Katznelson on “Exigencies: From Impermanent Emergencies to Enduring Exceptions”

The Henry L. Stimson Lectures on World Affairs was given by Ira Katznelson in a series of three lectures under the theme of “Exigencies: From Impermanent Emergencies to Enduring Exceptions.” Katznelson is Ruggles Professor of Political Science and History at Columbia University. A prolific author, he has written extensively on the liberal state, inequality, and social knowledge. His book Fear Itself: The New Deal and the Origins of Our Time was awarded the Bancroft Prize in History, as well as the Woodrow Wilson Foundation Award in Political Science. A member of the American Academy of Arts and Science and the American Philosophical Society, Katznelson has previously served as president both of the American Political Science Association and the Social Science Research Council.

Professor Katznelson’s three lectures addressed the tension between liberty on the one hand and national security on the other. The first lecture set up the question, the second investigated the issue within the liberal democratic tradition, and the third proposed possible solutions for the future. (view lecture 1) (view lecture 2) (view lecture 3)

In the first lecture, titled “Dahl’s Nightmare,” Katznelson began by noting that the problem of security for liberal democracies has existed since the Founding Fathers, pointing specifically to Alexander Hamilton’s words in his Federalist No. 23 essay which warned against “constitutional shackles” in the name of national security.

Katznelson then discussed the work of Robert Dahl, the political theorist for whom the first lecture is titled. For Katznelson, Dahl is part of the “political studies enlightenment,” or a group of thinkers in the post-war years who insisted the tradition of enlightenment required “realism, repair, and fortification.” Dahl’s essays, “The Domestic Control of Atomic Energy” and “Controlling Nuclear Weapons: Democracy Versus Guardianship,” addressed the social implications of atomic energy by considering the effects of secrecy on democracy, the relationship between lay citizens and experts, and the role of leaders in making decisions in American democracy.

Katznelson explained that until the mid-20th century, the “Roman model” where constitutional dictatorship is established for controlled periods of time during crises was central to the treatment of emergencies and exceptions in the liberal political tradition. He noted that while President Wilson exercised substantial power during World War I, the “Wilson administration…dismantled the wartime dictatorial authorities” post-war. However, the 1917 Espionage Act remained in effect, a harbinger of the post-WWII failure to repeal a number of war-time legislation that bolstered the power of the executive during exigencies. In the past few decades, “None of the legal entitlements projected and protected by the Bush Administration were explicitly renounced, and thus have remained ready for use by the Trump Administration,” Katznelson said.

The second lecture, titled “Liberalism’s Edge,” investigated approaches to security within the liberal democratic tradition. He began by describing, “Dahl and President Eisenhower did not quite search for balance between security and liberty… each sought to achieve both within a hierarchy of importance.” For them, security over liberty is justified only when it is geared towards protecting human freedom, a guiding principle ingrained within the liberal tradition.

Katznelson then discussed the similarities and differences between Hobbes’ and Locke’s conceptualizations of security and liberty. While they both give decision-making power to the sovereign in times of emergency, Locke’s idea of prerogative power is not unlimited. Unlike Hobbes, Locke imagines that people have the right — even duty — to rebel.

The “balanced view” of the Federalists allowed for a small but expandable army that “did not impinge on liberal constitutional order,” Katznelson said. Their view also influenced Lincoln’s impermanent expansion of power during which he ruled for eleven weeks without the legislature in an undeclared war. He argued that because the emergency had a beginning and ending, as well as a well-defined goal, the government after the war “proceeded by doing business as usual.” Katznelson stated, “There was no overarching transfer of power to the executive from the legislature.”

“Unfortunately, these dilemmas have become more, not less, difficult because we have moved beyond the challenge of quantitative frequency to one of qualitative permanence,” he explained.

The third lecture, titled “Negotiating the Rule of Law,” continued to describe the shift from impermanent emergencies to enduring exceptions. Katznelson considered, “at which point do exceptions become the new norm, transforming political order from within?”

Katznelson contrasted the theories of Robert Dahl with those of Carl Schmitt, who opposed liberal democracy. He then discussed Giorgio Agamben’s arguments that took Dahl’s nightmare to its natural extreme. Katznelson explained that Agamben thought it was too late to turn back to constitutionalism, and that the only hope is a “utopian vision of post-liberal political play, a politics outside the constraints of formal institutions.”

Though Katznelson recognized the rhetorical and analytical skill of Agamben’s argument, he disagreed with its premise, calling it “a diatribe that suffocates distincts, moving from imprisoning implications to fantasy solutions.” The state of exception in Agamben’s analyses “erases any boundary between the ordinary and the exceptional, something Dahl rightly refused to do,” he said.

Katznelson asked again whether security can be insured “without departing from liberal democracy’s insistence that rulers give reasons, that decisions be as transparent as possible, and that judgements be rendered as to whether the public good has been — indeed is being — served.” To answer this question, Katznelson referred to Algernon Sidney’s three conditions of prerogative power: “limited in time, circumscribed by law, and kept perpetually under the supreme authority of the people.”

He argued that the condition of being kept perpetually under the supreme authority of the people is met if Dahl’s three requirements of citizenship are met. Dahl reasoned that citizens must possess competence, the ability to make “adequately enlightened” judgements; control, the insurance that “the final decision corresponds with their informed intentions”; and influence, the obligation of those to whom authority is delegated “to be motivated to seek the goals implied by the informed intentions of citizens rather than their own interests… or their own private conceptions of the public good.”

The two other criteria, limited in time and circumscribed by law, reflects Locke’s belief that prerogative power should not be boundless and only lasts until the legislature reconvenes. Similarly, the Founders insisted on safeguards against prerogative power. Katznelson noted, “what we currently lack, however, are prescriptions that fully take current conditions into account and respond to Agamben’s critiques in the way that our predecessors responded to Hobbes and Schmitt.” 

Kaznelson insisted that today’s constitution places prerogative power outside formal stipulation, saying “apart from the suspension of habeas corpus during invasion or internal rebellion, [the constitution] is either silent or implicit regarding emergencies and exceptions.”

He ended by saying, “navigating tensions between liberty and security is a process, not a matter that can be decisively resolved. There is no single or portable solution to governing emergency in a liberal frame.” 

The funding for the Stimson lecture series comes from an anonymous donor, in honor of Henry L. Stimson, Yale College 1889, an attorney and statesman whose government service culminated with his tenure as secretary of war during World War II.

Since 1998, the MacMillan Center and the Yale University Press have collaborated to bring distinguished diplomats and foreign policy experts to the center to lecture on their books that are published by the Yale Press.

Previous Stimson Lectures have included “Political Order in Changing Societies” by Samuel P. Huntington; “Financial Crises in Emerging Markets” by Alexandre Lamfalussy; “Arms and Influence” by Thomas C. Schelling; “The Arab Center: The Promise of Moderation” by Ambassador Marwan Muasher; “Beyond the Democratic Maze” by John Dunn; “What Happened to National Liberation” by Michael Walzer; “The Imprint of Congress” by David Mayhew; “FDR’s Third Hundred Days” by Susan Dunn; “Liberal Ideals & International Realities” by John J. Mearsheimer; “America Confronts the Post-Imperial World” by William R. Polk; and “The Lost History of Global Intelligence—and Why It Matters” by Christopher Andrew.

Written by Julia Ding, Class of 2019.