Hannah Arendt and Leo Strauss: Philosophy and Politics

Seminar at the TU-Dresden, Summer 2007

Rodrigo Chacón
New School for Social Research
ChacR167@newschool.edu

The political thought of Hannah Arendt and Leo Strauss attracts more interest today than it ever
did during their lifetime or since. Why is this the case? And what do these two thinkers, normally
considered anathema, have in common? In this seminar we explore the following hypothesis.
Widely different in their political convictions, Strauss and Arendt nevertheless shared a) the same
background in German philosophy (especially Heidegger), and b) an enduring concern with the
problem of the relation between philosophy and politics. We shall trace the origins and the
development of their thinking on philosophy and politics, first, in their parallel biographies (both
Arendt and Strauss embodied in different moments of their lives the life of the mind, the life of
political action, and their conjunction in an attempt to practice political philosophy); second, in
the early Heidegger’s interpretation of the problem of theory and praxis in Aristotle (an
interpretation which was very influential for the thought of other important thinkers as well, such
as Gadamer); and third, in their analyses of ancient and modern political thought as expressions
of different ways of understanding the ‘proper’ relation between philosophy and politics or theory
and praxis. To trace these themes we will focus our attention on a parallel reading of Arendt’s The
Human Condition (1958), and Strauss’s Natural Right and History (1953).

Course requirements:

Reading reports:
The seminar depends on the informed participation of every member in each of the planned
meetings. Students enrolling in the seminar should be prepared to do all of the assigned readings
and to submit a report (no longer than four double-spaced pages) responding to questions about
the day’s readings. These short assignments will form the basis of class discussion and are also
meant to extend the dialogue beyond class. They will be due two days prior to each of our
meetings (i.e., on June 27 and July 4). (I will send out questions via email well in advance; your
reports should be emailed to my account: ChacR167@newschool.edu.)

Seminar presentations:
In addition, each student will be responsible for preparing a presentation on a topic in the course.
These presentations should be based on the themes covered in the course, but they should also
address a particular problematic that is of interest to you (and that you may thus want to develop
in your final papers). You should be prepared to speak for about 25 to 35 minutes. You are also
encouraged to send a handout of the presentation to the group at least one day in advance.

Final paper:
Students will submit a final paper of 20 to 25 pages (font 12; double-spaced) on a topic of their
choice. For this, each student will prepare a paper prospectus including their research question,
problematic, and argument, as well as relevant bibliography. (Due dates to be announced.)

Grading:

1
Half of the grade will be based on attendance, preparation, and participation in the seminar,
including regular submission of the reading reports and seminar presentations. The term paper
will comprise the other half of the grade.

Readings:

I. Biographical:

A. Who were they?

Recommended reading:

Arendt:

Young-Bruehl, Elisabeth. Hannah Arendt: For Love of the World. New Haven:
Yale University Press, latest edition.

Grunenberg, Antonia. Hannah Arendt und Maritn Heidegger. Geschichte einer

Liebe. Munich: Piper Verlag, 2006.

Strauss:

Sheppard, Eugene. Leo Strauss and the Politics of Exile: The Making of a
Political Philosopher. Brandeis University Press, 2006.

Leo Strauss, Correspondence. In Gesammelte Schriften, Band 3: Hobbes’

politische Wissenschaft und Zugehörige Schriften – Briefe. Stuttgart: Metzler
Verlag, 2001.

B. Political Impact:

Recommended:

Arendt:

Muller, Jan. “Preparing for the Political: German Intellectuals Confront the
"Berlin Republic’.” New German Critique no. 72 (Autumn, 1997): 151-176

Ernst Vollrath, “Hannah Arendt bei den Linken,” in Antonia Grunenberg, Lothar
Probst, eds., Einschnitte : Hannah Arendts Politisches Denken Heute. Bremen:
Edition Temmen, 1995.

Judt, Tony. “At Home in This Century.” New York Review of Books 42 (April 6,
1995), 9-15.

Havel, Vaclav. “The Power of the Powerless.” In J. Keane, ed., The Power of the
Powerless: Citizens Against the State in Central-Eastern Europe. London:
Hutchinson, 1985.

Strauss:

2
 Frachon, Alain and Daniel Vernet. L'Amérique Messianique : Les Guerres Des
Néo-Conservateurs. La Couleur Des Idées. Paris: Editions du Seuil, 2004.

II. The problem of philosophy and politics in the work of Arendt and Strauss

A. History of the problem of philosophy and politics/theory and

practice/contemplative-active lives

Required reading:

Lobkowicz, Nikolaus. Theory and Practice: History of a Concept from

Aristotle to Marx. University of Notre Dame. Notre Dame Ind.: University of
Notre Dame Press, 1967. (Read at least Part I.)

Recommended Reading:

Jaeger, Werner. Aristoteles; Grundlegung Einer Geschichte Seiner

Entwicklung. Berlin: Weidmann, latest edition. (Appendix “On the Origin
and Itinerary of the Philosophical Ideal of Life.”)

Edler, Frank H. W. "Heidegger and Werner Jaeger on the Eve of 1933: A

Possible Rapprochement?" Research in Phenomenology 27, (1997): 122-149.

Blumenberg, Hans. Das Lachen Der Thrakerin : Eine Urgeschichte Der

Theorie. Suhrkamp Taschenbuch Wissenschaft. 1. Aufl ed. Vol. 652.
Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1987.

Bruno Snell, “Theorie und Praxis” in Die Entdeckung des Geistes, Hamburg,
Claassen Verlag, 1955, pp. 401-412.

B. The problem of philosophy and politics in contemporary political theory

Required:

Michael Walzer, “Philosophy and Democracy,” Political Theory, 9, 1981,

379-399.

John Rawls, “Justice as Fairness: Political not Metaphysical,” Philosophy

&Public Affairs 14, No. 3 (Summer, 1985).

Richard Rorty, “The Priority of Democracy to Philosophy,” in Objectivity,

Relativism, and Truth. Philosophical Papers, Vol. I (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1991).

Jürgen Habermas, “The classical doctrine of politics in relation to social

philosophy,” in Theory and Practice. Boston: Beacon Press, 1973.

3
 “Metaphysics after Kant,” in Post-metaphysical Thinking, trans. William M.
Hohengarten (Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, 1992)

Alain Badiou, Ethics: An Essay on the Understanding of Evil. London; New

York: Verso, 2001. (Page selections to be announced.)

Cornelius Castoriadis, “Democracy as Procedure and Democracy as

Regime,” in Constellations, Vol. 4 No. 1, 1997, pp. 1-17.

C. The conflict between philosophy and politics in Arendt and Strauss

Arendt:

Required:

“Philosophy and Politics.” Social Research, Vol. 57, No. 1, 1990, pp. 73-
103.

“Concern with Politics in Recent European Philosophical

Thought”, in Essays in Understanding 1930-1954, ed. Jerome Kohn.
New York: Harcourt Brace, 1994.

“Introduction into Politics.” In The Promise of Politics, ed. Jerome Kohn.

New York: Schocken Books, 2005.

“Truth and Politics,” in Between Past and Future: Eight Exercises in

Political Thought. London: Penguin Books, 1993 [1961].

Preface. In Men in Dark Times. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich,

1968.

“Thinking and Moral Considerations”, in J. Kohn, ed. Responsibility and

Judgment. 1st ed. New York: Schocken Books, 2003.

Recommended:

1963 course (University of Chicago): “Introduction into Politics”:

http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?
collId=mharendt_pub&fileName=04/040700/040700page.db&recNum=
9&itemLink=/ammem/arendthtml/mharendtFolderP04.html&linkText=7

1969 course (New School for Social Research): “Philosophy and Politics,
Or: What is Political Philosophy?”

Strauss:

Required:

4
 “What is Political Philosophy?”, in Leo Strauss, What is Political
Philosophy? And Other Studies. Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1959.

(Additional readings to be announced.)

III. Origins of their thinking on the problem of theory and practice: Heidegger’s
Aristotle

A. Aristotle:

Required:

Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, Book VI; book X.

B. Heidegger:

Required:

Martin Heidegger, Plato’s Sophist, Preliminary Considerations and

Introductory Part (§ 1 to § 26).

Heidegger, “The Self-Assertion of the German University,” trans.

Karsten Harries. Review of Metaphysics 38 (March 1985).

Recommended (strongly so if you have not read Heidegger before):

Safranski, Rüdiger. Ein Meister Aus Deutschland : Heidegger Und Seine

Zeit. München: C. Hanser Verlag, 1994.

Polt, Richard. Heidegger : An Introduction. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell

University Press, 1999.

C. Other perspectives on the question of theory and praxis:

Required:

Hans-Georg Gadamer, “The Idea of Practical Philosophy”, in The Idea of

the Good in Platonic-Aristotelian Philosophy. New Haven: Yale
University Press, 1986, 159-179;

Edmund Husserl, “Philosophy and the Crisis of European Man,” in

Quentin Lauer (ed.), Phenomenology and the crisis of philosophy (New
York: Harper & Row, 1965).

5
IV. Natural Right and History and The Human Condition: philosophy and politics in
antiquity and modernity

Required:

Leo Strauss, Natural Right and History. University of Chicago Press,

1965.

Hannah Arendt, The Human Condition, University of Chicago Press,

various editions.