Colonial sovereignty means power exercised outside the law, with peace as endless war.

Evidence

A fact remains, though: in modern philosophical thought and European political practice and imaginary, the colony represents the site where sovereignty consists fundamentally in the exercise of a power outside the law (ab legibus solutus) and where “peace” is more likely to take on the face of a “war without end.” — Achille Mbembe, Necropolitics, 74

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines colonial sovereignty as ab legibus solutus — power outside the law — a precise concept for the toolkit.
• XREF: Feeds the necropolitics/biopolitics strand of the module and Mbembe’s later argument that colony is where sovereignty is unbound from law. — connects to: Colonial sovereignty operates outside legal and institutional rules of warfare — Achille Mbembe, Necropolitics, 84; Imperialism made power an end in itself rather than a means to law; Laws and property are a permanent war waged by conquerors, not peace — Michel Foucault, Society Must Be Defended, 123 (+5 more)
• DEEPTHINKING: The compression of ‘peace as war without end’ plus sovereignty outside law is dense enough to sit with.

Related

• Colonial sovereignty operates outside legal and institutional rules of warfare (similarity 0.89)
• War drives the regular mechanisms of power beneath the law (similarity 0.83)

Broader Connections

• Colonial sovereignty operates outside legal and institutional rules of warfare #corroborates (0.95) — Achille Mbembe, Necropolitics, 84
• Laws and property are a permanent war waged by conquerors, not peace #corroborates (0.92) — Michel Foucault, Society Must Be Defended, 123
• State sovereignty is defined and limited by existing international rules. #contradicts (0.85) — HLA Hart, The Concept of Law (Clarendon Law…, 522
• War drives the regular mechanisms of power beneath the law #expands (0.85)
• Imperialism made power an end in itself rather than a means to law #corroborates (0.82)
• War exercises sovereignty through the right to kill. #expands (0.80) — Achille Mbembe, Necropolitics, 7
• Sovereignty annexes the race-war weapon by shifting from law to norm #expands (0.75) — Michel Foucault, Society Must Be Defended, 98
• Planter violence and slave denunciation tested the colonial legal system’s limits #exemplifies (0.72)