2016 | Book

The Wandering Thought of Hannah Arendt

Author: Hans-Jörg Sigwart

Part of: Springer Professional "Business + Economics & Engineering + Technology" , Springer Professional "Business + Economics"

Table of Contents

About this book

This book interprets Hannah Arendt’s work as a “wandering” type of political theory. Focusing on the sub-text of Arendt’s writings which questions “how to think” adequately in political theory whilst categorically refraining from explicitly investigating meta-theoretical questions of epistemology and methodology, the book characterizes her theorizing as an oscillating movement between the experiential positions of philosophy and politics, and by its distinctly multi-contextual perspective. In contrast to the “not of this world” attitude of philosophy, the book argues that Arendt’s political theory is “of this world”. In contrast to politics, it refrains from being “at home” in any particular part of this world and instead wanders between the multiple horizons of the many different political worlds in time and space. The book explores how these two decisive motives of Arendt’s theoretical self-perception majorly influence her epistemological, methodological and normative frame of reference and inspire her understanding of major concepts, including politics, judgment, understanding, nature, and space.

Frontmatter

Chapter 1. Introduction

Abstract

Although Hannah Arendt refrained from explicitly investigating meta-theoretical questions of epistemology and methodology, her writings do entail a self-reflective sub-text on the question of “how to think” adequately in political theory. Focusing on this sub-text, the present study suggests an interpretation of Arendt’s work as a “wandering” type of political theorizing. Theory is characterized by its oscillating movement between the experiential positions of philosophy and politics and by its distinctly multi-contextual perspective. In contrast to the “not of this world” attitude of philosophy, Arendt’s political theory is “of this world.” In contrast to politics, it refrains from being “at home” in any particular part of this world and instead wanders between the multiple horizons of the many different political worlds in time and space.

Hans-Jörg Sigwart

Chapter 2. Defending Politics Against Philosophy

Abstract

Arendt’s critical stance against philosophy, especially against Plato, forms an important part of the background of her theoretical self-perception. For Arendt, the term philosophy denotes a main historical current of the Western tradition of political thought, but also a general mental activity and experiential position. In both respects, philosophy bears anti-political implications. As a consequence, the practical logic of political experience which substantially differs from philosophizing has often been neglected or even dismissed within Western political thought. Arendt’s political theory not only aims at defending the experience of politics against these misconceptions. It also epistemologically sides with the political against the philosophical mode of experiencing reality, at least gradually, and therewith closely relates the vita contemplativa with the vita activa of human beings.

Hans-Jörg Sigwart

Chapter 3. The Realms of Necessity and of Utility

Abstract

This chapter turns the focus to Arendt’s theory of the vita activa. In order to understand Arendt’s account of political experience, it is helpful to first look at her account of labor and work as developed in The Human Condition. The chapter provides a succinct summary of these two fundamental types of human activity. More importantly, however, it examines the peculiar practical logics they follow as well as the existential experiences they provide. It turns out that Arendt’s clear distinction of the fields of experience these activities constitute has important implications for her own theoretical position, particularly regarding her understanding of nature, utility, the social question, self-determination, freedom, and alienation. These implications also help to clarify her perspective on the political mode of experiencing reality.

Hans-Jörg Sigwart

Chapter 4. The Practice of Politics

Abstract

This chapter provides an interpretation of Arendt’s account of action as that form of human activity which she most clearly associates with the practice of politics. By acting politically, human beings establish a common world of inter-subjective relations in which freedom is realized. Against readings of Arendt’s theory of action as implying an understanding of politics too elusive to be applicable to real politics, however, the chapter emphasizes the significance of spatiality, borders, and stability for Arendt’s account. Politics takes place in concrete public spaces which require more or less stable borders to serve their function of realizing freedom. As such a spatial phenomenon, the practice and experience of politics involve an ambiguous ingredient of instrumentality.

Hans-Jörg Sigwart

Chapter 5. The Epistemology of Politics

Abstract

Taking up the results of the previous chapters, this chapter examines the epistemological or experiential implications of Arendt’s understanding of the practice of politics. While these implications are not elaborately addressed in The Human Condition, they more clearly come to the fore in Arendt’s reflections in other texts on the concepts of judgment, common sense, and understanding. They indicate that politics as a field of experience is constituted by a peculiar “thinking of citizens” which can be characterized as a worldly mental activity (1) of meaningfully integrating particulars, (2) of self-localization, (3) of assuming a We-perspective, and (4) of actualizing a bounded form of enlarged mentality.

Hans-Jörg Sigwart

Chapter 6. The Experiential Position of Political Theory

Abstract

According to Arendt, the mental activity of political theorizing on the one hand resembles the worldly practical logic of political experience as examined in the previous chapter. On the other hand, it at the same time is characterized by a gradual epistemological deviation and emancipation from the limited horizons of practical political understanding. This is realized by a practice of critical understanding which oscillates between genuinely political and genuinely philosophical experiences and which locates itself in a distinctly comparative and multi-contextual frame of reference. This account of a wandering type of theory has important implications for Arendt’s relation toward modernity, for her method of interpretation and conceptual construction and for the language of her political theory.

Hans-Jörg Sigwart

Chapter 7. The Limits of Political Horizons and the Vocation of Theoretical Wandering

Abstract

This final chapter provides a brief overview of the normative and ethical implications of Arendt’s wandering thought. Her theory stresses the significance of political experience also in normative terms. The genuine contribution political theory has to offer to public political discourses is nonetheless rather critical than justificatory. Its vocation is majorly to understand the necessary conditions and the limitations of the political mode of understanding reality. These limitations particularly derive from the spatial conditions of the practice of politics. Against the background of the multi-contextual and fragmented social ontology of numerous political spaces and worlds brought out in Arendt’s exercises in political thought, her theory not only highlights the significance of politics for realizing freedom, but also indicates certain ethical ambivalences involved in it.

Hans-Jörg Sigwart

Backmatter

Title: The Wandering Thought of Hannah Arendt
Author: Hans-Jörg Sigwart
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan UK
Electronic ISBN: 978-1-137-48215-0
Print ISBN: 978-1-137-48214-3
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-48215-0