Achille Mbembe engages with Giorgio Agamben’s philosophy, particularly his concepts of sovereignty, the state of exception, and bare life, to develop and refine his theory of necropolitics. While Mbembe draws upon Agamben’s insights, he critically extends and reconfigures them to account for the colonial and racial dimensions of power that Agamben does not fully address. Here’s a detailed breakdown of how Mbembe uses Agamben’s philosophy in his necropolitics:
1. Agamben’s Concepts and Their Influence on Necropolitics
a. The State of Exception
Agamben defines the state of exception as a condition in which sovereign power suspends laws and normal political rules, effectively deciding who can live and who must die. In this suspended state, the sovereign exercises ultimate control over life and death.
Mbembe’s Use:
Mbembe expands the concept of the state of exception, showing how it operates not only in moments of crisis but as a permanent condition in colonial and postcolonial contexts.
In necropolitics, the state of exception becomes normalized, particularly in colonial territories, where violence and domination are everyday practices.
b. Bare Life
Agamben’s idea of bare life refers to individuals reduced to mere biological existence, stripped of political and social recognition, and rendered subject to sovereign power’s arbitrary decisions.
Mbembe’s Use:
Mbembe critiques and extends this concept by focusing on how racial and colonial power structures produce populations as bare life㺱isposable, dehumanized, and subjected to death.
While Agamben draws on European examples (e.g., Nazi concentration camps), Mbembe locates bare life in colonial histories, such as the transatlantic slave trade, apartheid, and the occupation of Palestine.
2. Sovereignty and Death in Necropolitics
Agamben discusses sovereignty in terms of the power to decide who lives and who dies, a foundational aspect of political power.
Mbembe’s Contribution:
Mbembe shifts the focus from the biopolitics of life (as discussed by Michel Foucault and Agamben) to the necropolitics of death, emphasizing how sovereignty is often exercised through the production of death, not just the regulation of life.
In colonial and postcolonial contexts, sovereignty is exercised through extreme forms of violence, such as enslavement, genocide, and apartheid, where certain populations are marked for exclusion and extermination.
3. Colonialism and the Politics of Death
While Agamben’s framework centers on Western examples like totalitarianism and concentration camps, Mbembe points out its Eurocentrism and argues that the colony has historically been the original site of necropolitical practices.
Mbembe’s Addition:
In colonial systems, entire populations were relegated to the status of bare life, subjected to dehumanization, forced labor, and extermination.
Mbembe situates necropolitics within the broader historical and spatial dynamics of imperialism, highlighting how colonial territories were governed through states of exception and the routine deployment of violence.
4. Spatialization of Death
Agamben emphasizes the camp (e.g., Nazi concentration camps) as the paradigmatic space of modern sovereignty.
Mbembe’s Reconfiguration:
Mbembe expands this idea to include other spaces of death, such as colonial plantations, prisons, occupied territories, and urban slums. These spaces are governed by necropolitical logic, where certain lives are made expendable.
For Mbembe, spaces of death are not confined to the camp but are diffused across geographies of power, particularly in the Global South.
5. Critique of Agamben’s Limitations
While Mbembe builds on Agamben, he critiques his work for neglecting the racialized and colonial origins of necropolitics:
Race as a Key Mechanism: Mbembe highlights how race has historically been central to the production of bare life, particularly in colonial regimes where populations were divided into those who could live and those who could die.
Colonial Modernity: Mbembe argues that the colony was the original site where modern states of exception were tested and perfected. Agamben’s focus on European modernity overlooks the colonial foundations of necropolitics.
6. Necropolitics and the Afterlife of Colonialism
Mbembe integrates Agamben’s philosophy into a broader critique of the afterlife of colonialism - the ways in which colonial structures of power continue to shape modern politics.
While Agamben focuses on the suspension of rights in totalitarian regimes, Mbembe demonstrates how this logic persists in postcolonial states, where certain populations are subjected to systemic neglect, displacement, and death.
7. Life in Death: Resistance and Survival
Mbembe complicates Agamben’s concept of bare life by showing how populations marked for death often find ways to resist and affirm life:
In the plantation, the ghetto, and the refugee camp, individuals create new forms of community, culture, and resistance despite the necropolitical forces arrayed against them.
This acknowledgment of resilience and creativity adds a dynamic dimension to necropolitics, which Agamben’s framework lacks.
Conclusion: Mbembe’s Necropolitics as a Decolonial Reworking of Agamben
Achille Mbembe uses Giorgio Agamben’s philosophy as a starting point but transforms it to address the colonial, racialized, and global dimensions of sovereignty and power. While Agamben’s concepts of bare life and the state of exception are central to Mbembe’s necropolitics, Mbembe reframes them to emphasize how colonialism and racial hierarchies have historically structured the politics of death. By doing so, Mbembe situates necropolitics as a global and historical phenomenon, offering a more expansive and decolonial account of sovereignty, violence, and resistance.
