A study based on state of exception and sovereignity within the context of Giorgio Agamben's political philosophy

In this master's thesis, the "State of Exception" term, which has crucial importance in debates on contemporary political theory, is studied. The relation between "State of Exception" and violence, legitimacy and sovereign, which are the main themes of political thought, is analyzed structurally and ideationally on the basis of Giorgio Agamben's works, in which he held this matter. Therefore, the corresponding and exceeding dimensions by Agamben's conceptualization of "State of Exception" with Carl Schimitt and Walter Benjamin's ideas are studied in the text. It is found that Agamben defines "sovereign" relating it to the terms "Zone of Indistinction" and "Threshold; in this way, with his theories such as "Homo Sacer" and "Bare Life," he has an inventive contribution to the debates in political theories on the power of Sovereign. In this thesis, Agamben's views are evaluated in terms of different approaches; the relation of sovereignty with law and violence is studied. The study is not limited to political philosophy in a narrow sense; the structural characteristics of sovereign power observed from different angels in various literary texts and tragedies, its legitimacy, its relation with biopolitics and its reflections are analyzed, and literary texts are used as a source in this perspective. In addition to these, Agamben's conceptualization is assessed on a practical bases in terms of the political situations in Turkey. Keywords : Agamben, state of exception, sovereignty, homo sacer, bare life, biopolitics, potential and language, Walter Benjamin, Carl Schmitt