Rethinking Franz Neumann's route to Behemoth

Because of its characterization of National Socialism as a form of 'totalitarian monopoly capitalism', many critics of Franz Neumann's pioneering book of 1942, Behemoth, have rejected what they see as a crude Marxist analysis of the subject. This not only does little justice to the richness of Neumann's book, it also distorts its central focus. By contrast, this paper suggests that a proper appreciation of the impact of Max Weber in general, and Carl Schmitt in particular, on the development of Neumann's thought permits a more detailed assessment of both the merits and the shortcomings of his most famous analysis.