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Temptations of Tyranny
Rod Dreher’s conflicted support for President Trump illustrates a broader crisis among intellectual conservatives who fear the "soft totalitarianism" of liberal institutions yet embrace the hard authoritarianism of executive overreach. Drawing on Hannah Arendt’s political thought, the essay contends that true freedom is preserved not through charismatic leaders but through the multiplication and decentralization of citizen power. Revitalizing democracy, it argues, requires stubborn, local acts of collective governance rather than the dangerous temptation to concentrate authority in a single figure.04-27-2025
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Who Controls the State?
Roger Berkowitz's article examines the historical struggle in the United States over who controls the state, emphasizing the ongoing tension between elites and the working classes. He contrasts the Jacksonian approach of centralizing power to empower the people with Hannah Arendt's view that true republican freedom requires decentralizing power to prevent any single faction from dominating the state.08-25-2024
When the World is at Stake: Arendt on The Value of Emersonian Wisdom
"What attracts me to this quote is that Arendt is expressing the value of Emersonian wisdom in the context of a world facing unprecedented meaninglessness. More specifically, this is a world where totalitarianism and the Nazi regime revealed to us that anything is possible, and our abilities to confront both understanding and independent judgment have become increasingly difficult. Further, Arendt identifies Emerson as occupying a unique space in the Western Tradition that is concerned with chiefly human matters and who embodies a kind of thinking that does not belong to the vita contempletiva – the philosopher’s way of thought that Arendt critiqued as detached from the world, experience, and the unpredictability of the realm of human affairs."08-22-2024
Pickle Time
Is Germany's democracy facing its biggest threat since World War II? As three eastern states gear up for crucial elections, far-right and far-left parties are surging in popularity, challenging the political establishment. With anti-system parties potentially capturing up to 49% of the vote, traditional parties are scrambling for solutions. From neo-Nazi rhetoric to Stalin admirers, the political landscape is shifting dramatically. Could these September elections determine not just regional governance, but the fate of Europe's economic powerhouse? Join us as we delve into Germany's "pickle time" politics and the looming crisis that has experts warning: democracy is under attack. Germany's "pickle time" politics and the looming crisis has experts warning: democracy is under attack.08-18-2024
Time as Broken in the Middle
Arendt understands Kafka’s parable, "He," as describing what happens when we think. When we think about anything – and, Arendt is interested in thinking through political questions – the past exerts a force on our thought. But, contrary to expectation, the past is not some ‘burden’ or ‘dead weight’ placed upon the shoulders of the human person. The past is never simply dead, nor even past. It propels thought into the future and battles with it, which, again, contrary to expectation, drives the human person back into the past and seems to want to be rooted in something in the past.08-14-2024
Leaderless Crowds
Recent riots in Britain reveal the complex interplay between political grievances and emotional drivers of collective violence. This analysis challenges simplistic explanations, arguing that the core appeal of riots lies in their ability to foster belonging and power among participants. It highlights the role of misinformation and leaderless crowd dynamics in modern civil unrest.08-11-2024
What would an “Arendtian naturalism” look like?
I have always been intrigued by Arendt’s relationship to materialism and the natural sciences. On a first reading, Arendt seems to be a committed humanist, in the sense that she sees human beings as possessing a distinct set of qualities that are the basis of morality and politics. As a consequence, she is distrustful of observing human affairs through the lenses of the natural sciences, which disregard freedom and spontaneity. This quote, however, shows that things are not so simple.08-08-2024
On Fake Hannah Arendt Quotations
This article discusses a mis-attributed quote to Hannah Arendt circulating on social media, exploring why such alterations occur and their potential consequences. Berkowitz argues that while simplified versions of Arendt's words may increase accessibility, they risk undermining the integrity of her original texts and contribute to a broader cynicism about truth, which Arendt herself warned against in her writings on totalitarianism and the importance of factual reality.08-04-2024
An Independent Press
This article discusses the challenges faced by The New York Times in cultivating a culture of independent journalism among a new generation of reporters, as explained by Executive Editor Joe Kahn. Kahn emphasizes the importance of intentionally building a newsroom culture that values impartiality, resilience, and the willingness to cover difficult stories, while also supporting journalists who face backlash for their work on sensitive issues.08-04-2024
In the midst of darkness
In the 1968 preface of Men in Dark Times, Hannah Arendt invites us to explore the life of some extraordinary human beings that, with their unconventional lives, shed some light when darkness prevailed in history and freedom was not in sight. Seeking the exemplary dimension of deeds and actions of these non-ordinary individuals is a practice common to politics, philosophy, historiography, or poetry, but Arendt’s unique way of doing it has a strong appeal for the reader and it still has it for us now.07-23-2024