Giorgio Agamben: on health scare and the religion of science

Abstract

Around the time of the Covid-19 pandemic Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben published a series of incisive, short texts on the conjuncture of biopolitics and the governmentality of the global health scare. While many voiced their opinion on the topic, few ignited such a heated debate as Agamben. Among Agamben's key claims was that it was not as if governments were using the pandemic to stage an artificial state of exception, but that this exceptional state had already been instituted. Against these views Agamben was met with a chorus of dismay. In order to facilitate a more informed view of Agamben's pithy interventions we are now reprinting two of his short texts in translation by Adam Kotsko.