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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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Campus Politics
Liel Leibovitz offers an interesting perspective on the current wave of identity politics on college campuses in Tablet...06-02-2019
Immortality and Politics
Roger Berkowitz writes about immortality, Arendt, and Amber Scorah's reflections on grief.06-02-2019
The Greatest Possible Torment: The Last Judgment by Frans Floris
Max FeldmanMax Feldman writes about the holocaust, Arendt, and Frans Floris's The Last Judgment in this month's column.
05-31-2019
Why Arendt Matters: Bill T Jones
Roger Berkowitz talks with choregrapher and director Bill T. Jones about the importance of Hannah Arendt's ideas and writings. 05-31-2019
The New Aristocrats
By Roger BerkowitzMatthew Stewart in The Atlantic rehearses the truth that the top one percent of Americans are villains and the bottom 99 percent are the good guys. The reality, he argues, is more complicated. Stewart divides us instead into three classes. There is the top 0.1 percent who are masters of the universe and the bottom 90 percent who are losing out in a race to the bottom. In between is the top 9.9 percent who Stewart calls “the new aristocrats.” While it is easy to claim to be part of the 99%, many who do so are part of this new aristocracy who Stewart argues are “accomplices in a process that is slowly strangling the economy, destabilizing American politics, and eroding democracy.”
05-26-2019
Leadership and Academic Freedom
Roger Berkowitz writes about the Wall Street Journal's coverage of strong leadership and engaged debate at Bard College.05-26-2019
Taking White Interests Seriously?
By Roger BerkowitzIsaac Chotiner of The New Yorker interviews Eric Kauffman about his new book Whiteshift: Populism, Immigration, and the Future of White Majorities. Kauffman’s book looks analyzes a double insight...
05-26-2019
In Memoriam:
Jacques Taminiaux
By Jerome KohnI met Jacques Taminiaux in 1978 in Monteripido, where the Collegium Phenomenologicum gathered for six weeks in June and July. Monteripido is a Franciscan monastery -- a calm and beautiful place -- eight hundred years old, built in stone high above the fortress city of Perugia, Umbria, italy. It is the oldest Franciscan monastery after Assisi in which St. Francis lived and died. When the sky is clear one can see from Monteripido to Assisi.
05-26-2019
A Eulogy for Jacques Taminiaux
By Kazue KoishikawaJacques Taminiaux, professor emeritus in philosophy at the University of Louvain and Boston College, passed away on May 7th, 2019 at the age of 90 years. As those familiar with continental philosophy know, he left a tremendous legacy in the field of phenomenology from Husserl and Heidegger to Merleau-Ponty, Levinas, Arendt, and more.
05-22-2019