(1888-1985) One of Germany's leading political scientists and legal theorists during the inter-war years, and a fervent critic of the liberal democracy of the Weimar Republic. In works such as Political Romanticism (1919) and The Concept of the Political (1932) Schmitt articulated a theory of political action based on practical necessity and the need for dynamic leadership and ‘decisionism’ rather than on any system of abstract philosophical argument. Such a view led to a defence of authoritarian dictatorship and, more specifically, to Schmitt's own personal support for the National Socialism of Hitler and the Third Reich.

— Keith Taylor

The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Politics. Copyright © 1996, 2003 by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.