatre can also mean leaving it up to the audience to decide what they want to understand.” 4

In every form of theatre, it is up to the audience to decide what they want to understand. Exerting pressure on the audience to think in a certain way remains a pipe dream of overzealous theatre makers. Thoughts are free, even in theatre, and not just in political theatre.

Here, as there, there is no definable concept of “political.”

Politics and the political as asymmetrical opposites

However, reference is often made to the difference between politics and the political. The manifold attempts to establish this difference conceptually and to clarify the relationship between the two parts by Lacoue-Labarthe, Lefort, Badiou, Rancière and Nancy often shrink in theatre theory to a demarcation from ‘politics’. ‘The political’ is then everything in human coexistence that is not politics. Thomas Bedorf places this use of the dichotomy politics/political in the series of asymmetrical opposites such as Christian/pagan.5 The term ‘political’ is thus used to qualify theatre works that have no recognisable connection to “politics” as political. But why is this qualification necessary? Is ‘political’ simply a value-laden adjective like ‘interesting’?

Three microanalyses of theoretical statements

Hidden value judgements are typical of contemporary theatre studies. Here are three linguistic microanalyses:

‘The forms of explicitly political theatre that developed during the 20th century seem to have reached an end point.’6

A cautious (‘seem’), descriptive statement. But in the context of contemporary theatre studies, the assertion that a form of theatre has reached an ‘end point’ is a devaluation of that form. For this discipline seeks to theorise the new and thus point the way forward for practice. Such forms of explicitly political theatre are “often reduced to a legitimisation of the theatre business through obvious conflict themes,” writes Primavesi. Here, too, the description is cautious (‘often’). But the following participle “reduced” cannot refer to the frequency of the performances, but rather to their content, and conveys a devaluation of this content. In this context, the adjective “obvious” also takes on an aesthetically pejorative connotation. The “legitimisation of theatre operations” is also a pejorative motif in this context. Why should a theatre be criticised for wanting to legitimise its operations? It must legitimise its operations in the public eye, and it can do so with productions that take up “obvious conflict issues” or with productions that “disappoint or subvert the audience’s habitual perceptions”, as Primavesi describes and prefers in his essay. The “legitimation of theatre operations” is possible in many different ways. But it is necessary in any case.

Another example:

‘However, as this review of various positions on the question of political theatre has already shown, there can be no normative definition that determines once and for all what political theatre is or even should be. Nor is there “the political” that could serve as an absolute criterion of quality and prove the relevance of artistic practice. Who would decide what is political and what is not?’7

There is some confusion in these sentences by Primavesi.

1. A definition of what political theatre is is not normative, unless “political” is a normative term, a criterion of quality. Normative would only be a codification of what political theatre must be, i.e. a codification of instructions on what political theatre should look like.

2. A definition of what falls under the term ‘political theatre’ is necessary if one wants to clarify terms. And that is a task for philosophy. However, clarifying a term is not a prescription for practical behaviour.

3. Of course, there is no such thing as ‘the political’ that can function as an absolute (or even relative) criterion of quality. But every theory of political science or political philosophy attempts to determine what ‘the political’ is, what is meant by this term.

4. Even in the rejection of ‘the political’ as a criterion of quality for theatre, it becomes clear that Primavesi also considers it to be such. According to Primavesi, the reason why the political cannot be a criterion of quality is simply that it is impossible to determine what meets this criterion. If there were a generally accepted definition of what ‘the political’ is, we would have a criterion of quality for good theatre, and the relevance of artistic practice would be proven. Relevant theatre would then be political theatre.

Or

‘Making theatre politically does not mean that one does not want to take a political stance, but rather that one consciously refuses to take this moral position in order to address the functioning of politics. Moral political criticism, on the other hand, always falls short; it operates on the surface and remains trapped in the system of a conventional concept of politics.’ 8

Here, “taking a political stance” is equated (“this”) with “moral position”. The autonomy of politics and morality is thus ignored, yet a distinction is made between not taking “a political stance” and “consciously refusing to take this moral position” (=political stance).  The difference can therefore only lie in awareness. Political criticism, and thus political theatre that refers to ‘politics’ and does not merely ‘make  theatre politically’, is equated with moral criticism and devalued (‘too short … superficial … trapped’).

An open definition of political theatre

An older definition of political theatre from English-language theatre studies, on the other hand, is much more open and less normative than descriptive:

“Thinking of political theatre as a cultural practice that self-consciously operates at the level of interrogation, critique and intervention, unable to stand outside the very institutions and attitudes it seeks to change. Such a difference allows us to place under the rubric of political theatre a range of theatrical activity, from theatre as an act of political intervention taken on behalf of a designated population and having a specific political agenda; to theatre that offers itself as a public forum through plays with overtly political content; to theatre whose politics are covertly, or unwittingly, on display, inviting an actively critical stance from its audience.”9

At the same time, in their overview of the contributions to their anthology, the editors make it clear why it is so difficult to develop an open, descriptive concept of political theatre:

‘Critical activity is itself a situated act of political investment.’10

The  analysis of political theatre in theatre studies is rarely purely descriptive because the condition of partiality, which is inherent in any activity in the field of politics, spills over from the object to the analysis. The definition of what political theatre is is itself understood as a political act.

So what is the political?

A common distinction between politics and the political in theatre theory can be found in Jan Deck:

“Politics here means thinking in terms of government logic and problem-solving strategies, but also the practice of criticising state measures … And that means excluding certain views of social developments from political discourse per se. The political is that which eludes this definition and reduction to pragmatic self-restraint. It is the resistant, that which is not recognised as relevant by politics…. Contemporary approaches to the performing arts seem to be a place of the political in a way completely different to this understanding of politics.” 11

This understanding of the political as opposed to politics, as a political opposition that is not part of politics and therefore does not have to concern itself with ‘logics of government,’ ‘problem-solving strategies,’ and ‘state measures,’ and of theatre as a place of the political, not of politics, has shaped the idea of political theatre in Germany from around 2000 to the present day.

Oliver Marchart12 on the other hand, develops a different concept in his examination of the left-Heideggerian theorists of the political13. For Marchart, the political is the dimension of the founding of politics, the ‘institutionalisation of the community,’ which, according to his post-fundamentalist approach, is at the same time the recognition of the impossibility of a final justification of politics. For Marchart, the founding of politics is necessary, but always  necessarily contingent. Every political system must attempt to justify itself through reasons. At the same time, however, it is clear that these justifications are arbitrary, contingent, and that other justifications are always possible. Democracy is the form of politics that institutionalises this knowledge of the impossibility of a final foundation of politics. The connection between politics and the political is therefore one of foundation (in the form of necessary groundlessness on the one hand and the necessity of foundation on the other), not one of opposition.

‘No one has ever encountered “the political” in its pure form anywhere other than in the fractures and divisions of society, which are filled, expanded or closed by: politics.’14

A theatre of the political would therefore have to represent or examine how politics fills the ‘fractures and cracks of the social’ and in doing so discovers the possibilities for founding society.

An example:

The founding documents of a theatre of the political are, of course, Aeschylus’ ‘Oresteia’ and Sophocles’ ‘Antigone’15. What we can learn from this today in order to recognise the current political dilemmas by viewing them through the lens of the old model is demonstrated by Karin Beyer’s staging of Roland Schimmelpfennig’s five-part Thebes cycle ‘Anthropolis’ (Deutsches Schauspielhaus Hamburg 2023 16).

In ‘Iokaste’ (= Anthropolis IV), the chorus formulates the post-fundamentalist insight into the abysmal nature of all foundations of the community:

Chorus: “Justice and law are nothing but a construct, a house whose walls stand until someone tears them down, and then all that remains of justice and law is rubble.” 17

Jocasta then provides a foundation for politics in the tradition of Hannah Arendt:

Jocasta: “Equality is a law among humans, and this law applies to everyone, to all of humanity. You both have the same right. Equality and peace govern the world.” 18

And in ‘Antigone’ (= Anthropolis V), Creon formulates his concept of foundation closely based on the wording of Carl Schmitt’s definition of the political:

Creon: “Those who value their friends more than their own country are nothing but nothing… and an enemy can never become my friend or ally, for I know: We are all nothing without the city; without it, we are lost; there can be no future, no plans, no alliances, no friends without it; everything else is treason.” 19

In “Anthropolis”, the various possibilities for establishing the political are played out, demonstrating the necessity of this foundation and, at the same time, revealing the contingency of these various attempts. The diverse anachronisms that Schimmelpfennig has incorporated into the ancient mythological material ensure a connection to contemporary politics20.

What, then, is politics?

Marchart gives a minimal definition of politics. He lists six criteria that an action must fulfil if it is to be understood as politics:

  • Becoming a majority
  • Strategy
  • Organisation
  • Collectivity
  • Conflictuality
  • Partisanship

A political action must pursue the goal of becoming capable of gaining majority support, it must pursue a certain strategy, i.e. be compatible with a long-term concept that can become politically dominant (hegemony), have a minimum degree of organisation, be or become collective in some form, want to intervene in a conflict and therefore represent a certain point of view and thus be partisan, not neutral.

‘Politics is always shaped by restrictive conditions, including those of becoming a majority, strategy, organisation, collectivity, conflictuality and partiality.’ 21

No theatre production can fully meet these criteria, at least not one that is publicly funded, except perhaps the agitprop group of a political party, such as the “Rote Sprachrohr” (Red Megaphone) of the KPD in the Weimar Republic. 22. A municipal theatre (Stadttheater) is a publicly funded institution with a highly differentiated division of labour for the purpose of producing theatre art, but it is not a political organisation.

Nevertheless, there are varying degrees of approximation to these criteria of politics in contemporary theatre. Attempts to bring political groups such as the ‘Centre for Political Beauty’ (Zentrum für politische Schönheit, “2099” Theater Dortmund 2015) or ’”The Last Generation (“Die letzte Generation‘”, ’Recht auf Jugend” Schauspiel Bonn 2022, text: Lothar Kittstein, director: Volker Lösch) go the furthest in this direction. Here, the theatre places itself at the service of a political organisation, albeit only temporarily. Projects such as ‘Die Welt neu denken’ (Theatre Bonn 2021, based on the book of the same title by Maja Göpel, directed by Simon Solberg) and ‘Geld ist Klasse’ (FFT Düsseldorf 2024 with Volker Lösch and Marlene Engelhorn) meet these criteria even less, although they proclaim concrete instructions for action to the audience, because they are not directly (but possibly indirectly23) with a political organisation. Even further removed from these criteria are productions such as ‘Mölln 92/22’ (Schauspiel Köln 2022, concept and direction: David Nuran Calis) or ‘Aufstieg und Fall des René Benko’ (Volkstheater Wien 2024, concept and direction: Calle Fuhr), which do not proclaim any instructions for action but are nevertheless partisan.

Mass-politics – post-politics – anti-politics

The fact that so many examples of theatre productions that approach politics and explicitly address political issues can be found since 2020 is also due to a change in the relationship between society and politics. Theatres respond not only to theatre theory, but also to audience preferences. The “old” political theatre was not always wrong, it simply had a different audience. The “old” political theatre of the 1950s to 1970s (Sartre, Peter Weiss, Kipphardt, etc.) still fell within the phase of mass-politics, when politics still took place in institutionalised contexts (parties, organisations). Hans-Thies Lehmann’s definition of post-dramatic theatre as political in its departure from politics fell within the phase of post-politics between 1990 and 2010 24. The importance of organised political institutions declined, and political decisions were presented as having no alternative. Political engagement was less in demand.

‘Post-politics {…} was characterised by widespread depoliticisation: citizens withdrew into their private lives, wanted little to do with politics – and certainly not with regular political participation.’ 25

This turning away from the actual politics of the time is reflected in the theatre as a shift in the demands placed on politics:

‘When (government) politics becomes the mere administration of the existing order, it loses its function as a place of utopia.’ 26

This utopian function was now to be taken over by the theatre of the political.

Between 2010 and 2020, this relationship changed and new social movements with political aspirations emerged (Black Lives Matter, Yellow Vests, Last Generation, etc.). This marked the beginning of the phase of anti-politics, in contrast to the apolitical phase of post-politics.

‘Anti-politics was a politics against a politics that was not.’ 27

The examples of theatre projects mentioned above, which come as close as possible to politics, date from this phase. This shift is also reflected in theoretical reflections on the relationship between politics and theatre. Alexander Kerlin, then dramaturge at Schauspiel Dortmund under the artistic direction of Kay Voges, stated in 2019:

‘In view of the threat posed by anti-liberal, anti-democratic politics, many voices today are calling for a return to a completely different tradition in the performing arts: direct and unmediated political and activist action.’ 28

And Michael Wolf (editor of Nachtkritik) finds a solution for how political theatre can be effective: by taking a stand in local conflicts and anchoring itself in political debates at the local level 29.

“The ultimate goal of political theatre is not to make a few audience members think differently about an issue. Political theatre that wants to be taken seriously must leave the sidelines and take a position at the centre of the debate. […] How can a politically active theatre still have an impact? The answer is obvious: by relating its content to its region. It is important to limit the radius of one’s own themes. Stadtheater should remember that it is a local cultural institution.‘ 30

Here, then, is a proposed way in which theatre can meet the criteria of conflictuality and partisanship in politics.

Hypothetical summary

In the post-political phase after 1989, the distinction between politics and the political, which originated in French criticism of totalitarianism 31, was used in theatre theory to confer the quality of ‘political’ on theatre productions that deliberately avoided explicitly political content. In Germany, there is a long tradition of equating politics with the state 32. This tradition was still effective in this post-political phase. Distancing oneself from politics meant turning away from state action. However, the concept of ‘the political’ as the antonym of ‘politics’ offered the possibility of continuing to use the epithet “political” and thus continuing the justification of theatre from the years of the Weimar Republic and the ‘trent glorieuses’ 1945-75. The concept of ‘the political’ thus fulfilled a function similar to that in the German tradition of “culture” as the antithesis of politics understood as state action 33. However, when various political movements emerged (again) after 2010, both internationally and in Germany, which were political but not state-run, it became possible once more to apply the term ‘politics’ to a sphere that was not state-run. Theatres opened up to these political movements, and political content, albeit in a different form, was no longer taboo.

To be continued

  1. “The production that Rimini Protokoll created in 2006 from Karl Marx’s classic theory ‘Das Kapital, Band 1’ proved to be paradigm-forming {for new forms of political theatre}.” Christian Rakow, “Auf zweiter Stufe: Theater und politische Bildung – geht das überhaupt zusammen?” in: Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung (ed.), Moralische Anstalt 2.0. Über Theater und politische Bildung ↵
  2. “So what makes Holzinger Theater so special? {…} it is a density of theatrical means that function almost flawlessly and, in the flow of what can be seen, allow for moments of reflection, casual, clear, political in their own way.“ Georg Diez, ”Klarheit, Tiefe, Krassheit“ {review of Florentina Holzinger’s ”Sancta.” Die Zeit, June 1, 2024 ↵
  3. Patrick Primavesi, “Theater/Politik. Kontexte und Beziehungen” (Theatre/Politics. Contexts and Relationships). In: Jan Deck & Angelika Seeburg (eds.), Politisch Theater machen. Neue Artikulationsformen des Politischen in den darstellenden Künsten (Making Political Theatre. New Forms of Articulation of the Political in the Performing Arts). Bielefeld: Transkript, 2011, p. 65 ↵
  4. Jan Deck, „Politisch Theater machen – Eine Einleitung“ (“Making Political Theater—An Introduction”), in Jan Deck & Angelika Seeburg (eds.), Politisch Theater machen. Neue Artikulationsformen des Politischen in den darstellenden Künsten (Making Political Theatre: New Forms of Articulation of the Political in the Performing Arts). Bielefeld: Transkript, 2011, p. 17 ↵
  5. “It is only clear in each case what the political is not: namely, ‘mere’ politics. If this difference resembles the logic of asymmetrical opposites, as Reinhart Koselleck has examined in the history of concepts in the opposition between Greeks and barbarians, Christians and pagans, humans and subhumans, then the distinction between the political and politics threatens to become a hypostatisation of the political.” Thomas Bedorf, ‘Das Politische und die Politik. Konturen einer Differenz“ (The Political and Politics. Contours of a Difference). In: Thomas Bedorf and Kurt Röttgers (eds.): Das Politische und die Politik (The Political and Politics). Berlin: Suhrkamp. 2010, p. 33, cf. Reinhart Koselleck, »Zur historisch-politischen Semantik asymmetrischer Gegenbegriffe« (‘On the Historical-Political Semantics of Asymmetrical Opposites’). In: idem, Vergangene Zukunft. Zur Semantik geschichtlicher Zeiten, Frankfurt/M. 2nd ed. 1992, pp. 211-259. ↵
  6. Primavesi, op. cit., p. 44 ↵
  7. Primavesi, op. cit., p. 57 ↵
  8. Jan Deck, op. cit., p. 28 ↵
  9. Jeanne Colleran & Jenny S. Spencer (eds.), ’Introduction” to Staging Resistance Essays on Political Theatre. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1998 p.1 ↵
  10. ibid. p.3. The translation into German is problematic due to the different concepts of criticism and science. In this context, ‘critical activity’ refers to the detailed, theoretically underpinned analysis of a theatre performance, as this is the nature of most of the contributions to this anthology. ‘Theatre criticism’ (Theaterkritik) in the German sense, i.e. writing about theatre productions in the current media on a daily basis, is not meant here. In German terms, the contributions in this volume would fall under ‘theatre studies’ (Theaterwissenschaft) or ‘performance analysis’ (Aufführungsanalyse). In German terms, retranslated into English, the sentence means something like:  ‘Writing theatre studies or performance analyses is itself an activity embedded in a specific political situation with the aim of influencing politics.’ ↵
  11. Deck p. 25f ↵
  12. Marchart, Oliver, Die politische Differenz. Zum Denken des Politischen bei Nancy, Lefort, Badiou, Laclau und Agamben. Berlin: Suhrkamp, 2010 ↵
  13. Nancy, Lefort, Rancière, Badiou, Laclau, Mouffe ↵
  14. Marchart, p.328 ↵
  15. Sophocles’ Antigone repeatedly serves Hegel as an example of the opposing principles of state and morality. For various interpretations of this opposition, see Georg Steiner, Die Antigonen. Geschichte und Gegenwart eines Mythos. Munich: Hanser, 1988, first chapter, pp. 1-3, pp. 13-59), one can add: Hegel’s interpretation of Antigone can be seen as an example of a fundamentalist foundation of politics: the ‘tyrannical sacrilege’ (“tyrannischer Frevel”, Creon) and the ‘sacrilege of knowledge’ (“Frevel des Wissens”, Antigone) are suspended in the ‘absolute pure will of all which has the form of immediate being ’( im „absoluten reinen Willen aller, der die Form des unmittelbaren Seins hat“). For Hegel, the foundation of society arises from the confrontation and suspension (“Aufhebung”) of these two principles. Hegel, Phänomenologie des Geistes. Theorie Werkausgabe Vol. 3, Frankfurt/M.: Suhrkamp, 1970, p. 320f ↵
  16. Simon Strauß in: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 17 July 2024 or Till Briegleb in: Süddeutsche Zeitung 12 November 2023 ↵
  17. Roland Schimmelpfennig, Anthropolis. Monster. City. Thebes. With an afterword by Sibylle Meier. Frankfurt (M: Fischer, 2023, p. 359 ↵
  18. ibid. p. 390 ↵
  19. ibid. p. 418 ↵
  20. e.g. in ‘Iokaste’ (=Anthropolis IV): the chorus describes the arrival of Eteocles in Thebes: “A single man on his way into the city, he is armed. Combat boots, an automatic rifle, combat suit, helmet.” Ibid. p. 385f ↵
  21. Marchart p. 342 ↵
  22. The “Rote Sprachrohr” was founded in 1926 under the direction of Maxim Vallentin as the ‘First agitprop group of the KJVD’, the youth organisation of the KPD. See Ludwig Hoffmann and Daniel Hoffmann-Ostwald (eds.), Deutsches Arbeitertheater 1918-1933. 2 vols. Munich: Rogner & Bernhard, 1973, introduction p. 37f ↵
  23. ‘Geld ist Klasse’ was co-financed by the Rosa-Luxemburg-Foundation, the party foundation of the ‘Left Party’ (“Die Linke”) ↵
  24. See also Colin Crouch’s concept of ‘post-democracy’ in: Colin Crouch, Postdemokratie. Berlin: Suhrkamp 2008 ↵
  25. Anton Jäger, Hyperpolitik. Extreme Politisierung ohne politische Folgen. Berlin: Suhrkamp, 2023, p.15 ↵
  26. Deck, op. cit. p. 13 ↵
  27. Anton Jäger, op. cit., p. 82 ↵
  28. Alexander Kerlin, ‘Beim Blick in den Abgrund’ (Looking into the Abyss), in: Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung (ed.), op. cit. p. 28 ↵
  29. The above-mentioned projects by Volker Lösch and Nuran David Calis can be seen as evidence of this thesis. ↵
  30. Michael Wolf, “Theater für den Heimbedarf: Wie Theater politisch wirksam werden kann” (Theatre for home use: How theatre can become politically effective), in: Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung (ed.), op. cit., pp. 44-45 ↵
  31. Following early work by Carl Schmitt and Hannah Arendt ↵
  32. Ernst Vollrath, ‘Zur Topologie der politischen Wahrnehmung in Deutschland I und II’ in: ibid. Was ist das Politische? Eine Theorie des Politischen und seiner Wahrnehmung. Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann, 2003, pp. 115-176 ↵
  33. ‘Leading representatives of German cultural self-awareness {have} separated culture and politics from each other, even setting them in opposition to each other.’ Vollrath, op. cit. p. 157 ↵

Essay on political theatre – Part 4

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In Part 3 of the ‘Essay on political theatre’, the development of the distinction between ‘the political’ and ‘politics’ from Herodotus to Lyotard was outlined. Now this development will be followed up to the theatre of the present day.1

f) Derrida

Lyotard’s parallelisation of representation in politics and representation in theatre is taken up by Jacques Derrida in a lecture from 1997 on the occasion of a theatre performance “Karl Marx, Théâtre inédit” in Nanterre. For him, the concept of representation is the intersection of politics and theatre. Derrida speaks of a disease of representation or an evil (“mal de répresentation”) that has infected both areas. His criticism of political representation is less sharp than Lyotard’s; he does not want to attack representative democracy as such, but only to remind the political representatives of their function. To do this, he demands of the theatre:

‘We must change the stage, change the time, change the order of time’ 2.

Without making a clear distinction between politics and the political, he calls for ‘allowing politics or the political to enter the structure of the theatre.’ 3 This can be achieved, ‘by interweaving several heterogeneous times in a single time that is divided and out of joint; by interweaving several orders of speech, modes of speaking that are simultaneously real, that is, realistic, and fictional, that is, lyrical and poetic.’ 4 Like Rancière, he also demands that theatre has the function of giving a voice to the unrepresented.

‘The art of disruption, of contratiempo (off-beat), is also an art of the political, an art of the theatrical, the art of giving the floor at the most inconvenient of times to those who, in the current course of events, have no right to raise their voice.”5

g) What used to be called political theatre

Jacques Derrida shares with Lyotard the rejection of

“what used to be called political theatre, which conveyed a message, sometimes a revolutionary content, without changing the form, time and space of the theatrical event”.6

This reproach against the old political theatre has been running through the discussion about politics in theatre since the 1990s, without the reproach being substantiated by examples. In the French context, one might assume that Sartre’s plays are meant, since they work with the traditional means of theatre: fictional plot and characters, empathy, arcs of suspense, concentrated narration with a condensed fictional time structure, clear separation of stage and auditorium (fourth wall).

Brecht is also considered part of the outdated, old political theatre. Lyotard rejects Brecht in his radical criticism of all symbolism in theatre and Rancière sees in Brecht, as in Artaud, one of the ‘theatre reformers’ who started from the false idea that ‘the theatre is a place of community in itself.’7 Both Brecht and Artaud set themselves the task of

‘to teach their audience the means to stop being spectators and to become actors in a collective practice.”8

Rancière, on the other hand, believes that ‘in a theatre […] there are only individuals who go their own way through the forest of things, actions and signs that they face.’ Only the equality of minds, only the same ability to play an unpredictable game of associations and dissociations, connects individuals.

‘Being a spectator is not the passive state that we have to transform into activity.”9.

Jens Roselt has used the phenomenological method to work out exactly what being a spectator in the theatre is like. It is a temporary, even selective community that in no way suspends the associative activity of the individual spectators. The spectator is actually not passive, he or she acts ‘in individual difference together’10. Although each spectator makes his or her own way through the forest of theatrical signs, the fact that all the others are also in this forest also characterises the theatrical situation of the audience. Commonality and difference – both are part of being an audience member.

An example:

In Karin Beier’s production of Roland Schimmelpfennig’s drama “Iokaste”11, the question of how the occidental culture of the political has developed from a ritual to a political culture is discussed on stage.12 The fact that a production like Karin Beier’s “Iokaste” deals with issues on stage that evoke associations in many minds to the current conflict between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip is just one example of the combination of individual freedom and temporary collectivity in the theatre: the fact that about 1000 people are staring in the same direction while at the same time being free to concentrate on whatever detail, that such a temporary collective subject arises, which reacts to the same thing in its own individually different mixture of emotions, considerations and judgements.

Brecht was already aware of this. As is well known, Brecht wanted to teach the ‘art of watching’ ‘an art that must first be learned, trained, then constantly practised in the theatre’13. He was also aware of the inconsistency of audience reactions in political theatre:

‘When plays with political effects are performed, the ambivalence of our audience […] can be clearly seen.’

He explicitly rejects the attempt to strive for ‘a uniformly reacting audience’; only Aristotelian drama, based on empathy, could attempt this. He even saw the possibility of theatre motivating action outside of the theatre more in the Aristotelian than in his epic theatre.14 However, he was not a ‘teacher without teaching’, as Rancière wishes teachers to be.

h) After Brecht

For post-Brecht German productions of political theatre, the accusation that they want to teach the audience to no longer be an audience is hardly true. In the 1960s, the predominant form of theatre was documentary theatre, but it only ever addressed political issues after the fact: Kipphardt’s ‘In the Case of J. Oppenheimer’ (In der Sache J. Oppenheimer, 1964) and ‘Brother Eichmann’ (Bruder Eichmann, 1982), Peter Weiss’s ‘Inquiry’ (Die Ermittlung, 1965) and ‘Vietnam Discourse’ (Vietnam-Diskurs, 1968) or Heiner Müller’s ‘Germania – Death in Berlin’ (Germania Tod in Berlin, 1971) and ‘The Commission’ (Der Auftrag, 1979) took up past political events to shed light on contemporary debates. With the exception of Rolf Hochhuth’s ‘The Deputy’ (Der Stellvertreter, 1963), none of these plays was formally naive in the sense of Schillerian or Ibsenian dramaturgy. The clarity of the ‘message’ conveyed by the old political theatre according to Derrida varied, however: very clear in Peter Weiss’ “Vietnam Discourse”15 and in the original version of Kipphardt’s ‘Bruder Eichmann’, very unclear in Heiner Müller’s ‘Der Auftrag’. The authors and directors of the 60s and 70s were also aware of the mode of operation of their medium. Or as Rancière puts it: the unavoidable split between intention and effect.16 Even then, Peter Stein thought that

‘the actual effect of art on politics is zero.’ 17

These banal insights were already known at the time. Only Peter Stein and Wolfgang Schwiedrzik’s Munich production of the ‘Vietnam Discourse’ in 1968, with an integrated collection of money for the Vietcong (FNL), tried (unsuccessfully) to rebel against this basal structure of reception, but it also only expected a mobilising effect only in the audience that was already in agreement.18

i) Hans-Thies Lehman and the post-dramatic theatre

The most influential definition of what political theatre is for German theatre in the 21st century can be found in Hans-Thies Lehmann’s essay “Wie politisch ist das postdramatische Theater?”(How political is post-dramatic theatre?) from 2001. [Hans-Thies Lehmann, “Wie politisch ist das postdramatische Theater?”, in: H-Th.L., Das Politische Schreiben. Essays zu Theatertexten. Berlin: Theater der Zeit, 2002 {= Recherchen 12}; first published in: Theater der Zeit, October 2001]. As a lecturer at the Institute for Applied Theatre Studies in Gießen and as a professor at the University of Frankfurt/M, Hans-Thies Lehmann has had a decisive influence on the generation of directors and dramaturgs after 2000. His essay, like his magnum opus, ‘Das postdramatische Theater’19, is a profound analysis of contemporary theatre and, at the same time, an aesthetic programme, i.e. not just theatre theory, but a science that is to be applied. From today’s perspective, however, one must formulate some reservations about his definition of political theatre.

Lehmann first reformulates the title question of his essay to ‘How is theatre, for example post-dramatic theatre, political?’ His premise is therefore: theatre is political in a way that is particular to it. So there is no question of whether theatre is political or what kind of theatre is political. He later writes that theatre is structurally political, that the political is ‘inscribed’ in it. In doing so, he explicitly refrains from a more precise definition of the term ‘political’.20 In any case, the term ‘of the political’, which Lehmann always uses here, is not distinguished from ‘politics’.

As a theatre theorist, Lehmann does not want to give ‘instructions (programmes)’. But time and again, evaluations of theatre practice creep into his formulations. For example, when he warns against taking up political content in theatre because then there is a danger that it will ‘too obediently parrot’ what public discourse dictates. He is concerned with defending post-dramatic theatre (Fabre, Wilson, Pollesch, Lauwers) against the accusation that it lacks the political.

The political in theatre

Lehmann’s definition of the political in theatre is based on three formulas, the first of which has three sub-theses.

1. a) The political can only appear in theatre indirectly, in modo obliquo.

b) The political comes to bear in theatre when and only when it cannot be translated or retranslated into the logic, syntax and conceptuality of political discourse.

c) The political in theatre is to be thought of as an interruption of the political.

2. Political theatre is to be understood as a practice of exception. Only a theatre that shakes its own rules, that interrupts theatre as a show, enters into a genuine relationship with the political.

3. Political theatre takes the form of the shock of habit/disappointment of desire to find dramatised simulacra of political realities on stage. At the same time, this is a shock to the moralisation associated with the personalisation in politics and thus the avoidance of the moralistic trap.

Lehmann’s thesis that the political in theatre is the interruption of the political obviously draws on Walter Benjamin’s use of the term ‘interruption’ in his characterisation of Brecht’s epic theatre. Benjamin sees the ‘interruption of sequences’ in Brecht as an essential means of alienation and thus for the spectator to discover in amazement the conditions in which he lives. 21 Lehmann expands this concept of interruption, however, from the interruption of processes to the ‘interruption of the regulatory’ in general and in politics. The interruption thus becomes an intended effect rather than an aesthetic device. The ‘solidified façade of legal relationships’ in which we live is to be broken open so that the agonistic, the conflict as the essence of politics, becomes clear again.22 It also becomes clear to what extent Lehmann in 2001 assumed a society based on superficial consensus in which conflicts are hidden. Meanwhile, in 2025, Western societies in Europe and America are on the road to increasing polarisation. The façade of consensus is crumbling, even legal relationships are becoming fluid because the opponents of the pluralistic-democratic system (Trump, Orban, Le Pen, Meloni, Kickl, Ben-Gvir) are attacking the legal institutions first. For Lehmann, however, these agonal forces of politics have no place and are not persons. Therefore, they ‘offer no content that would be political, no form to representation’. This is the old insight that Brecht had already formulated as:

‘Actual reality has slipped into the functional’.23

But if theatre wants to present these formless forces of the political (or of politics?), it cannot just present function graphs, it needs the detour via people, actors, performers or presenters. Lehmann seems to shy away from this detour and points to the possibility of retreating away from politics and towards one’s own rules, towards interrupting the ‘listening and viewing order’. The paradoxical formulation that the political aspect of theatre consists in keeping free of everything political is very much in line with Jacques Rancière’s:

‘Art that makes politics by abolishing itself as art is thus opposed by an art that is political on condition that it keeps itself pure of any political influence.”24

Rancière’s critique of art that abolishes itself for the sake of politics applies more to the actions of the ‘Centre for Political Beauty’ (Zentrum für politische Schönheit, ZfS) and similar artivist projects than to current attempts at political theatre. The political (and politics) also appear in the theatre directly, in modo recto. The political in the theatre can be translated into the terminology of politics. The political in theatre is not an interruption of the political, but (also, not always) an interference in politics.

Political tendency and artistic tendency

Walter Benjamin’s definition of the relationship between political tendency and literary tendency seems to provide a template for determining the relationship between theatre and the political:

‘The tendency of a piece of writing can only be politically correct if it is also correct in literary terms. This means that the politically correct tendency includes a literary tendency, […] this literary tendency can consist of a step forward or backward in literary technique.”25

Lehmann seems to want to reverse Benjamin’s formula: for him, progress in theatrical technique (‘overcoming the visual and auditory arrangement in favour of an exploration of the situational aspect’) is the condition for political theatre. For Benjamin, it was still clear which political tendency he meant. His lecture on the author as producer was delivered in 1934 in Paris at the ‘Institute for the Study of Fascism’. For Lehmann, on the other hand, there is no specific political tendency that political theatre should pursue, but only a ‘genuine reference to the political’, which, however, should consist precisely in a break with political content.

The auxiliary institute of theatre

‘Theatre cannot be an auxiliary institution of political education.’ 26

On the other hand, it is certain that theatre is being used as such in the present day: it is often the case that theatre intervenes in the realm of politics, and thus in the realm of power and strategy. The temporal dimension plays a role here. Theatre often takes up global topics of medium-term relevance and relates them to contemporary issues27 or locally in retrospect.28 The most internationally well-known play of this kind, which deals with political processes in retrospect, is ‘Enron’ by Lucy Prebble about the fraud of the American energy company.29 Or, more recently, Volker Lösch and Marlene Engelhorn’s show ‘Geld ist Klasse’ (Money is Class). Elfriede Jelinek’s almost daily text productions for the theatre, e.g. ‘Am Königsweg’ (On the Royal Road) 2017 on Donald Trump’s first election, most recently ‘Endsieg’ (Final Victory) on his re-election, and their staging by Falk Richter, are examples of how quickly the theatre can react and that a theatre that takes up current political content does not have to resort to the structures of traditional narrative-Aristotelian theatre.30

Investigative Theatre

Theatre not only addresses the conditions of the constitution of the polity, the political, but also, to an increasing extent, politics itself. Theatre critics can criticise such projects aesthetically, one can question their political effectiveness, but theatre theory would have to take note of the fact that such a thing exists and explain the condition of its possibility: the analogy of theatre and politics.31 Jean Peters of the journalists’ collective Correctiv explains the function of this investigative theatre with the decline of newspapers:

‘Theatre is one of many answers: here you can tell a story in peace and at the end we know: there are witnesses to the shared experience…. Theatre has the calmness of development and of picking up on things, of contextualisation and of meta-levels.’ ’It’s about creating a space in which society can develop. We want to awaken the desire to shape society. … That is my vision – and theatre can do that.”32

‘A space in which society can develop’ is a definition of the political, and this is the basis for a theatre project about a conference of far-right politicians who discussed the re-migration of emigrants: “Geheimplan gegen Deutschland” (Berliner Ensemble, Volkstheater Vienna 202 4).33 Here, then, the ‘political’, the conditions for the constitution of society, and ‘politics’, the decisions about society that are concentrated in the state and organised institutionally, are to be connected; the one is not without the other in the theatre, not separated as in Lehmann. Here, the political comes into play precisely because it can be translated into public discourse, which is called politics. At most, one could apply Derrida’s proviso clause: provided that the theatre “does not simply turn into a meeting place and continues to follow its theatrical destiny.”34 This journalistic theatre of revelations should certainly not be propagated as the future of theatre, but we should at least take note of its potential.

The moralistic trap

Lehman warns of the ‘moralistic trap’ that theatre could fall into by taking on political content, through the theatricalisation and personalisation of the political. This warning is in line with Rancière’s warning against the ‘ethical confusion’ that equates politics and art.35 For Rancière, art and politics are two areas that are in a permanent state of tension, but do not merge into one another. The possibility of political theatre does not mean a weakening of the autonomy of art36, although, as Janis El-Bira puts it, in the theatre “the post-autonomous has long since been rattling at the auditorium doors.”37  Art remains a separate area with its own valuations, rules and procedures, like politics and morality, even if one system can be judged by the standards of the other.

The ‘moralistic trap’ does not snap shut as soon as the theatre takes up political content because the political, like art, is an autonomous realm. Since the ‘Machiavellian moment’, politics has established itself as a separate realm alongside morality.38 But the autonomous realms of politics, art and morality are in a mutual state of tension.
For a pure ethics of reason, as advocated by Kant, there is no conflict between morality and politics, because politics must always be guided by morality, to which only what is possible is binding.39 But for actual morality, for the moral concepts in people’s minds, for what Hegel calls ‘morality’40, these conflicts between morality, politics and art arise constantly.

From today’s perspective, Hans-Thies Lehmann’s definition of the political in theatre, especially in post-dramatic theatre, seems to be a retreat from the ‘disgusting corruption of political discourse’41 to a ‘politics of perception’42, the effect of which remains questionable and the re-connection to the realm of the political is deliberately negated.

To be continued.

  1. This essay generally refers to German theatre and theory. Therefore, most references and quotations are originally in German. Quotations have been translated by myself, even if there are official English editions as in the case of well-known authors like Brecht, or Rancière. Titels are given in the original language (usually German), sometimes translated into English in addition, if it seems helpful. ↵
  2. Jacques Derrida, “Marx, das ist wer”. in: Zäsuren, November 2000, No. 1 Ökonomien der Differenz, ed. by Hans-Joachim Lenger, Jörg Sasse, Georg Christoph Tholen, pp. 58-70. Here p. 64. Transcript of a lecture in connection with the staging of the play ‘Karl Marx, théâtre inédit’, March 1997 Théâtre des Amandiers, Nanterre, Director: Jean-Pierre Vincent ↵
  3. ibid. p.65 ↵
  4. ibid. p.64 ↵
  5. p.69 ↵
  6. Derrida, ibid. p.64 ↵
  7. Rancière, “Der emanzipierte Zuschauer”, in: J.R., Der emanzipierte Zuschauer. Wien: Passagen, 2nd ed. 2015 (first  Paris 2008), p.26f ↵
  8. Rancière, ibid. p. 18 ↵
  9. Rancière, ibid. p. 27f ↵
  10. Roselt pp. 330-333, see also Essay on Political Theatre Part 2 on this website ↵
  11. Roland Schimmelpfennig ‘Iokaste’, directed by Karin Beier, Deutsches Schauspielhaus Hamburg ↵
  12. cf. Ernst Vollrath, Was ist das Politische? Eine Theorie des Politischen und seiner Wahrnehmung. Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann, 2003, pp. 23-27 ↵
  13. Bertolt Brecht, Große kommentierte Berliner und Frankfurter Ausgabe, Vol.22.1, Schriften 2, Part 1. ‘Politische Theorie der Verfremdung’ (1936/37), p.125 ↵
  14. Bertolt Brecht, Große kommentierte Berliner und Frankfurter Ausgabe, Vol.22.2, Schriften 2, Part 2,   p. 663 ↵
  15. “The ideal for an artist would, of course, be to describe the situation in which we live so vividly that people, when they read about it or experience it on stage, say on the way home: ”We have to change that. It can’t go on like this. We won’t put up with it any longer. As long as I haven’t managed that, I haven’t done my job as an artist.‘ Peter Weiss in conversation with A. Alvarez, in: Karlheinz Braun (ed.), Materialien zu Peter Weiss’ `Marat/Sade’. Frankfurt/M: Suhrkamp, 5th edition 1975, p.99 Two years later, however, he also said: ‘Theatre itself cannot change society. That is impossible. The best effect I can hope for is that a play provides an opportunity for further reflection.’ Interview with Peter Weiss, in: Der Spiegel 12/1968 ↵
  16. ‘No art form can avoid the aesthetic split that separates effects from intentions.’ Rancière, ‘Die Paradoxa der politischen Kunst’, op. cit., p. 99 ↵
  17. Hans Bertram Bock, “Ohne Duselei. Gespräch mit Peter Stein, Wolfgang Schwiedrzik und Wolfgang Neuss”. Abendzeitung (Munich) 24 June 1968, quoted in: Dorothea Kraus, Theater Proteste. Zur Politisierung von Straße und Bühne in den 1960er Jahren. Frankfurt: Campus, 2007 p.145 ↵
  18. Dorothea Kraus also provides a detailed account of the controversies surrounding the performances of ‘Vietnam Discourse’ in Frankfurt, Munich and Berlin in 1968, op. cit. pp.142-153. ↵
  19. Hans-Thies Lehmann, Das postdramatische Theater. Frankfurt/M: Verlag der Autoren, 1999 ↵
  20. ‘The political should not be vaporised in the rarefied air of more precise distinctions’, ibid., p. 14. ↵
  21. ‘Was ist das epische Theater?’ in: Walter Benjamin, Der Autor als Produzent. Aufsätze zur Literatur. Stuttgart: Reclam 2012, p. 222, also ibid. “Der Autor als Produzent”, p. 245 ↵
  22. Here Lehmann also refers to Carl Schmitt. ↵
  23. Bertolt Brecht, ’Der Dreigroschenprozeß. Ein soziologisches Experiment“, in:  Große kommentierte Berliner und Frankfurter Ausgabe, vol. 21, Schiften 1, Frankfurt/M.: Suhrkamp, 1992, p. 469. Also quoted in Walter Benjamin, ‘Eine kurze Geschichte der Photographie’ in: W.B., Angelus Novus. Ausgewählte Schriften, vol. 2. Frankfurt/M: Suhrkamp, 1966, p.243 ↵
  24. Jacques Rancière, “Die Ästhetik als Politik” in: J.R., Das Unbehagen in der Ästhetik. Vienna: Passagen 3rd ed. 2016, p.47 (first published in French in Paris 2004) ↵
  25. Walter Benjamin, “The Author as Producer” ibid. pp.229, 231 ↵
  26. Lehmann, ibid., p.13 ↵
  27. Climate crisis: “Rethinking our world” (Unsere Welt neu denken) Schauspiel Bonn 2021, war in Ukraine: “The revolution starves its children” (Die Revolution lässt ihre Kinder verhungern’,   Schauspiel Köln 2022) ↵
  28. Bankruptcy during the construction of the World Congress Centre: Schauspiel Bonn 2017 ‘Bonnopoly’, Archive collapse: Schauspiel Köln 2010 “The Work/On the Bus/A Fall” ‘Das Werk/Im Bus/Ein Sturz’ ↵
  29. Nuremberg 2010 ↵
  30. Likewise Marcus Lobbe’s staging of Mike Daisey’s monologue ‘The Trump Card’ at Theater Dortmund 2017 ↵
  31. More examples: Calle Fuhr, ‘Aufstieg und Fall des Herrn René Benko’ (The rise and fall of Mr. René Benko, Volkstheater Vienna 2024) ↵
  32. Calle Fuhr and Jean Peters, ‘Zum Verstehen verfühen’, interview with Nachtkritik editors Elena Philipp and Esther Slevogt 6.8.204. ↵
  33. This action by the journalists’ collective Correctiv, which created a political fact with minimal aesthetic preparation, is likely to be a borderline case in the relationship between theatre and politics, however. ↵
  34. Jacques Derrida, ‘Marx, das ist wer’. in: Zäsuren, November 2 000, No. 1 Ökonomien der Differenz, ed. Hans-Joachim Lenger, Jörg Sasse, Georg Christoph Tholen, pp. 58-70 ↵
  35. Rancière, Ist Kunst widerständig? Berlin: Merve, 2004, p.34 ↵
  36. Cf. Volker Ullrich, Die Kunst nach dem Ende ihrer Autonomie. Berlin: Wagenbach, 2022. Especially Part I “Was hat die Idee autonomer Kunst geschwächt?” Ullrich is mainly concerned with the visual arts. ↵
  37. Janis El-Bira, Das ‘Art-Toy’ als Lebensbegleiter. Review of Volker Ulrich, Die Kunst nach dem Ende ihrer Autonomie. Nachtkritik.de ↵
  38. “It is only with Machiavelli that politics achieves a distinctive identity and autonomy.” The Machiavellian moment is the ontological moment “of the experience of contingency and groundlessness of the social.” Thus, politics cannot be based on morality. Oliver Marchart, Die politische Differenz. Berlin: Suhrkamp, 2010, pp.28 and 49, cf. Luhmann ↵
  39. ‘ultra posse nemo obligatur’, ‘true politics cannot take a step without first paying homage to morality.’ Immanuel Kant, ‘Zum ewigen Frieden. Ein philosophischer Entwurf’ in: I.K. Werkausgabe Bd.XI, hg. Wilhelm Weischedel. Frankfurt/M: Suhrkamp,1968, S. 229 B71, S. 243 B97 ↵
  40. cf. G.W.F. Hegel, Grundlinien der Philosophie des Rechts, Werke Bd. 7. Frankfurt/M: Suhrkamp 1970. §142, S.292. In Hegel’s appendix to §144, there is a nice poem:
    „Heilig, was die Geister bindet, wär es auch nur leicht wie die Binse den Kranz. Heiligstes, was innig gedacht ewig die Geister einig macht.“ (“Sacred is the bond that unites minds, though it be but light, as the slender rush makes the wreath. Most sacred what as individual thought, eternally unites the minds.”) Here, as often in his Aesthetics, Hegel refers to the exemplary conflict in Sophocles’ “Antigone” between the state (politics) and morality (custom) pp. 293f. ↵
  41. Lehmann, loc. cit., p. 18 ↵
  42. ibid. p. 19. If every change in our perception were political, sunglasses and earplugs would be political. ↵

Essay on political theatre – Part 3

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Politics or the Political

In the discussion about what political theatre is, the distinction between ‘politics’ and the ‘political’ plays an important role. What Fischer-Lichte calls ‘New Politics of the Aesthetic’1 is based on this distinction. The separation of ‘politics’ from ‘the political’ makes it possible for an influential current in contemporary theatre to distance itself from a ‘political theatre’ that takes up political topics or content, and yet still see itself as political. Therefore, the development of this distinction will be briefly presented here. 2

a) Herodotus and Aristotle

The nominalisation of the adjective ‘political’ goes back to antiquity, to the peculiarity of the Greek language of enabling such nominalisations through articles, and to the tendency of Greek philosophy to formulate abstract concepts in such a way 3 The noun τὸ πολιτικόν first appears in Herodotus.

“καίτοι εἰ τὸ πολιτικὸν ὑμῖν πᾶν ἐστι τοιοῦτ”  (“and if  your political is as you describe it”)4

The Persian ruler Xerxes is discussing the fighting strength of the Greeks with Demaratus, a former Spartan king who has defected to the Persians, and is planning a campaign against them. Here, the political is equated with the polity, the city-state of Sparta.

Aristotle also uses the adverbial version of ‘politikos’ (πολιτικῶς). Ernst Vollrath relies on a passage in Athenaion Politeia (The Athenian State),

‘Πεισίστρατος … διῴkει τὰ κοινὰ πολιτικῶς μᾶλλον ἤ τυραννικῶς ‘ (14.3) ‘Peisistratos ruled the common – that is, the polis – in a political rather than a tyrannical way.’5

to show that the political is a practice.6 It means an ‘adverbial modality’, not a specific content or area.7 This adverbial use of the concept of the political will become even more significant for theatre in the 21st century.

b) Carl Schmitt and Hannah Arendt

Later, the concepts of politics and the political were largely equated8, until Carl Schmitt’s 1932 essay ‘Der Begriff des Politischen`(The Concept of the Political) provided the impetus to define the category of the political more precisely. For him, however, the conceptual opposition was between the state and the ‘political’. His fanfare-like opening was the sentence:

„Der Begriff des Staates setzt den Begriff des Politischen voraus.“ (The concept of the state presupposes the concept of the political.)9.

‘Politics’ is identified with the state. 10. While the ‘political’ is understood as a general term for a certain quality of human coexistence:

‘{The political} does not denote a separate subject area, but only the degree of intensity of an association or dissociation of people.”11.’ Christian Meier, Die Entstehung des Politischen bei den Griechen. Frankfurt/M: Suhrkamp, 2nd ed. 1989, p. 36]

Th the theoretical opponent of the later Nazi jurist Carl Schmitt was Hannah Arendt12. For her, politics is the free association of people:

“The meaning of politics is freedom”13,

Not, as with Carl Schmitt, ‘the distinction between friend and foe’14. But Hannah Arendt also does not give an independent definition of the political that could be contrasted with politics. She uses the concept of the political for ‘the political sphere’ or the ‘space of the political’15.

c) Paul Ricoeur

A definitional distinction between politics and the political can be found at around the same time in Paul Ricoeur 1957:

‘Le politique est organisation raisonnable, la politique est décision {…}. Le politique ne va pas sans la politique.’ (“The political is reasonable organisation, politics, on the other hand, is decision. {…} Of course, the political does not exist without politics.”)16

Ricoeur is actually concerned with the demarcation between politics and economics. Soviet troops marching into Hungary in 1957 was the reason for his criticism of Marxism, because it ignored the autonomy of the political sphere and thus made Stalin’s despotism possible.17 But to do that, he needed a concept of politics that did not mean the respective actions, but the area in which political actions take place, namely the ‘political’.18 But to do that, he needed a concept of politics that does not refer to the respective actions, but to the area in which political actions take place, namely the ‘political’, ‘la politique’.

d) Jean-Luc Godard

In the aftermath of May 1968 in Paris, this distinction between politics and the political was further developed because the demand for political effectiveness remained, but the experience of the failure of the rebellion also had to be processed. ‘Politics’ became the realm of established state powers, ‘the political’ the realm of art. The statements of film director Jean-Luc Godard are one stage in this development. His in his 1970 manifesto ‘Que faire?’, he invented the momentous distinction between ‘political’ as an adjective and ‘political’ as an adverb. It is no longer about the artistic product as political, but about the process of creating the work of art as understood politically.

1 We must make political films. 2 We must make films politically. 3 1 and 2 are antagonistic to each other and belong to two opposing conceptions of the world. {…}

10 To carry out 1 is to remain a being of the bourgeois class. 11 To carry out 2 is to take up a proletarian class position. {…}

21 To carry out 1 is to give a complete view of events in the name of truth in itself. 22 To carry out 2 is not to fabricate over-complete images of the world in the name of relative truth.19

Godard’s distinction between ‘making political films’ and ‘making films politically’ is repeatedly cited against a theatre that takes up current political issues. Godard’s text was written in 1970 and reflects the political discussions of the time.

In thesis and antithesis, the two concepts (making political films and making films politically) are juxtaposed. But when you read how Godard tried to explain what he meant by ‘making films politically’, it becomes clear how little use this is today. For him, making political films means ‘describing the wickedness of the world’. On the other hand, political filmmaking means ‘showing the people in struggle.’ So there is a difference in content, in the material depicted in the film. And when he concludes by calling for ‘reading the reports of Comrade Kiang Tsing,’ it becomes clear that this is not an authoritative text that could be referred to today. (He probably means Jiang Qing, Mao Zedong’s wife at the time, who has not published any reports. After Mao’s death, she was convicted as a member of the Gang of Four who had pushed the Cultural Revolution.)

There is only one pair of theses in this manifesto that points to the future: thesis 21, making political films ‘means giving a complete view of events in the name of truth itself.’ And thesis 22, making political films means ‘not creating over-complete images of the world in the name of relative truth.’ By calling for incomplete images and emphasising the relativity of truth, he is opposing the dogmatism of the left at the time and pointing the way for his further aesthetic development.

e) Jean-François Lyotard

A further step in the direction of a theatre that rejects ‘political theatre’ but still sees itself as political is Jean-Francois Lyotard’s essay ‘The Tooth, the Hand’ from 1972.20. In it, Lyotard attempts to refute the semiotic analysis of the theatre as a sign system by means of a complex argument. To do this, he goes back to Marx’s analysis of capitalism, in which the commodity relation is analysed as the interchangeability of everything with everything else. For Lyotard, this makes a meaningful sign relationship between representing signs and the represented signified impossible. Lyotard calls this a nihilism. He then turns against the agreement of the various elements of theatre, as demanded in the theory of Japanese Noh theatre. He wants ‘the independence, the simultaneity of sounds/noises, words, body figures, images.’21 He also criticises Brecht’s Marxist sign theory of theatre. He goes back to the surrealist painter Hans Bellmer, who, using the example of a hand cramped with toothache, questions the relationship between sign and signified. The hand does not signify pain. For the ‘movement of the libido’, both phenomena are equivalent, their relationship reversible. Lyotard pleads for an ‘energetic theatre’ in which there are no more sign relationships.

Lyotard’s essay is one of the first pieces of evidence that political representation in representative democracy is equated with the representation of the signified by and the signifying in theatre and is rejected in the same way. For him, categorically ‘no representation is justified.’ 22 In doing so, Lyotard equates political representation with ‘politics’, but his counter-concept is not yet that of the ‘political’ or ‘political theatre-making’, but rather that of ‘energetic theatre’, entirely in the sense of Antonin Artaud.

“9. Where the sign relationship and its gulf are abolished, the power relationship (the hierarchy) becomes the domination of the dramaturge + director + choreographer + set designer over the alleged signs and the alleged spectators impossible.
10. Alleged spectators, because the concept of such a person or function goes hand in hand with the predominance of representation in social life and especially with what the modern West calls politics.’”23

To be continued

  1. Erika Fischer-Lichte, {Lemma} „Politisches Theater“ in: Erika Fischer-Lichte e.a. (Hg.), *Metzler Lexikon Theatertheorie*. Stuttgart/Weimar: Metzler, 2nd ed. 2014, p.262. Translations of German quotations into English are my own G.P. ↵
  2. This presentation is inspired by the works of Marchart and Primavesi, but goes beyond these sources. ↵
  3. e.g. τὸ ἀγαθόν, the good in Aristotle. ↵
  4. Herodotus, Historien VII, 103 (1) ↵
  5. Ernst Vollrath, Grundlegung einer philosophischen Theorie des Politischen. Würzburg: Königshaus & Neumann, 1987, p. 54 ↵
  6. Vollrath takes Michael Oakeshotts concept of practice as his starting point. ↵
  7. Less relevant is a passage in Aristotle’s Politics, where the relationships within the household (economy) are explained: the man must rule over the woman and children, but in different ways, ‘γυναικός μὲν πολιτικῶς τέκνων δὲ βασιλικῶς’ (1259b1). Franz F. Schwarz translates ‘πολιτικῶς (politikoos)’ as ‘über die Frau nach Art eines Staatsmannes’ (Aristoteles, Politik. Schriften zur Staatstheorie. Stuttgart: Reclam, 1989, p. 101), Eugen Rolfes ‘über das Weib nach Art des Hauptes eines Freistaates’ (Aristoteles, Politik. Hamburg: Meiner, 4th ed. 1981, p.26) ↵
  8. Ernst Vollrath has traced the history of the concept in detail in his dictionary entry ‘Politisch, das Politische’. Ernst Vollrath, Lemma ‘Politisch, das Politische’, In: Historisches Wörterbuch der Philosophie, ed. by Joachim Ritter & Karlfried Gründer. Vol. 7 P-Q, Basel: Schwabe, 1989 pp. 1072-1075 ↵
  9. Carl Schmitt, Der Begriff des Politischen. Text von 1932 mit einem Vorwort und drei Corollarien . Berlin: Duncker und Humblot, 9th ed. 2015 ↵
  10. In a detailed study, Ernst Vollrath has shown the extent to which the concept of the political in Germany has always been identified with the state. ‘German political perception is almost exclusively related to the state, so that the political is seen and shown in absorptive identification with the state.’ Ernst Vollrath, Was ist das Politische. Eine Theorie des Politischen und seiner Wahrnehmung. Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann, 2003, p.115 ↵
  11. „{Das Politische} bezeichnet kein eigenes Sachgebiet, sondern nur den Intensitätsgrad einer Assoziation oder Dissoziation von Menschen.“ Carl Schmitt l.c., p.36. Carl Schmitt’s definition of the political is the starting point for any discussion of the concept: critically, for example, in the work of Ernst Vollrath, who criticises  Schmitt’s definition of the political solely through dissociation, i.e. through the friend-foe relationship, and points  to Schmitt’s later justification of the Hitler’s ‘leader principle’  as the moment of association in the political as a consequence of his earlier definition of the political as category of dissociation.  Cf. Vollrath 1987 pp. 37f. Or approvingly in Christian Meier: ‘Carl Schmitt speaks very aptly of a field of relationships and tensions. What was previously concentrated in the substance of the state has, due to its decentralisation, increasingly been externalised among the diversity of forces and relations, and the concept of the political seeks to do justice to this situation [… ↵
  12. Ernst Vollrath was a participant in Hannah Arendt’s seminars at the New School for Social Research in New York. G.P. was only a student of Ernst Vollrath in a seminar in Cologne. ↵
  13. „Der Sinn von Politik ist Freiheit“ Hannah Arendt, Was ist Politik? Munich: Piper, 1993 p.28, in a fragment published only from the estate, written around 1958 ↵
  14. “die Unterscheidung von Freund und Feind” Carl Schmitt, op. cit., p.19 ↵
  15. Arendt, op. cit., p. 53. In her work, politics and the political can also be used synonymously, e.g. „… der Sinn von Politik, und zwar das Heil wie das Unheil des Politischen“ p. 42 ↵
  16. “Das Politische ist vernünftige Organisation, die Politik hingegen Entscheidung. {…} Das Politische freilich existiert nicht ohne Politik.“ Paul Ricœure, „Das politische Paradox“, in: P.R., Geschichte und Wahrheit. Trans. by Romain Leick. Munich: Li , 1974. First published in French as ‘Le paradoxe politique’, in: Esprit 25 (1957), pp. 721-745 ↵
  17. ‘Only a political philosophy that has recognised the specificity of the political – the specificity of its function and the specificity of its evil – is able to correctly pose the problem of political control.’ „Nur eine politische Philosophie, die die Spezifität des Politischen – die Spezifität seiner Funktion und die Spezifität seines Übels – erkannt hat, ist in der Lage, das Problem der politischen Kontrolle korrekt zu stellen.“ Ricoeur ibid. p.265 ↵
  18. Ricoeur, op. cit., p.265 ↵
  19. Jean-Luc Godard, “What is to be done?” afterimage No. 1 April 1970. German in: Jean-Luc Godard, „Was tun?“ in: Godard/Kritiker. Ausgewählte Kritiken und Aufsätze über Film (1950-1970*. Auswahl und Übersetzung von Frieda Grafe. München: Hanser, 1971 p.186-188 ↵
  20. Jean-Francois Lyotard, „Der Zahn, die Hand“, in: Essays zu einer affirmativen Ästhetik. Berlin: Merve, 1982, pp. 11-23 {first published in French as ‘Le Dent, la Paume’, 1972} ↵
  21. Lyotard, ibid. p. 21 ↵
  22. Lyotard, l.c. p.11 ↵
  23. „9. Wo man die Zeichenbeziehung und deren Kluft abschafft, wird die Machtbeziehung (die Hierarchie) die Herrschaft des Dramaturgen+Regisseurs+Choreographen +Bühnenbildners über die angeblichen Zeichen und die angeblichen Zuschauer unmöglich. 10. Angebliche Zuschauer, weil der Begriff einer solchen Person oder Funktion einhergeht mit der Vorherrschaft der Repräsentation im gesellschaftlichen Leben und besonders mit dem, was das moderne Abendland Politik nennt.“ Lyotard, op. cit. p.21 ↵