Ogden, S.G. (2024). Defying Strongman Politics: On Theologians and the Cultivation of Resistant Subjectivity in a Time of Global Crisis. In: Babie, P.T., Sarre, R. (eds) Religion Matters: Volume 2 . Springer, Singapore.
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-9777-0_10
Abstract
We have to live with strongman politics for some time to come. With no obvious political solutions in sight, then, we have to ask fundamental questions about who we are and how we shall live. In the West, moreover, the mainstream church has become increasingly marginalized. So, there are also important questions about the political and social relevance of the church. Nevertheless, I am specifically interested in the identity and practice of theologians in the face of strongman politics. As such, theologians hold a privileged position in the academy, as well as the church. In colloquial terms, we have a platform. So, then, we are more or less public intellectuals. Subsequently, we have an ecclesial and social responsibility to resist strongman politics. Moreover, with the COVID pandemic, the climate crisis, and strongman politics, which are all related, this calls into question our identity and practice as theologians, as well as our ethical commitments, our collaborative spirit, our use of time, and our choice of projects. Nevertheless, the task of resisting strongman politics is complex. It is exacerbated by the pervasive nature of violence. What’s more, resistance itself can escalate violence.
In response, I am employing concepts from Michel Foucault in order to reinterpret the theologian’s vocation. In Foucauldian terms, vocation is an expression of subject formation. In the face of strongman politics, the theologian is called to resist strongman politics, where defiance is expressed in terms of counter-conduct and critique. In that sense, Howard Caygill’s concept of resistant subjectivity encapsulates the theologian’s vocation. All this works at two levels. At the personal (or micro) level, this entails the transformation of the theologian. This is the undoing and re-formation of the subject (i.e., de-subjectivation). At the political (or macro) level, and as a result of self-transformation, the theologian engages in the work of resistance in the political space. In this chapter, the focus is primarily on the personal level, which also has wider political implications. In the end, this is more than an exercise in political theology. In the present global crisis, resistance is in fact incumbent on all theologians.
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