The Political Theology of Sphere Sovereignty

Philosophy and Social Criticism. 2026.

Van de Wall B.

In an article published in 1965, Carl Schmitt discusses political theology in the context of Protestant legal theories and calls for more political theological reflection on Calvinist thought. In this paper, I intend to answer Schmitt’s call and adopt his political theological method as a ‘sociology of juristic concepts’, and apply it to the concept of ‘sphere sovereignty’ that was developed by Dutch Neo-Calvinist thinkers in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. In contrast to the decisionist concept of sovereignty that Schmitt derived from Catholic authors, the Neo-Calvinist concept of sphere sovereignty is intended to limit the power of the sovereign and secure the independence of other institutions, primarily that of the church. A political theology of sphere sovereignty simultaneously contributes to Max Weber’s study of Calvinist economic influence on modernity. On this basis, some preliminary conclusions are provided about the relationship between Calvinism and secular modernity.

Keywords: secularization, Carl Schmitt, political theology, Protestantism, Max Weber, Calvinism, sphere sovereignty, Herman Dooyeweerd, Abraham Kuyper, Neo-Calvinism