A new article by Manuel Alejandro Gutiérrez González, member of the Academic Network of the International Ratzinger Foundation, addresses one of the most pressing questions in contemporary political thought: the crisis of legitimacy of power and its detachment from truth, justice, and being.
The study, “Exousía (poder) como don y responsabilidad: la crítica teológica de Ratzinger a la concepción del poder en la teología política moderna y su crisis de legitimidad” (Exousía [Power] as Gift and Responsibility: Ratzinger’s Theological Critique of the Conception of Power in Modern Political Theology and Its Crisis of Legitimity), offers a rigorous philosophical-theological analysis of how modernity has progressively redefined power. Rather than being understood as a derived and accountable authority, power has often been reduced to technical force, strategic efficacy, or the will to impose. In this context, the article engages critically with Karl Marx, Martin Heidegger, and Michel Foucault, showing how their respective approaches have contributed, in different ways, to conceiving power as production, domination, or an impersonal network of forces, with significant anthropological consequences.
Against this background, the article highlights the originality of Joseph Ratzinger’s proposal through a recovery of the Greek concept of ἐξουσία (exousía). Unlike potentia, understood as sheer capacity or force, exousía denotes a form of power that proceeds from being, is received as a gift, and is legitimized through obedience to truth. This distinction proves decisive for rethinking political authority, the relationship between law and ethics, and the limits of the rule of law in pluralistic societies.
The article further applies this framework to current debates on natural law, legal positivism, anonymous structures of power, and the crisis of public reason. In doing so, it presents Ratzinger as an indispensable interlocutor for articulating a vision of power grounded not in domination or success, but in responsibility, truth, and service.
Reference
Manuel Alejandro Gutiérrez González, “Exousía (poder) como don y responsabilidad: la crítica teológica de Ratzinger a la concepción del poder en la teología política moderna y su crisis de legitimidad,” Studia Gilsoniana 15, no. 1 (January–March 2026).
Read the full article here: http://gilsonsociety.com/?15-1-(january-march-2026),252