La promesa de la politica

by Hannah Arendt, Jerome Kohn (Editor), Eduardo Cañas (Translator)

«La promesa de la política» reúne el conjunto de escritos de Hannah Arendt que realizó a partir de abordar el marxismo (tras la publicación de «Los orígenes del totalitarismo» en 1951).

Desde los tiempos en que Sócrates fue condenado a muerte por sus compatriotas, Arendt analiza los filósofos que han seguido a Platón al construir sus teorías políticas a expensas de las experiencias políticas, incluyendo la experiencia griega prefilosófica del comienzo, la experiencia romana de la fundación y la experiencia cristiana del perdón. Es una narración fascinante, ingeniosa y original, que trata del conflicto entre filosofía y política, y que abarca la obra de Arendt desde «Los orígenes del totalitarismo» hasta «La condición humana», publicada en 1958.

Para Arendt la política no posee un «fin»; en su lugar, ha sido en ocasiones—y quizás pueda volver a serlo—el empeño nunca acabado por parte de la gran pluralidad de seres humanos por vivir juntos y compartir la tierra bajo una libertad mutuamente garantizada. Esa es la promesa de la política.

Genres: Philosophy, Politics, Nonfiction, Essays, Theory, Jewish, Social

242 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 2005

About the author

Hannah Arendt (1906 – 1975) was one of the most influential political philosophers of the twentieth century. Born into a German-Jewish family, she was forced to leave Germany in 1933 and lived in Paris for the next eight years, working for a number of Jewish refugee organisations. In 1941 she immigrated to the United States and soon became part of a lively intellectual circle in New York. She held a number of academic positions at various American universities until her death in 1975. She is best known for two works that had a major impact both within and outside the academic community. The first, The Origins of Totalitarianism, published in 1951, was a study of the Nazi and Stalinist regimes that generated a wide-ranging debate on the nature and historical antecedents of the totalitarian phenomenon. The second, The Human Condition, published in 1958, was an original philosophical study that investigated the fundamental categories of the vita activa (labor, work, action). In addition to these two important works, Arendt published a number of influential essays on topics such as the nature of revolution, freedom, authority, tradition and the modern age. At the time of her death in 1975, she had completed the first two volumes of her last major philosophical work, The Life of the Mind, which examined the three fundamental faculties of the vita contemplativa (thinking, willing, judging).

Reviews

[Mariam · Rating 5 out of 5]

easily one of my best reads.
the desert that stretches in the political landscape and between us as individuals is one of the most interesting analogies. i wish i could crawl inside arendt's mind and experience these ideas as they are born.

[Gabriel Fugazi · Rating 4 out of 5]

It' interesting to see how brilliant Hannah Arendt is when she is doing her heideggerian hermeneutics of political thought and how uninteresting she can be in anything else. The things she says about Marx for example are wrong and the same time insightful. Then again, the prophetic wisdom of the Epilogue is stunning. These two or three pages are also a kind of self interpretation on Arendt's part. It's probably best to read this book along with "On Revolution".

[Simon Duffy · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Promise of Politics is an interesting collection of Arendt's writings on what politics could be and what undermines it. It could perhaps be the dream of politics - linking the idea of political discourse to Ancient Athens and the Roman Republic - and it would be easy to scoff at this as a kind of romanticism.

But in fact what Arendt is exploring is the way in which Western thought has constantly failed to respect the possibility of political action and discourse as a genuine good. This failure - which she links to the death of Socrates and the development of Platonic and Aristotelian thought - leads to the craziness by which wish upon ourselves the death of politics.

For Arendt this disdain for the political reality of needing to find mutual accommodation and respect for one another is the connection between Totalitarianism, Revolutionary Millenarianism and Consumerism.

One great line: Revolution is the opium of the people.

[Irami]

This collection of essays tries to bridge the gap between political philosophy and political practice. I found the first and the last essays thrilling; Hannah Arendt traces the trajectory of the ideas of freedom, academics, and philosophy to show how the ideas have changed through time and how modern philosophy and politics have reached an intellectual detente, a pact of non-aggression with clearly delineated borders, where the ivory tower won't delve into practical politics and political practice won't wrestle with big questions. Arendt believes this barrier needs to be breached for the good of both practical politics and robust philosophy.

[J · Rating 2 out of 5]

I may have enjoyed this book more had I understood it at all. Then again, maybe I would have liked it even less. Either way, I'm glad it's over.

[Claire Ziller · Rating 5 out of 5]

Everyone must read Arendt. Introduction into Politics and the Epilogue may be some of my very favorite essays by her. Yes, I did cry it was so beautiful. These essays use beautiful analogies, and tie together so many of her theories in ways I have not come across in her other books. NOTE- this book should not be your first Arendt book (“The Human Condition” and “On Revolution” are in my opinion the most fundamental of her books).

I recommend reading the Introduction after reading the rest of the text. Kohn describes the unique beauty of reading Arendt so well in this Introduction- that her purpose is “to persuade us that the chance to stave off the ruin of our world is one worth taking. Her stories do not theoretically define political action, which is self-limiting, but they make those who are attentive to them more politically minded, better citizens as it were” and “her need to understand for herself cannot be severed from our need to think and judge for ourselves”. Reading Arendt is difficult because she doesn’t tell you what to think, she makes you think for yourself with the way she writes and the theories she adores. AUGH!! She is just the most important and empowering philosopher you can find on the shelves, so please please read Arendt!

[Dan'S_mind · Rating 3 out of 5]

It has some amazing insights, towards the second half of the book
But it got me bogged down, and I found it really exhausting to go on, at certain times

[Lee · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author in a nutshell argues that politics has come to take on a meaning opposite of what it used to be, at least since the antiquity of Greece and city-states. Politics for her is about creating a space for freedom and then preserving it. Politics is a space built "between" people where they could fully realize themselves. This space for the ancient Greeks was the place where citizens could deliberate and ultimately in turn gain respect, glory and in a sense immortality. Mostly it was a place where you could be at your most excellent, it was about human potential. However without force to protect such spaces, it comes under threat of being destroyed. Hannah Arendt argues that over time this need for force has come to stand in for politics itself, displacing it's original meaning. This is bad because foreign policy becomes in time more about total destruction between people's rather than creating new spaces, and creates a metaphorical desert instead. When Hannah Arendt wrote this, it was during the Cold War and the threat of nuclear annihilation was ever present. Which prompted the question, what is politics about, or for? If the realm of politics now incorporates the possibility of the destruction of all life at any moment, does this render politics meaningless? These feelings are a little outdated now, but the idea of what politics has become, and what it could be is still salient today.

[Coop · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have nothing but praise for this book. Arendt is now solidly on my “I need to read all their work” list. Some of my favorite insights from this book:

- Forgiveness was invented to combat the seeming randomness of human action.
- In ancient Greek culture, the word “archein” meant both “to rule” and “to begin”. Leadership was seen as a force of spontaneity that forged brand-new causal chains.
- Freedom, originally conceived, was a sphere of free and equal dialogue. Only heads of household could be understood as free, because they partook of civil discourse. The sphere of personal ownership, or solitude, was not a space of freedom, but rather isolation (the word “idiot” connotes muteness and derives from the Greek word for personal space).

[haetmonger]

seems to be about the gap between the vita contemplativa and the vita activa. good stuff.

[Marie]

Granted, I've read only one essay, that is "Socrates" ("Philosophy & Politics"), but there are no doubts Arendt would ever disappoint me. I need to finish the whole book at some point.

[Joseph Sverker]

How I admire and enjoy reading Hannah Arendt and this book is no exception. It is not my favorite to read books that are edited posthumous from unfinished manuscripts, but when it comes to Arendt I can live with that. There is a sense in which some chapters and arguments within could have been developed more, I think. That is not from me being able to judge that, but I noticed that after the fact that it is pointed out in the foreword.

What I really bring with me from this book is Arendt's concept of 'world' and 'things' and that the world is what happens in the between of things. The world is in that way relational, or created by the fact that we relate. In that way it is completely unacceptable to annihilate people or things because by doing that it, in a real way, destroys my very own world. With this comes Arendt's long discussion about the political sphere in ancient Greece, and later, Rome. This is veyr interesting in that Arendt is able to show the importance of being clear with how one understands politics to be constituted. Or what politics is. This is something I bring with me when I read more contemporary writing on politics (or what is more my area whenever politics comes up within theology.)

[Jp · Rating 5 out of 5]

São as 269 páginas que valem mais do que uma vida inteira compelida a absorver jornalismo tacanho alinhado a palanques populistas. Aqui Arendt explica como a verdadeira noção de política foi perdida pelo ocidente com o teoricismo acadêmico, intelectual e, sobretudo, filosofal. Ao se absorver a tradição do pensamento filosófico ocidental desencadeado por Platão e, séculos depois, o fim desta tradição pela dialética marxista (espoliada de Hegel) prostitui-se toda noção da liberdade de ação humana em criar novos começos e novas correntes (acepção kantiana) espontaneamente a partir da pluralidade infinitamente diversificada no relacionamento entre iguais, perante a idéia de que a motivação entre homens e mulheres indivíduos em conjunto, não é mais do que mero reflexo condicionado por forças históricas a forjar uma cronologia fática determinista, irreversível e inevitável a um destino manifesto. Discípula de Jaspers e, por assim dizer, neo-socrática, política não é um instrumento-meio para fins externos à vida.

[Beatriz · Rating 5 out of 5]

Levei mais de três meses a ler este livro - ou melhor, a lê-lo e a tirar apontamentos nas margens. O raciocínio de Hannah Arendt é demasiado complexo para que possamos simplesmente acompanhá-lo descontraidamente, pelo que é imperativo ler os seus textos com calma e paciência, com um lápis à mão. Também demorei mais tempo até o acabar porque é difícil ler mais do que uma dezena de páginas por dia, tal é a densidade do conteúdo exposto.
Num mundo cheio de pseudo-políticos, todas as pessoas deviam entrar em contacto com as ideias da Hannah Arendt, que em menos de 200 páginas nos ensina uma preciosa lição acerca do mundo em que vivemos (continuando as suas palavras, escritas em meados do século passado, preocupantemente actuais) e nos motiva a pensar de maneiras que nunca imaginámos ser possível, relacionando fenómenos passados e contemporâneos, até nos apresentar a teia de acontecimentos que resultou no momento presente.

[Pedro José]

Like all Arendt's works, this is a riveting piece of political thought. It is much broader and undefined than her other writings (among other things, because it is a collection of unfinished papers), but it is still clear and makes several important points. Arendt's critique of the philosophical "Tradition" in political theory is particularly illuminating—she claims Plato started this tradition, and it ended with Marx, who put it on its head. I find this argument very suggestive, though a bit simplistic perhaps. In any case, her assertion of the primacy of politics (much like Carl Schmitt's) is one of the key aspects of my own views on the matter.

Worth reading.

[Maja]

Julia Kristeva said of Arendt, something to the effect...that more than having value as intellectual insight, her writing was a kind of action. I've just begun this book, so it's a little early to say much, but within her introduction, she speaks of a person's opening to the world, in reference to Plato's 'Republic'. It was so clearly illuminated, what could be stages of a philosopher, I turned to the ladies sitting next to me on the subway & asked them if they knew Greek.

[Erik C · Rating 4 out of 5]

Picked this up at the Symposium, after realizing that I had forgotten to pack my Phenomenlogy anthology for my train ride to Boston.

Pretty amazing so far. But I'm sure I wouldn't have much grasp of the material if I hadn't read the Human Condition.

[Johann · Rating 5 out of 5]

including her essay on Socrates, which, i think, is an excellent one discussing tragic outcome of philosophy confronting politics in Socrate's own period.

[Craig Bolton]

The Promise of Politics by Hannah Arendt (2007)

[Jessica · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love her analysis on the nature of politics and what it truly encompasses. Though she writes during the Cold War, much of her discussion is relevant today in many forms.

[David Goldman · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Promise of Politics

This is two part series of essays - with a related theme. How philosophy became became a bystander in politics and how the western tradition valued thought over action. I found the first part of a fascinating take on the greek tradition. The second part, which attempts to build a case for action in philosophy was honestly beyond me. While I found some interesting points, I really could not follow the argument.

* Socrates. Arendt focuses the initial chapter on Socrates to explain how philosophy became divorced from politics and how Plato came to contract his politics with the polis (democracy).

* Socrates refused to engage in persuasion (mass public dialogue) vs dialect which is one on one. Socrates wanted each person to come to his how sense of being (Doxa) and used personal dialectic to ensure that their own doxa is the truth. When the public turned on this approach, as indicated in Socrates arrest and execution, Socrates refused to flee (like Aristotle later) but submitted to pubic will. Thus, Socrates is the model of a democratic philosophy of the polis. And Socrates defended this to the death.
* Plato draws the opposite conclusion. Recognizing that truth cannot be obtained by the polis (as it will always change), Plato requires the philosopher king to promote unchanging truth - the idea of good” vs human needs. But the philosopher king is not looking for the common good as meeting tangible good but the pure unchanging good.
* Plato - persuasion is the art of forcing your views on others. It’s not the opposite of violence but another form of it.
* Aristotle - society is not a community of equals. It is community that comes into being by allowing people to be equal in exchanges with others.
* Socrates- when men act they must live with person they are and impact they have with others. Thus, all men must not be conflict with themselves. His role was not to rule but “art of midwifery: he wanted to help others give birth what they themselves thought .. their true selves.” 15
* The cave. Arendt focuses on the political implications of this allegory. Humans chained only see the shadows are the every day human, trapped by their limited knowledge. The philosopher is in a state of wonder - an inarticulate yearning for the roots of where the world comes from (science). Then he turns to see the true forms. When the philosopher goes back, he is met with skepticism. This tragic results requires the philosopher to either remove himself from politics or to rule in accordance with the true forms not human desires.
* Arendt v Popper. Arendt sees this beginning as philosophy retreat from politics; Popper sees the same tradition as setting the foundation for totalitarianism. I think Arendt’s reading would support Popper’s conclusion. She hints at this but doesn’t emphasize it.
The tradition of political thought.
* Traces how the tradition of withdrawal of philosophy from politics from greeks, romans and middle ages
* Roman rules trinity “religion, authority, tradition” (e.g. foundation)
* End of history. Marx ends the political tradition of thought/philosophy being a private matter. Action became the the legitimate end of thought
* Marx no state power can be legitimate. Only a proxy of rulers. Only when there no rulers (proletariat state)

[Krishna Avendaño · Rating 4 out of 5]

Con la muerte del sentido común, que nos fue conferido por la tradición occidental, «ha iniciado el movimiento progresivo e imparable de superficialidad que cubre con un velo de sinsentido todas las esferas de la vida moderna.»

Arendt entiende que el final de la tradición está en el cuestionamiento de su autoridad y es esta crisis la que, en última instancia, ha dado pie al surgimiento del relativismo como piedra de toque de la modernidad: «todo lo que previamente era tenido por cierto asume ahora el aspecto de una perspectiva, frente a la cual debe existir la posibilidad de una multiplicidad de perspectivas igualmente legítimas». Claramente, ya en la década de los cincuenta Arendt no solo anticipaba la dialéctica del posmodernismo sino que la desnudaba por lo que realmente era, una aportación de la visión marxista no tanto a la economía política como a todos los dominios del pensamiento filosófico occidental: «Y es este pensamiento perspectivista el que de hecho el marxismo ha introducido en todos los campos del estudio humanístico».

Pero, contrario a lo que postulan muchos críticos de ese neblinoso y mal entendido término del marxismo cultural, el marxismo es menos la negación de la occidentalidad que un producto inevitable de su sistema de pensamiento, inaugurado este por el platonismo y que con Hegel llegara a la cumbre. Una vez que Marx invierte la dialéctica hegeliana, convencido de que el filósofo ha de representar una fuerza transformadora de la historia y no un mero observador de los fenómenos, el Occidente tradicional entra en crisis sin que por ello su andamiaje se derrumbe del todo: «Lo que ha ocurrido en el pensamiento moderno, a través de Marx por un lado y de Nietzche por otro, es la adopción del marco de la tradición junto con un rechazo simultáneo de autoridad».

[Ian Jay · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book offers an analysis of the challenges facing modern democracies and the role of the citizen in a democratic society. Arendt argues that the purpose of politics is to create a space for individuals to engage in meaningful dialogue and debate, and that the vitality of a democracy depends on the active participation of its citizens.

The book also outlines the views of philosophers towards politics, since Socrates, to Plato and Aristotle, to how philosophers' views evolved through time with Nietzsche and Marx.

In order to follow through, it's better if you have at least an elementary understanding of previous philosophies and have google ready to translate some latin words that Arendt just doesn't mind translating. If you are a grammar nazi, prepare your brain cells, as it is filled with grammatical errors. Although some are negligible, I couldn't stand Arendt's almost obsessive use of run-ons that confuses me further (which probably is the reason why it took me more than a month to finish the book because I read most of the chapters more than twice just to really get the gist).

Nonetheless, the book is filled with interesting albeit somehow too idealistic perspective and nails down how politics should be viewed by individuals if we are to build a better future out of it. Politics, as Arendt argues is not a struggle between classes, not inherently evil, and something that is crucial to a functioning society.

[Socrate · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ceea ce Hegel spune despre filosofie în general, anume că „bufniţa Minervei nu-şi începe zborul decât în căderea serii”, este valabil doar pentru filosofia istoriei, adică este adevărat pentru istorie şi corespunde viziunii istoricilor. Hegel a fost, desigur, încurajat să adopte acest punct de vedere ca urmare a încredinţării sale că filosofia a început cu adevărat în Grecia abia cu Platon şi Aristotel, care au scris când polisul şi gloria istoriei greceşti se aflau la sfârşitul lor. Astăzi ştim că Platon şi Aristotel au reprezentat mai degrabă apogeul decât începutul gândirii filosofice greceşti, care şi-a început zborul atunci când Grecia şi-a atins sau aproape şi-a atins punctul culminant. Ceea ce rămâne totuşi valabil este că Platon, ca şi Aristotel au devenit începutul tradiţiei filosofice occidentale şi că acest început, diferit de începutul gândirii filosofice greceşti, a avut loc când viaţa politică din Grecia era, într-adevăr, aproape de sfârşitul său. În întreaga tradiţie a gândirii filosofice şi, în particular, a celei politice, n-a existat, probabil, niciun factor de o asemenea covârşitoare importanţă, şi cu o asemenea influenţă asupra a tot ce avea să urmeze, precum faptul că Platon şi Aristotel au scris în secolul al IV-lea, sub impactul unei societăţi aflate în plină decădere politică.

[Ana Mendes · Rating 4 out of 5]

Um livro assente na contraposição da pólis grega - e outros períodos históricos - à realidade vivida pela autora - os totalitarismos do séc.XX e a bomba atómica-, retirando conclusões sobre o conceito, fins e necessidade da política na sociedade, inevitavelmente a par do conceito de liberdade:

“[a] liberdade de movimento, portanto - quer enquanto liberdade de partir e começar alguma coisa de novo e de inédito, quer enquanto liberdade de interagir no discurso com muitos outros e de conhecer a experiência da diversidade (…) -, não era nem é com toda a certeza o propósito e a finalidade da política (…). É antes a substância e o sentido de todas as coisas políticas. Neste sentido, a política e a liberdade são idênticas, e onde esta espécie de liberdade não existe não há também espaço político no verdadeiro sentido da palavra.” - p.111

“(…) o extermínio já não se refere a um número maior ou menor de pessoas que em qualquer caso terá de morrer, mas a todo um povo e à sua constituição política, que continham ambos a possibilidade - e no caso da constituição, a intenção - de ser imortais. (…) Quando um povo perde a sua liberdade política, perde a sua realidade política, ainda que logre sobreviver fisicamente.” - p.137

[Anderson Paz · Rating 4 out of 5]

A obra é uma coleção de textos de obras inacabadas de Arendt. Seu objeto é a promessa da liberdade em um ambiente plural político em que os indivíduos podem agir politicamente. No primeiro capítulo, Arendt trata da percepção socrática de política por meio de um diálogo aberto e plural. No segundo capítulo, Arendt faz um panorama da tradição do pensamento político ocidental. No terceiro, a autora discute como Montesquieu revisou a tradição do pensamento político por meio da identificação do princípio de cada forma de governo. Em seguida, Arendt trata do pensamento político em Hegel e em Marx. No capítulo seguinte, a autora discute como Marx findou a tradição do pensamento político. Por último, no capítulo mais longo, Arendt trata de sua perspectiva sobre a promessa política como um ambiente de pluralidade e liberdade entre pessoas distintas.
Críticas: Arendt faz longas digressões em seus textos que, às vezes, dificultam desnecessariamente a leitura. E Arendt trata do pensamento e prática política gregas, por vezes, de forma romântica. Apesar de ponderar os erros dos gregos, a autora conserva um certo romantismo com a suposta pluralidade grega.

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

If this is how Hannah Arendt writes, I need to read more of her. It’s not that it’s the most interesting topic all the time, but the totality and the writing is just exquisite. The book is a collection of a few shorter essays and one longer, but they all go together and form kind of a whole. This is however much more than that, it’s an look into history in order to understand the present, or the concept of politics that we strive with. She begins with Socrates, a great essay but it’s very relevant for what is to come. When she goes into politics, freedom and force, she binds it all together really well. It is not that it is very opinionated in itself, it reads more as a topical history, but within that history Arendt adds her flavor and her ideas and interpretations so that the reader feels agreement. She has such knowledge, and together with being scholarly and objective she is also philosophical and show the mastery within the realm of ideas. A great read, that make me wonder what I have missed by not reading Arendt before.

[Saúl Cabello · Rating 4 out of 5]

Me ha costado mucho terminarlo pero me ha encantado. Recomiendo leer antes La condición humana porque conceptualiza muchas ideas que luego retoma aquí para poder desarrollarlas mejor y más en profundidad. Un popurrí de textos sobre la política ateniense, su relación con la filosofía en Sócrates y Platón (para mí lo más rico del libro), y el cambio de paradigma en relación con la idea de guerra a partir del siglo XX (muy de actualidad con el tema de Palestina; lo más interesante del texto). Un clásico en Arendt es hablar de conceptos atemporales a través de contignencias históricas y por eso su filosofía no envejece, y además, aunque no hable específicamente de temas feministas, antirracistas o LGBTI, su insistencia en la necesidad de pluralidad permite hacer lecturas del estilo, cosa que no ocurre en otras filosofías. Necesitamos un poquito más de Arendt en nuestras vidas

[Armando · Rating 5 out of 5]

Los textos aquí presentados sirven como una forma embrionaria de las ideas y perspectivas que Hannah Arendt plasmaría, posteriormente y desplegados in extenso, en “La condición humana”. Sirve, también, como un ejercicio monográfico de su parte, donde pone a discusión argumentos e ideas de otros pensadores para construir, desde su perspectiva, la tradición del pensamiento político occidental. En el camino, vemos la forma en que Arendt se apropia de las ideas de pensadores como Platón, Aristóteles, Montesquieu, Hegel y Marx, que muestran una capacidad analítica brillante y una fundamentación de su propio pensamiento que trasciende el señalamiento hecho hacia su pensamiento de demasiado helenista.

Una lectura imprescindible, con un corte didáctico e introductorio para pensar lo político.

[Andy · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting perspective on the divide between philosophy and politics, as well as on the meaning of politics in general. The language could have been simplified. In certain points the use of compound clauses and lengthy sentences distracted from the main point. Overall, Arendt provides a great idea with a solid explanation that would have been better with added clarity.