The Anti-Axial Age

Karl Jaspers famously characterized the period from the beginning of the eighth to the end of the third century before Christ as an “Axial Age” in which intellectual freedom and creativity blossomed as never before. This article argues that it was followed, five hundred years later, by an “Anti-Axial Age”, which devised a novel formula for intellectual and political repression. Its essence was the state’s capture of the millenial narrative, which had first been developed as religious doctrine within Zoroastrianism and Christianity. Involving the two great classical empires of Western Eurasia, Persia and Rome, and then empowering the expansion of Islam, the Anti-Axial Age left an ideological legacy that continues to haunt the contemporary world.     

A Positive,Communitarian Right to Security in the Age of Super-Terrorism

Post-9/11, and especially with the dramatic rise of Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), the author advocates a collective right to security. Plotting a course through state absolutism and liberalism, one finds communitarianism as a philosophy to support this right to security. The communitarian right to security is based on an interpretation of European human rights law, particularly positive duties of the state, to protect the rights to life of individuals from violations by non-state actors such as suspected terrorists. But for reasons of practical enforcement, limitations to the exercise of the right are also articulated.