Draws connections between three major philosophers to better understand the origin of Schmitt’s authoritarian liberalism.

Schmitt, Hobbes, Hegel centers a pivotal period in German constitutional history, which began with the German Revolution of 1918–19. Carl Schmitt played a significant intellectual and personal role in the constitutional crisis that climaxed in 1932, undermined German democracy, and ultimately paved the way for Hitler’s rise to the chancellorship in 1933. During the dying days of the Weimar Republic, authoritarian liberalism was invoked against democracy. Hermann Heller rightly observed that authoritarian liberalism held lessons for legalistic democrats who believed they could dispense with the authority and power of a more assertive democracy. The freedom/authority dialectic is desirable in the context of a republican democracy; outside of that context, freedom becomes anarchy and authority turns into authoritarianism. In seeking the roots of Schmitt’s political and constitutional theory, Cristi turns his attention to Hobbes and Hegel, whose personal circumstances were also shaped by revolutionary events—the English Revolution of the 1640s and the French Revolution that began in 1789.