GIORGIO AGAMBEN’s Speech at the conference of Venetian students against the greenpass on November 11, 2021 at Ca’ Sagredo

My translation of the Quodlibet text. Italian original is here.

Previously, I posted an English translation of the transcription of his actual speech, this is a re-worked version for print, which I found even superior to the spoken version.

“To begin with, I would like to take up some of the points I tried to make a few days ago in an attempt to define the surreptitious, but no less radical, transformation that is taking place before our eyes. I believe we must first realize that the legal and political order in which we believed to have been living has completely changed. The operating agent of this transformation has been, as is evident, that dead zone between law and politics that is the state of emergency.

Almost twenty years ago, in a book that attempted to provide a theory of the state of exception, I noted that the state of exception was becoming the normal system of governing. As you know, the state of exception is a space of suspension of the law, and therefore an anomic space, which, however, claims to be included in the legal system.

But let’s take a closer look at what happens in the state of exception. From a technical point of view, there is a…