Thinking Without a Banister

Roger Berkowitz
German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock gave a major foreign policy speech last week in which she began and ended her speech by referencing Hannah Arendt’s idea of “thinking without a banister.” Arendt employs the metaphor to express the challenge of thinking after the break of tradition and thinking in the gap between past and future. At nearly all moments in history, humans live amidst traditions, customs, and mores that structure our lives as well as our moral and political values. We may trespass those limits but the traditions remain authoritative nevertheless, as banisters that inform our common understanding. The Holocaust, Arendt argues, has broken that tradition and shattered the pillars of authority based upon tradition and religion. For the first time in history, she continues, we live without banisters. This is both a challenge and an opportunity since the breakdown of tradition means we are free to rebuild our world and inaugurate new traditions. The thoughtful engagement in building new worldly traditions on the foundation of our shattered past is what she calls “Thinking without banisters.” You can read Baerbock’s speech here. 

I think you are doing exactly what Hannah Arendt – who, as you all know, was a member of this faculty – meant when she spoke about “thinking without a banister,” or in German “Denken ohne Geländer”.
An approach in which we are brave enough to leave biases and preconceptions behind and open ourselves up to new ideas. And I would like to say very frankly: that’s an approach not necessarily in the DNA of politicians. But what The New School stands for is what we need today, as we face tremendous challenges in this world. We have to come up with fresh ideas. We have to be willing to also look at the world from the perspective of people who do not share our opinions….
To make room for creative disputes in our societies so that our democracies can develop, advance and modernize. Democracy never finishes, it keeps developing. Because it is never complete, they need to adapt to new times. Otherwise, they stand still and die. But we also need to be sure to protect our democracies against attempts to destroy their very core – the values and institutions without which they cannot live. We should help each other to succeed in this double task: Because we are close friends, because it’s in our interest. And I am glad that we are creating a new forum to nourish this debate:
The German American Futures Forum, which will meet for the first time in November in Germany: We are bringing together young experts and decision-makers from both our countries to explore new ideas for our societies and the transatlantic partnership – in short: “to think without a banister”.