Introduction - The Politics of Nothing: Sovereignty and Modernity

The title of this special issue of Culture, Theory and Critique is inspired by Georges Bataille's famous formulation: 'Sovereignty is NOTHING' (1980:300). Bataille's statement may appear too obscure or 'metaphysical' in a world that became obsessed with questions about sovereignty after the events on September 11, 2001. The present collection of articles seeks to highlight how indispensable the nothing is in thinking questions about sovereignty in modernity. This will become apparent after a brief consideration of the way sovereignty is mobilized to explain contemporary social phenomena, as well as of the current status of the theorectical debate about sovereignty.