The Godfather of Left-Schmittianism? Otto Kirchheimer and Carl Schmitt after 1945

Abstract

In the vast secondary literature on Carl Schmitt as well as on the Frankfurt School, the political and legal thinker Otto Kirchheimer is described as a forerunner of contemporary Left-Schmittianism. This view is sometimes expanded in the literature to the personal relationship between Schmitt and Kirchheimer after 1945 as well. A closer look at Kirchheimer’s late work, at his unpublished correspondence with Schmitt, and at additional unpublished sources contradicts such an interpretation. In fact, Kirchheimer strongly attacked Schmittianism in German debates on constitutional theory after 1945. This article finally uncovers the extent to which Schmitt tried to instrumentalize his former doctoral student to pursue his political rehabilitation in the Federal Republic via the United States. Kirchheimer, however, took a firm stand against this attempt. In his defense of modern parliamentary democracy, Kirchheimer definitely sided with the political left of his times; but he did so without any flirtation with Schmittianism.