Giorgio Agamben

"We can say that politics secretly works towards the production of emergencies." A short article written in response to the 9-11 attacks by the philosopher Giorgio Agamben published in Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung [Frankfurt general newspaper] September 20, 2001.

An excerpt from the 2005 book State of Exception which serves as a good introduction to Agamben’s recent work on the nature of state power/sovereignty, as well as his dense and difficult style (5,000 words).