Redemptive Power of Narrative

Hannah Arendt and the Redemptive Power of Narrative
Author(s): SEYLA BENHABIB

Source: Social Research, Vol. 57, No. 1, Philosophy and Politics II (SPRING 1990), pp. 167-196
Published by: The New School
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and /
HannahArendt
theRedemptive /
Powerof /
Narrative / byseylabenhabib
1 he question ofJewishidentity and the fateof theJewish

people in the twentieth centurywere the undeniablecondi-
tions which inspired a rather unpoliticalstudent of the
of Karl Jaspersand MartinHeidegger to
Existenzphilosophie
becomeone of themostilluminating, and certainlyone of the
mostcontroversial politicalthinkersof our century.1At the
centerof Hannah Arendt'spoliticalthoughtis a tensionand a
dilemma,indicatingthat these two formativeforcesof her
spiritual-political
identity,GermanExistenzphilosophie
of thelate
1920s and her political experiences as a Jewish-German
werenotalwaysin harmony.WhenArendtreflects
intellectual,
on the politicalrealitiesof the twentiethcenturyand on the
fate of the Jewish people in particular,her thinkingis
decidedlymodernistand politically universalist.
She looks for
political structuresthat will solve the nineteenth-century
conflictbetween the nation and the state. Although the
modern states establishedafter the Americanand French
revolutionsmade the recognitionof the individual as a
rights-bearingpersonthe basis of theirlegitimacy, nationalist
developmentsin Europe revealed that one's rightto be a
1See Arendt'sletterto datedNov. 18,1945,explaining
rathercoylythatshe
Jaspers,
had become something between einemHistoriker und einempolitischenPublizisten("a
historianand a politicalpublicist"):Hannah Arendt-
KarI Jaspers:Briefwechsel
(München,
1985), p. 59.
SOCIAL RESEARCH, Vol. 57, No. 1 (Spring 1990)

168 SOCIAL RESEARCH
person was safeguarded onlyinsofaras one was a memberof a

specificnation:
Fromthebeginningthe paradoxinvolvedin thedeclarationof

inalienablehumanrightswas thatitreckonedwithan "abstract"
humanbeing who seemed to existnowhere.. . . The whole
questionof humanrights,therefore, was quicklyand inextrica-
blyblended withthe questionof national
emancipation; onlythe
emancipatedsovereignty of the people, of one's own people,
seemedto be able to insurethem.2
On these matters Arendt was a political modernist who

pleaded for the realization of this basic principle of political
modernity,that is, the recognitionof the rightto have rights
simplybecause one is a member of the human species.
Arendt's major theoretical work, The Human Condition,
however,is usually,and not altogetherunjustifiably, treatedas
an antimodernistpolitical text. The same historical process
which brought forth the modern constitutional state also
brought forth"society,"that realm of social interactionwhich
interposeditselfbetween the household on the one hand and
the political state on the other. "The rise of the social," as
Arendt names this process, primarilymeant that economic
processes, which had hithertobeen confined to the "shadowy
realm of the household," emancipated themselves from this
domain and entered the public realm.3 A century before,
Hegel had described this process as the development in the
midst of ethical life of a "system of needs" {Systemder
Bedürfnisse),of a domain of economic activitygoverned by
commodityexchange and the pursuitof economic self-interest.
The emergence of thissphere meant the disappearance of the
"universal,"of the common concern for the political associa-
tion, for the respublica,from the hearts and minds of men.4
2 H. Arendt,The (NewYork,1979),p. 291.

ofTotalitarianism
Origins
3 H. Arendt,TheHumanCondition
(Chicago,1973),pp. 38-50.
4 See G. W. F. (1821), #189ff;Hegel, The Philosophy
Hegel, Rechtsphilosophie ofRight,
tr.T. M. Knox(Oxford,1973),pp. 126ff.

REDEMPTIVE POWER OF NARRATIVE 169
Arendtsees in thisprocesstheoccludingof thepoliticalbythe

social and the transformation of the public space of politics
intoa pseudospaceof social interaction, in whichindividuals
no longer"act" but "merelybehave"as economicproducers,
consumers,and urbancitydwellers.
Thisrelentlesslynegativeaccountofthe"riseofthesocial"and
thedeclineofthepublicrealmhas beenidentified as thecoreof
Arendt's "antimodernism."5
political Indeed,atonelevelArendt's
textis a panegyricto theagonisticpoliticalspace of the Greek
polis.Whatdisturbs thecontemporary readeris perhapslessthe
and
high-minded highly idealizedpictureof Greekpoliticallife
whichArendtdraws,butmoreherneglectofthequestion:Ifthe
agonisticpoliticalspace of the poliswas possibleonlybecause
largegroupsof humanbeingslikewomen,slaves,children,la-
borers,noncitizen residents,and all non-Greeks wereexcluded
fromit and made possiblethroughtheir"labor"forthe daily
necessities
oflifethat"leisureforpolitics" whichthefewenjoyed,
thenis thecritiqueof theriseof thesocial,whichemancipates
thesegroupsfromthe"shadowyinterior ofthehousehold,"also
a critiqueof politicaluniversalism as such?6Is the"recovery of
thepublicspace"underconditionsof modernity necessarilyan
elitist
and antidemocratic project which can hardlybe reconciled
withthe demand foruniversalpoliticalemancipationand the
universalextensionof citizenship rights?7 To put it somewhat
polemically:Arendt's ownversionofthepredicament ofthe"Ger-
man-Jewish Mt. Parnassus," firstidentified by Moritz Goldstein
forhisgenerationof German-Jewish namely,that
intellectuals,
they "had to administer the intellectualpropertyof a people
whichdeniesus the rightsand the abilitiesto do so,"8maybe
5 Cf.
ChristopherLasch, "Introduction"to Special Hannah Arendt issue of
Salmagundi 60 (1983): vff.;JürgenHabermas,"Hannah Arendt'sCommunications
Conceptof Power,"SocialResearch44 (1977): 3-24.
6 Cf. Arendt,Human
pp. 212-220.
Condition,
Fora sympatheticcritiqueofArendtalongtheselines,cf.HannahPitkin,"Justice:
On RelatingPublicand Private,"Political
Theory9 (1981): 327-252.
MoritzGoldstein,"Deutsch-Juedischer Parnass,"as quoted in Hannah Arendt,
"WalterBenjamin,"in MeninDarkTimes(NewYork,1968),pp. 183-194.

170 SOCIAL RESEARCH
her continuingadulation of Greek spiritualand politicallife,

followingthe traditionof the German humanisticintelligentsia
fromHölderlin over Hegel to Heidegger. This "antimodernist"
currentof her workcontrastssharplywithher experiencesas a
persecuted Jew in the twentiethcentury and her decidedly
modernistanalyses and reflectionson the political and social
conflictsof the West since the Enlightenment.
In this essay I will explore Arendt's "antimodernist
modernism"by beginning with her analysis of totalitarianism
as a new and unprecedented form of human domination in
history.Particularlythose sympatheticstudentsof her thought
who discovered Arendt's work during the civilrights,student,
and antiwarmovementsin the United States in the 1960s have
tended to rejecther theoryof totalitarianismas a paradigmatic
instance of cold-war social science.9 My thesis is that the
historiographyof National Socialist totalitarianismpresented
Arendt withextremelydifficultmethodologicaldilemmas with
normativedimensions, and that while reflectingupon these
dilemmasArendt developed a conceptionof politicaltheoryas
"storytelling."In light of this conception, her analysis of the
decline of the public space cannot be considered a nostalgic
9 Withthe whichhave taken place in 1989 in Eastern

revolutionarytransformations
Europe and the collapse of Soviet-backed communist regimes in these societies,
historicallythe cold war has come to an end. In lightof these transformations,theories
of totalitarianismdating fromthe 1950s, and in particularthose like Hannah Arendt's
which were formulatedprimarilywith the National Socialist experience in view, will
have to be reconsidered. In this essay I am assuming that Arendt's theory of
totalitarianism was mostilluminatingwithrespectto National Socialism but thatit had
severe limitationsin explaining"Soviet-style" Cf. note 23 below on this
totalitarianisms.
point. Ironically, even if her empirical and historical model of totalitarianismis
inadequate in explaining these societies,in her politicaland philosophical reflections
on Rosa Luxemburg, on the Kronstadt rebellion, and on the Hungarian revolt of
1956, Arendt noted certain featuresof "revolutionaryexperience" in these societies
which, if anything,have been proven completely right by recent developments in
Poland, Hungary,Czechoslavakia, East Germany,and Romania. In these societiesthe
people appear to have discovered the "lost treasureof the revolutionarytradition"by
creatingspontaneouslyand by "action in concert,"a power strongenough to topple
tyrantslike Ceausescu, and lasting enough to create a "public space" of action and
deliberation,be it in the squares of Prague, the union rooms of Solidarnozs, or the
streetsand churches of Dresden and Leipzig.

(a historyof decline). Rather,it must be

Verfallsgeschichte
viewedas an "exercise"in thought,thechieftaskof whichis to
digundertherubbleofhistory and to recoverthose"pearls"of
past experience,with theirsedimented and hidden layersof
meaning,so as to cull fromthema storythatcan orientthe
mind in the future. Yet the tension between Arendt's
modernism and herantimodernism, whichalmostcorresponds
to theJewishand Germanlegaciesin herthoughtrespectively,
is neverresolved.It animatesher visionof theoryand politics
to theend.
PuzzlesofArendt'
Methodological s Analysisof Totalitarianism
Hannah Arendtdid not engage in methodologicalreflec-

tions,and on thosefewoccasionswhenshe characterized her
own workshe appeared to confusemattersfurther, as in the
case of her variousprefacesto The Originsof Totalitarianism.
Here she distinguishedbetween"comprehension" and "deduc-
ing the unprecedented from precedents,"10and between
"totalitarianism"and "its elementsand origins."11The "ori-
gins" of totalitarianism
is actuallya misnomer for thiswork,
which originallyappeared in England under the title The
BurdenofOurTimes.In theseprefacesArendtmakesclearthat
she is not concernedto establishsome inevitablecontinuity
betweenthepastand thepresentof sucha naturethatone has
to viewwhathappenedas whathad to happen. She objectsto
thistrap of historicalunderstanding and maintainsthatthe
futureis radicallyunderdetermined,12 but thatmore signifi-
10Arendt,1950
prefaceto Origins p. viii.
ofTotalitarianism,
Arendt,1967prefaceto PartOne of Origins of p. xv.
Totalitarianism,
12Arendt'sclaimthatthe futureis and can neverbe
radicallyunderdetermined,
foretoldon the basis of the past,is rootedin her ontologicalanalysisof human
"spontaneity."This is the capacityto initiatethe new and the unexpected.It
corresponds to thehumanfactof birth.Justas everybirthsignifies a newlifestory,
one whichcan neverbe foretold at birth,so thehumancapacityforactioncan always
initiatethenewand theunexpected(see HumanCondition, pp. 243ff.).This capacity

172 SOCIAL RESEARCH
cantlyto place the present in an inevitableline of continuity

withthe past will lead to failurein appreciatingthe noveltyof
what has taken place. The keytermswhichshe uses to describe
her method in The Originsof Totalitarianismare "configuration"
and the "crystallizationof elements." Arendt is searching for
the "elements" of totalitarianism; for those currents of
thought,political events and outlooks, incidents and institu-
tions,which once the "imaginationof history"13has gathered
them together in the present reveal an altogether different
meaning than what theystood for in the original context.All
historicalwritingis implicitlya historyof the present,and it is
the particularconstellationand crystallizationof elementsinto
a whole at the presenttimethatis the methodologicalguide to
their past meaning. In language that resonates with Walter
Benjamin's introduction to The Origin of German Baroque
Drama,14Arendt explains:
The book,therefore, does not reallydeal withthe "origins"of

as its titleunfortunately
totalitarianism- claims-but gives a
accountof theelements
historical intototalitari-
whichcrystallized
anism.This accountis followedbyan analysisof theelementary
structure movements
of totalitarian and dominationitself.The
forspontaneityis essentialforpoliticallife,forthe buildingof the cityis due to such an

act of spontaneity, just as the continuityof the cityis dependent upon the coordination
of human activities. Totalitarianism aims at destroying this capacity for a new
beginning,thus making politicallife impossible.
Arendtdoes not reallyexplore how thisthesisof the spontaneityof human action is
relatedto the perspectiveof the social sciences,which,by focusingon the enabling and
antecedent conditionsof action, enhance our understandingof the course of action
while diminishingour sense for its spontaneity.Arendt would appear to be claiming
that social science is only possible insofaras humans do not "act" but "behave," i.e.,
insofaras theyrepeat sociallyestablishedpatterns.A more interestingaccount of the
impossibility of a social science of a nomologicaland predictivenature,whichbases this
thesis on the narrativecharacter of action rather than its spontaneity,is offeredby
Alasdair Maclntyre,AfterVirtue(Notre Dame, 1981).
13This is the
phrase used by Merleau-Pontyin describingMax Weber's analysisof
the Protestantethic and the spiritof capitalism;cf. M. Merleau-Ponty,Les Aventures de
la dialectique(Paris, 1955), p. 29.
14See Susan Buck Morsss
exploration ot the terms configuration and
"crystallizationof elements" as methodological categories of Benjamin's work, The
OriginofNegativeDialectics(New York, 1977), pp. 96-111.

structure
elementary of totalitarianism
is the hiddenstructure
of
the book while its more apparentunityis providedby some
fundamental conceptswhichrun like red threadsthroughthe
whole.15
Indeed, from the standpointof establisheddisciplinary

methodologies,Arendt's work defies categorizationwhile
violatinga lot of rules. It is too systematically
ambitiousand
overinterpreted to be strictly a historical
account; it is too
anecdotal,narrative, and ideographicto be consideredsocial
science;and althoughithas thevivacity and thestylistic
flairof
a workof politicaljournalism,it is too philosophicalto be
accessibleto a broad public.The unitybetweenthe firstpart
on anti-Semitism, thesecondparton imperialism, and thelast
part on totalitarianism is hard to discern.One of the first
reviewers of thiswork,thepoliticalphilosopherEricVoegelin,
maintainedthatthe arrangementof the book was "roughly
chronological," and thatis was "an attemptto makecontempo-
raryphenomenaintelligible bytracingtheiroriginbackto the
eighteenth century, thus establishinga timeunitin whichthe
essenceof totalitarianism unfoldedto itsfullness."16
Voegelin's
interpretation of Arendt's method as one of traditional
(philosophyof history)was undoubtedly
Geschichtsphilosophie
more indebtedto the curiousdistortions caused by his own
hermeneutic lens; nonetheless, hisquestionabouttheunityof
15Arendt,"A
Reply,"ReviewofPolitics15 (January1953): 78 to Eric Voegelin's
reviewof The Originsof Totalitarianism;
myemphases.Cf. Benjamin'sAdditionto
Thesis18 of theEnglisheditionof the"Theseson thePhilosophy of History" (which
Arendtedited in English):"Historicism contentsitselfwithestablishing a causal
connection betweenvariousmomentsin history. But no factthatis cause is forthat
veryreasonhistorical.It became historicalposthumously, as it were,throughthe
eventsthatmaybe separatedfromitbythousandsofyears.A historian whotakesthis
as hispointofdeparturestopstellingthesequenceofeventslikethebeadsofa rosary.
Instead,he graspsthe constellationwhichhis own era has formedwitha definite
earlierone. Thus he establishes
a conception
of thepresentas the"timefo thenow"
whichis shotthroughwithchipsof Messianictime"(Illuminations [NewYork,19691).
16See Eric Voegelin, reviewof The Originsof Totalitarianism,
in Reviewof Politics15
(January1953):69.

174 SOCIAL RESEARCH
the work, which prompted one of Arendt's infrequent

attemptsat methodologicalself-clarification, is a justifiedone.
If one interpretsthe unity of the work as Arendt herself
intended it to be read- "the elementarystructureof totalitari-
anism is the hidden structureof the book"- one must not
begin where the book itself begins, with Enlightenment
attitudestoward human nature and the social conditionof the
Hoffjuden, but withthe chapterentitled"Total Domination" on
the extermination and concentration camps. In the 1951
edition, this was the final chapter preceding the inconclusive
"Concluding Remarks"; in the 1966 edition Arendt expanded
these into a chapteron "Ideology and Terror." The chapteron
"Total Domination" is significantnot because it brings fresh
empiricaldata into the discussion- it does not- but because of
Arendt's interpretivethesis that the camps are the "guiding
social ideal of total domination in general" and that "these
camps are the true central institutionof totalitarianorganiza-
tional power."17The camps reveal elementarytruthsabout the
totalitarianexercise of power and about the structure of
totalitarianideology. Paradoxically,their darkness casts light
upon those moral, political,and psychologicalassumptionsof
theJudeo-Christiantraditionwhich,afterthe establishmentof
the camps, are irrevocablyplaced in doubt.
Arendt is concerned to stress that the camps served no
"utilitarian"purpose in totalitarianregimes and hence could
not be explained in functionalistterms: they were needed
neitherto intimidateand subdue the oppositionnor to provide
for "cheap and disposable" labor.18The camps are the living
laboratories revealing that "everything is possible," that
humans can create and inhabit a world where the distinction
between life and death, truthand falsehood, appearance and
reality,body and soul, and even victim and murderer are
17Arendt,
p. 438.
Originsof Totalitarianism,
18
Ibid.,p. 443. Cf. also Arendt'sreviewcalled The Historyot the Great Crime ot
Leon Poliakov,Breviaryof Hate: The ThirdReichand theJews,in Commentary, Mar. 13,
1952,p. 304.

constantly blurred.This totallyfabricated universereflects the

ideologicalimpetus of totalitarianregimes to create a universe
of meaningwhichis whollyself-consistent and also curiously
devoidof reality and immune to proofby it.
As thecrystalline structure throughwhoseblindingfocithe
totalitarianformof dominationis revealed,the camps show
firstthatthebeliefin thejuridicalpersonality of humanshad
to be shattered;second thatthe moralpersonality in humans
had to be destroyed;and finallythatthe individuality of the
self had to be crushed.Arendt'sanalysisin the preceding
sectionsof The Originsof Totalitarianism is designedto show
howcertain"elements"werepresentin thepoliticaland moral
cultureof Europeanhumanity in the precedingtwocenturies
which,in retrospect and in retrospect alone,couldbe viewedas
harbingers of a new form of politicaldominationin human
history.
The deathofthejuridicalsubject, of the personqua bearerof
rights,is the storyArendttellsin the sectionon imperialism,
whenshe tracesthe paradoxesof the nation-state and of the
universalbeliefin therightsof man.She recountsthecollapse
of Westernmoral standardsthroughthe confrontation with
Africa,both in the case of the Boer colonizationof South
Africaand in thecase of thelater"scrambleforAfrica."These
experiencesseem to say that mere humanityas such is no
guaranteeof one's juridical statusas subjectof rights.The
death of the juridical subjectis signed and made historical
testament whentheminority treatiesat theend of WorldWar
I create millions of homeless, nationless,and displaced
persons.The juridicalsubjectbecomesa "superfluous" human
being.
The murderof themoralpersonin humanity, thedeathof the
moralself,accompaniesthedeathof thejuridicalsubject.The
specificallymodern form of anti-Semiticprejudice plays a
specialrole in thisprocess.Such anti-Semitism ascribesmoral*
guilt and blame in a way which defies traditionalmoral
categories.The traditional anti-Judaism of Christian doctrine

176 SOCIAL RESEARCH
and practicehad blamed the Jews for a crime theycommitted

against the Son of God. For one's crimes one can atone by
conversion, by penance, by denunciation of one's brethren.
But modern anti-Semitism,which erupts when Jews en masse
begin to enter "society,"withoutfullybecoming its members,is
morally more perverse. Enlightened opinion distances itself
fromtraditionalconceptionsof the murder of the Son of God;
however,Jewishnessnow becomes an undefinable "essence," a
condition which is other and undeniable at once; Jewishness
becomes a "vice." Whereas a crime is an act, a vice is a
condition, a spiritual disposition, a trait of character; its
transformation is much harder since it is less easilyidentifiable.
The figure of the Jew increasinglybecomes associated with
forces and powers that bear little or no relation to the
empirical individual. She or he thus ceases to be a morally
accountable selfand becomes instead a specimen of the species
of Jews.19
The thirdelement in the crystallinestructureof totalitarian-
ism,as revealed via a retrospectiveanalysisof the death camps,
is the disappearance of individuality.The emergence of the
mob and the universalizationof the conditionof worldlessness
as a resultof war, politicalupheavals, and mass unemployment
19In Arendt'saccountof modernanti-Semitism, thehistorical-institutional roleof

theJewsin modern a
plays major
bourgeoissociety role.Nonetheless, itis important to
recallthatthepeculiarities ofmodernanti-Semitism cannotsimply be explainedbythe
identificationofJewswiththesphereofcirculation and exchange.Theseequationsare
onlymeaningful because"enlightened" societyhas gottenridof thefigureof theJew
as themurderer of theSon of God and has replacedhim/her bytheimageof theJew
as thepotential carrierofan unreformable, unredeemable "vice,"namely, the"fact"of
as such. Modern anti-Semitismfocuses on Jewishnessnot as an actbutas a
Jewishness
condition, as a formof identity.For thisreason,it is moreinsidious;it requiresthat
thisidentity be changedor thatthe factbe eliminated.Undoubtedly, the strange
oftheJewsin modernEuropeansociety - fromthebankerswhofinancedthe
visibility
absolutistkings,to the assimilatedbourgeoisiewho used itsconnections established
undertheOld Regimetocontinuecommercial relationsin thenewcapitalist economy,
to the Jewswho, like moneyitself,seemed to be the onlytrulysupra-European
community, membersof the nationalstateyetsupranational in theirhistorical ties,
relations,and languages-this made
visibility them the object of human
family
resentments.

play a special role in rendering"autonomy"a historical

chimera.For Arendt,the mob is a new historical actoron the
politicalscene,replacinglepeuple.The mobis theprecursorof
the lonelymasses of totalitarianism. It is composed of the
refuseof bourgeoissociety, of thoseindividualswhofallout of
thecracksof thesocialsystem, whobelongto no socialclassin
particular,who can be identifiedwithno specifictrade or
work,who have been made superfluousby the economicand
social changes broughtabout by industrialization, urbaniza-
tion,and commercialization.They are worldlessin the sense
thattheyhave lost a stablespace of reference,identity, and
expectationwhich they share with others. Not having a
particular socialperspectivefromwhichto viewtheworld,they
are particularly open to ideologicalmanipulation:theycan
believe anythingand everything for theyhave no definite
perspective whichis tiedto havinga certainplace in theworld.
Their conditionis one of loneliness.The destructionof the
individualin concentrationcamps by methodsof torture,
terror,and behaviormanipulation onlyshowsthata humanity
thathas becomeworldless,homeless,and superfluousis also
whollyeliminable.Arendtsumsup:
Loneliness,the common ground for terror,the essence of

totalitarian
government ... is closelyconnectedwithuprooted-
nessand superfluousness whichhavebeen thecurseof modern
massessincethebeginningof theindustrial revolutionand have
becomeacutewiththeriseof imperialism at theend of thelast
centuryand the break-downof politicalinstitutions and social
traditionsin our own time.To be uprootedmeansto have no
place in the world,recognizedand guaranteedby others;to be
superfluousmeansnotto belongto theworldat all.20
Even if it is possibleto interpret

theunityof Arendt'swork
in lightof the principlesof a "crystalline structure"or the
"elementsof a configuration," as I have suggestedabove,
20
p. 475.
Arendt,Originsof Totalitarianism,

178 SOCIAL RESEARCH
questions remain: Why did Arendt resort to such an indirect

manner of exposition and to an even obscurer method of
explanation in her account of totalitarianism?Was this yet
another example of the idiosyncraticand at timesbewildering
nature of her political thought? Discussions of Arendt's
intentionsand methodology in The Originsof Totalitarianism
have focused primarilyon the following:the concept of
theusefulnessor obsolescenceof thisconcept
totalitarianism,21
for "comparativestudiesof fascism"and for understanding
the innerworkingsof totalitarian politicalmovements,22the
questionablenessof treatingNazismand Stalinismas totalitar-
ian regimesof the same kind, and the unevennessof her
explanationsin thecase of thetworegimes.23
21See Manfred Funke, ed., Totalitarisme:Ein Studien-Reader zur Herrschaftsanalyse

moderner Diktaturen(Düsseldorf, 1978).
¿¿ See Hans Mommsen, "The
Concept of Totalitarian Dictatorship versus the
ComparativeTheory of Fascism,"in Ernest A. Menze, ed., Totalitarianism Reconsidered
(Port Washington,N.Y., 1981), pp. 146-167.
23 Karl Buckheim, "Totalitarismus: Zu Hannah Arendt's Buch 'Elemente und
Ursprünge Totaler Herrschaft',"in Adalbert Reif, ed., Hannah Arendt:Materialienzu
IhremWerk(Wien, 1979), pp. 21 Iff.This last point is worthconsideringin more detail.
Particularlyin the wake of the cold war, as research into totalitarianismitself
underwenta change and became "operationalized"throughthe workof Carl Friedrich
and Z. Brzezinski to fit positivistunderstandingsof social science, the concept of
totalitarianismcame to be almost synonymouswith Soviet-typesocieties. Cf. Carl
Friedrich and Zbigniew K. Brzezinski, TotalitarianDictatorship and Autocracy, 2d ed.
(Cambridge, 1965). See in particular the preface to the firstedition, pp. xi-xiii.
Interestingly,in recent years East European intellectualsand dissidents have also
revived this concept (Heller, Feher, Havel); see in particularF. Feher and A. Heller,
EasternLeft,Western Freedomand Democracy
Left:Totalitarianism, (Cambridge, 1986). Yet
whateverthe meritsof thisconcept to help us understand the lattertype of societies,
there is littledoubt that Arendt's historicalaccount does not illuminateStalinismand
Nazism to the same extentand in the same way.
Whereas it could be argued that there is more unitybetween the experiences of
imperialism,anti-Semitism,and the subsequent triumphof National Socialism, these
two phenomena, namely,imperialismand modern anti-Semitism, do not play the same
formative-hermeneutic role in the emergence of Stalinism.Arendt treatsnineteenth-
centuryPan-Slavismand Pan-Germanismas species of "continentalimperialisms,"but
this discussion is far too cursory,and the consequences of the lattermovement for
futuredevelopmentsin the Soviet Union remain unexplained. Arendt cannot really
prove thatthe dislocationscaused by World War I and the Russian Revolutionamount
to the creation of "mass" society,in the same way that the war experience, coupled
withinflationand depression, come to cause it in Germany in particular. Ironically,

These empirical and historical problems of Arendt's

of totalitarianism
interpretation stillcannotdistractfromthe
work'sgreatness.BernardCrick,forexample,has arguedthat:
If thebookdoesseemunbalancedin the space it give to Germany,

perhapsthisis a fault,but to see it as a grossfaultwouldbe to
misconceivethe whole purpose and strategyof the book. It
would be ratherlike, having been able to grasp that Toc-
queville'sDemocracyin America is reallymeantto be about the
whole of WesternEuropean civilizations, to then say thathe
should have givenequal and explicitspace to France and to
England.24
I am personallyless sanguinethatthisintelligent defenseof

Arendt'sstrategycan sufficeto rectifythe problemsof her
paralleltreatments of NationalSocialismand Stalinism.What
is moreimportant in Crick'sobservation,
and whatmightshed
further lighton the of
puzzles Arendt'sanalysisof totalitarian-
ism,is the affinitybetweenTocqueville'sDemocracyin America
and Arendt'sTheOrigins ofTotalitarianism.
Tocqueville wrote Democracy in Americabecause he saw
tendenciesin the life of this nation, such as the rise of
social equality,the tyrannyof the majority,the spread of
individualism,which he thoughtwere exemplaryof the
developmentaltrendsof modernsocietiesat large. Neverthe-
less,thepoliticalinstitutions
and trendsof nineteenth-century
Americawere not onlyexemplarybut also unique, or better
masssocietyand the abolitionof traditional classes,ratherthanprecedingStalinist

rule,are consequences ofit.It is Stalin'swaragainstthepeasantry thatfinallydissolves
thefabricof traditional societyon theland. See RobertC. Tucker,"BetweenLenin
and Stalin:A CulturalAnalysis"in PraxisInternational 6 (January1987): 470ff.,and
AlvinGouldner,"Stalinism: A Studyof InternalColonialism," Telos,no. 34 (Winter
1977-78):5-48. Also,theabsenceof a racially basedanti-Semitism as thecenterpiece
of Stalinistideology(of course,anti-Semitism was used by Stalinas the trialof the
Jewishdoctorsreveals,but one cannotclaimthatit was the centerof the Stalinist
Weltanschauung) throwsevengreaterdoubtas to thesensein whichthedevelopments
outlinedby Arendtin the firsttwosectionsof TheOrigins of Totalitarianism
can be
elements"
"crystalline of Stalinism and NationalSocialismalike.
24BernardCrick,"On
RereadingtheOriginsof Totalitarianism," SocialResearch44
(Spring1977): 113-U4.

180 SOCIAL RESEARCH
still, one could capture what was most exemplary about

them- the tendency of modern societies toward "equality of
conditions"and social leveling--by focusingon their unique-
ness-namely, democracy not just as a political form of
governmentbut as a social condition of equality. Repeatedly
Tocqueville emphasized that"A new politicalscience is needed
for a world itselfquite new,"25unless the "mind of men" were
left"to wander aimlessly,"unable to extractmeaning fromthe
present.
Whereas for Tocqueville a new reality required a new
science to comprehend it and extract meaning from it, for
Arendt totalitarianism required not so much a new science as a
new "narrative."Totalitarianismcould not reallybe the object
of a new "science of politics,"even if Arendt believed that
there could ever be such a thing,for totalitarianismsignified
the end of politics as a human activity,requiring freedom of
speech and association,and the universalizationof domination.
Under these conditionsone required a storythat would once
again reorient the mind in its aimless wanderings. For only
such a reorientationcould reclaim the past so as to build the
future. The theoristof totalitarianismas the narrator of the
storyof totalitarianismwas engaged in a moral and political
task. Put more sharply: some of the perplexitiesof Arendt's
treatmentof totalitarianismderive from her profound sense
that what had happened in Western civilization with the
existence of Auschwitzwas so radicallynew and unthinkable
thatto tell its storyone had firstto reflectupon the moral and
political dimensions of the historiographyof totalitarianism.
Althoughthe politicization ofmemory was part of the destruction
of traditionin the twentiethcenturythatArendt lamented,the
politicsof memory and themoralityof historiographywere at the
no less than of her
centerof her analysisof totalitarianism
on
reflections Eichmann.
25Alexis de in America,ed. J. P. Mayer,tr. George Lawrence

Tocqueville, Democracy
(New York, 1969), p. 12.

The PoliticsofMemoryand theMoralityofHistoriography
For Hannah Arendt,writingabout totalitarianism, but in

and concentration
particularabout the extermination camps,
whichshe saw as the most unprecedentedformof human
domination,presentedprofoundhistoriographical dilemmas.
Let me summarizethesearoundfourheadings:historicization
and salvation; the exercise of empathy,imaginationand
judgment;thepitfallsof analogicalthinking;
historical and the
moralresonanceof narrativelanguage.
Historicization and Salvation.All "historiography is necessarily

salvationand frequently justification,"notesArendt.26 Histori-
ography originates with the human desire to overcome
oblivionand nothingness; it is the attemptto save,in the face
of the fragility of human affairsand the inescapability of
death, something"whichis even more than remembrance."
ProceedingfromthisGreekand even Homericconceptionof
history, forArendtthefirstdilemmaposed bythehistoriogra-
phy of totalitarianism wastheimpulseto destroyratherthanto
preserve."Thus myfirstproblemwas howto writehistorically
about something-totalitarianism- which I did not want to
conservebuton thecontrary feltengagedto destroy."27
The verystructure oftraditional historical
narration, couched
as it is in chronologicalsequenceand the logicof precedence
and succession,servesto preservewhathas happenedbymak-
ingitseeminevitable, necessary, plausible,understandable, and
in shortjustifiable.Nothingseemedmoreabhorrentto Arendt
than the dictum that die Weltgeschichte ist das Weltgericht
(worldhistory is the courtof the world).Her responseto this
dilemmawasthesameas WalterBenjamin's:tobreakthechain
of narrativecontinuity, to shatterchronologyas the natural
structure ofnarrative, tostressfragmentariness, historical
dead
26
Arendt,"A Reply," p. 77.
¿/
Ibid., p. 79.

182 SOCIAL RESEARCH
ends, failuresand ruptures.Not only does thismethod of frag-

mentaryhistoriographydo justice to the memoryof the dead
by tellingthe storyof historyin termsof theirfailed hopes and
efforts,but it is also a way of preservingthe past withoutbeing
enslaved by it, in particularwithouthaving one's moral and
politicalimaginationstifledby argumentsof "historicalneces-
sity."Arendtstumbledupon thishistoriographical dilemmawhen
reflectingupon totalitarianism, but there is littlequestion that
this method of writinghistoryin defiance of the traditional
canons of historicalnarrativeguided her controversialaccount
of the action of theJudenrätein the Eichmann book as well as
her account of the French and American revolutions in On
Revolution.
Empathy,Imagination,and HistoricalJudgment.Arendt main-

tainedthattherewas a specialrelationship betweenhistorical
understanding and whatKanthad calledEinbildungs-
{Verstehen)
kraft the powerof creating,producingimages).28In
(literally,
each case, one had to recreatefromthe evidenceavailablea
newconcept,a newnarrative, a newperspective. For historical
understanding could never be the mere of the
reproduction
standpointof past historicalactors;to pretendthathistorical
understanding amountedto completeempathywas an act of
bad faithwhich served to disguise the standpointof the
narratoror thehistorian.In thiscontextArendtpainstakingly
distinguished"judgment"from"empathy."29 The historical
narratorno less thanthe moralactorhad to engagein actsof
judgment,for Verstehen as well was a form of judging-
certainly notin the senseof thedelivery
juridicalor moralistic
of a value perspectivebut in the sense of the recreationof
28Ibid. Cf. also H. Arendt, "The Crisis in Culture: Its Social and Its Political
Significance,"in BetweenPast and Future:Six Exercisesin PoliticalThought(New York,
1961), p. 221.
29Arendt,"Crisisin Culture,"
pp. 220-221; cf. also S. Benhabib, "Judgmentand the
Moral Foundations of Politics in Hannah Arendt's Thought," Political Theory16
(February 1988): 29-53.

shared reality from the standpoint of all involved and

concerned. Historical judgment revealed the perspectivai
nature of the shared social world by representingits plurality
in narrativeform. At stake in such representationalnarrative
was the ability"to take the standpointof the other," and this
did not mean empathizing or even sympathizingwith the
other,but ratherthe abilityto recreatethe world as it appeared
throughthe eyes of others.
In recreating this plural and perspectivai quality of the
shared world, the historiancould accomplish his or her task
only to the extent to which his or her facultyof imagination
was not limitedto one of these viewpoints.Arendt here drew a
fine line between the practiceofjudgment by the historianon
the one hand and the moral dilemmas of objectivism and
relativismon the other. The commitment to represent in
narrativeformeveryperspective,as the objectivistrequired, is
the equivalent of the God's-eye view of the universe. But
relativismis equally problematical,forthe more pluralized and
fragmentarysocial and historicalrealityappears, the more can
one gain the convictionthat there is no shared rightor wrong
and that all our moral concepts are smoke screens for our
perspectivesand preferences- a consequence whichNietzsche,
by whose perspectivalistepistemology Arendt was certainly
inspired,did not hesitateto draw.30
As in moral philosophyso in historiographyas well, Arendt
refused to deal with these problems via foundationalist
positions and insisted that the cultivation of historical and
moral judgment amounted to the ability to draw the "fine
distinctions"among the phenomena and to represent the
plural nature of the shared human world by recreating the
30WhenArendtdiscussesNietzsche in TheLifeoftheMind,vol.2, Willing

extensively
(NewYork,1978),pp. 158-172,she treatshimfirstand foremost as a philosopher
of
thewilland notas an epistemologist. Nietzsche's
Nonetheless, epistemic influenceon
Arendtis hard to miss. On Nietzsche'sperspectivalism,
cf. A. Nehamas,Lifeas
Literature
(Cambridge,1985).

184 SOCIAL RESEARCH
standpoint of others.31 According to some commentators,

Arendt herselfexcelled in thisart of representationto such an
extent that she was more successfulin capturing the mind of
the anti-Semitethan of theJew,of the whiteBoer settlersthan
of Africannatives.32
The PitfallsofAnalogicalThinking.One of Arendt's chief quar-

relswiththe socialsciencesof her day was thatthe dominant
paradigmled to ahistorical
positivist modesof thinking and to
hastyenthusiasmforanalogiesand generalizations. Since the
methodof sciencewas consideredtheinductiveone of assem-
blingevermoreinstancesof the same law,in socialscienceas
wellone searchedforthegeneralizable and cross-culturally"sim-
ilar,"therebyendingmoreoftenthannotin banal generaliza-
tions.33For Arendt,the problemwiththisapproachwas not
justmethodological butalso moraland political.This searchfor
nomologicalgeneralizations dulledone's appreciationforwhat
was new and unprecedented, and thusfailedto confrontone
withthe taskof thinkingmorallyanew in the faceof the un-
thismethodalso stultified
precedented.Politically, one'scapac-
ity forresistance
bymaking it seem thatnothing newand
was
thateverything had alwaysalreadybeen.34
Following this concernwith the unique ratherthan the
general,the unprecedentedratherthanthe commonplace,in
the first edition of The Origins of TotalitarianismArendt
employedthe categoryof "radicalevil"to describewhathad
?1I have dealtwithsomeof thedilemmasof Arendt'smoraltheoryin myarticle
"Judgment and theMoralFoundationsof Politicsin HannahArendt'sThought."The
of the otheris partof a universalistic-egalitarian
obligationto takethe standpoint
morality whichneeds a stronger in moralphilosophy
justification thanArendtwas
willingto offer.
á¿ See Evil (New Jersey,1983), pp.
George Kateb, Hannah Arendt:Politics,Conscience,
61-63.
33In someof
inthesocialsciencesin particular,
lightofpost-Kuhnian developments
Arendt'sobservationson the topic of generalizationhave proved remarkably
prescient;cf.,on the generaltopic,R. J. Bernstein,TheRestructuring of Socialand
Political
Theory(Philadelphia,1976).
34Arendt,"A
Reply,"p. 83.

happened in the death camps. Subsequently,and largelyas a

result of her analysis of Eichmann, she withdrewfrom this
position to the term "banality of evil." Her biographer,
Elisabeth Young-Breuhl, recounts that this change was a cura
posteriorfor Arendt.35 This cure meant, however, neither
forgiveness nor forgetting. (Arendt always insisted that
Eichmann had to be condemned for his deeds. The question
was on what principlesand according to whichjustification?)36
By this much maligned and much misunderstood phrase
Arendt raised a question which has remained unanswered till
today: namely,how "ordinary,"dull, everydayhuman beings,
who are neither particularlyevil, not particularlycorrupt or
depraved, could be implicated in and acquiesce to the
commitment of such unprecedented atrocities?37A better
phrase than the "banality of evil" might have been the
"routinization of evil" or its Alltäglichung(everydayness).
Analogical thinkinggoverns the logic of the everyday,where
we orient ourselves by expected and established patternsand
rules. For this reason, analogical thinkingroutinizes,normal-
izes, and renders familiarthe unfamiliar. In doing so, it can
reinforce the "normal" and the "everyday" quality of the
unacceptable, of the unprecedented and the outrageous.
TheMoral ResonanceofNarrativeLanguage. Arendt's firstcritics

had praised her work as passionate and had denounced it as
sentimental.38Arendt's response to this was that she had
parted quite consciously"withthe traditionof sineira etstudio"
in her analysis of totalitarianism,for not to express moral
indignationor not to seek to arouse it in one's readers would
35 E.
Young-Breuhl,Hannah Arendt:For Love oftheWorld(New York, 1982) pp 331
367.
See the exchange with Karl Jaspers on this point, in Hannah Arendt-Karl
Jaspers:
pp. 457ff.
Briefwechsel,
See Hans Mommsen, "Vorwort," in Eichmannin Jerusalem:Ein Berichtvon der
Banalitätdes Bösen(München, 1986), pp. xiv-xviii.
38Cf. E.
Voegelin, reviewof The Originsof Totalitarianism,
p. 71.

186 SOCIAL RESEARCH
have been equivalent to moral complicity."To describe the

concentrationcamps sine ira is not to be 'objective,' but to
condone them; and such condoning cannot be changed by a
condemnation which the author may feel duty bound to add
but which remains unrelated to the descriptionitself."39The
moral resonance of one's language does not primarilyreside in
the explicitvalue judgments which an author may pass on the
subject matter;rathersuch resonance mustbe an aspect of the
narrative itself. The language of narration must match the
moral qualityof the narrated object. Of course, such abilityto
narrate makes the theoristinto a storyteller,and it is not the
gift of every theorist to find the language of the true
storyteller.
as Storyteller
The Theorist
It may seem less perplexingnow thatin reflecting about

is one of themostfrequent
whatshe was doing,"storytelling"
answersArendtgives.40 The vocation of the theoristas the
is the unifyingthread of Arendt'spoliticaland
storyteller
philosophicalanalysesfromthe originsof totalitarianism to
herreflectionson theFrenchand theAmericanrevolutions to
her theoryof the publicspace and to her finalwords to the
firstvolume of The LifeoftheMind on Thinking,
I haveclearlyjoined theranksof thosewho forsometimenow

havebeen attempting and philosophy
to dismantlemetaphysics,
with all its categories,as we have known them from their
beginningin Greece untiltoday.Such dismantling is possible
only on the assumption thatthe threadof traditionis broken
39Arendt,"A
Reply,"p. 79.
4USee Arendt,Men in Dark Times, 22; BetweenPast and tuture,p. 14. 1 here is an
p.
excellent essay by David Luban, which is one of the few discussionsin the literature
dealing withHannah Arendt's methodologyof storytelling; cf. D. Luban, "Explaining
Dark Times: Hannah Arendt'sTheory of Theory," SocialResearch50 (1983): 215-247;
see also E. Young-Bruehl, "Hannah Arendt als Geschichtenerzaehlerin,"in Hannah
Arendt:Materialienzu IhremWerk(München, 1979), pp. 319-327.

and we shallnotbe able to renewit. Historicallyspeaking,what

actually has broken down is the Roman trinitythat for
thousandsofyearsunitedreligion,authority, and tradition.The
does notdestroythepast.. . .
loss of thistrinity
Whathas been lostis thecontinuity of thepast.. . . Whatyou
thenare leftwithis stillthepast,buta fragmentedpast,whichhas
lostitscertaintyof evaluation.41
The past thatclaimsauthorityon us because it is the way

thingsweredone is "tradition."42 The eventsof the twentieth
century, however, have createda gap betweenpastand future
of such a magnitudethat the past, while still present,is
fragmented and can no longerbe toldas a unifiednarrative.
Undertheseconditions, we mustrethinkthegap betweenpast
and futureanew for each generation,we mustdevelop our
own heuristicprinciples,we "mustdiscoverand ploddingly
pave anew the pathof thought."43
This recoveryof the past must proceed and cannot but
proceed outside the framework of establishedtradition,for
traditionno longerrevealsthe meaningof the past.Yet to be
withouta sense of the past is to lose one's self,one's identity,
forwhowe are is revealedin thenarratives we tellofourselves
and of our worldsharedwithothers.Even whentraditionhas
crumbled,narrativity is constitutiveof identity.Actions,unlike
things and natural objects,only live in the narratives of those
who performthemand the narrativesof those who under-
stand,interpret, and recallthem.This narrativestructureof
actionalso determines theidentity of theself.The humanself,
as opposed to thingsand objects,cannotbe identified in terms
ofwhatitis,butonlybywhoone is. The selfis theprotagonist
of a storywe tell,but notnecessarily itsauthoror producer.44
The narrative structure ofactionand ofhumanidentity means
that the continuingretellingof the past, its continued
41Arendt,The
LifeoftheMind,vol. 1, Thinking;
(NewYork,1978),p. 212.
42See her
essays,"WhatIs Authority?" and "WhatIs Freedom,"in Between
Pastand
Future.
43Arendt,
p. 210.
Thinking,
Arendt,HumanCondition,pp. 18Iff.

188 SOCIAL RESEARCH
reintegrationinto the story of the present, its réévaluation,

reassessment,and reconfigurationare ontological conditions
of the kinds of beings we are. If Dasein is in time,narrativeis
the modalitythrough which time is experienced. Even when
the thread of traditionis broken, even when the past is no
longer authoritativesimplybecause it has been, it lives within
us and we cannot avoid placing ourselvesin relationto it. Who
we are at any point is defined by the narrativeunitingpast and
present.
Narrative then, or, in Arendt's word, storytelling,is a
fundamental human activity.There is then a continuum
betweenthe attemptof the theoristto understandthe past and
the need of the acting person to interpretthe past as part of a
coherentand continuinglifestory.But what guides the activity
of the storytellerwhen traditionhas ceased to orientour sense
of the past? What structuresnarrativemodes when collective
formsof memoryhave broken down, have been obliterated,or
have been manipulated beyond recognition?To elucidate the
Arendt resortsto "a fewlines" which,
activityof the storyteller,
according to her, say "betterand more densely than I could"
what one does in the attemptto cull meaning of a fragmented
past. She quotes Shakespeare:
Full fathomfivethyfatherlies,
Of hisbonesare coralmade,
Those are pearlsthatwerehiseyes.
Nothingof himthatdothfade
But dothsuffera sea-change
Into somethingrichand strange.45
Afterthe storm,the theoristas storytelleris like the pearl

diver, who convertsthe memoryof the dead into something
"rich and strange." Arendt first cites this passage from
Shakespeare in her 1968 essay on Walter Benjamin:
and thelossof
WalterBenjaminknewthatthebreakin tradition
45 act I, scene 2.
p. 212, quoting The Tempest,
Arendt, Thinking,

authoritywhichoccurred in hislife-time
wereirreparable,
and
he concluded thathe had to discover
newwaysofdealingwith
thepast.In thishebecamea master whenhediscovered thatthe
ofthe
transmissibility past had been its
by citability
replaced and
thatinplaceofitsauthoritytherehadarisena strangepowerto
settle
down,piecemeal, inthepresentandtodeprive itof"peace
ofmind,"themindless peaceofcomplacency.46
In using the same lines from Shakespeareto characterize
Benjamin'seffortsand her own exercisesin remembrance,
Arendtrevealedthe significant influenceBenjamin's"Theses
on the Philosophyof History"exercisedon her views of
historicalnarrative.47Of course, Arendt herself did not
replace the transmissibility
of the past by its citability,
but
for
quotations her,just as for Benjamin, became interesting
fragments, archaeologicalcuriosities
whose meaninglay "full
fathomfive."In orderto findthose"pearlsthatwerehiseyes,"
one had to divedeep and excavatetheoriginalmeaningof the
phenomena which lay covered by sedimented layers of
historical Once one broughtthesepearlsto the
interpretation.
surface,one could unsettlethe presentand depriveit of its
"peace of mind."
In Arendt'sBenjaminessaythe figureof the pearl diveris
accompaniedbythatof thecollector:
The figureof the collector,
as old-fashioned as thatof the
could
flâneur, assume such eminently modern featuresin
Benjaminbecausehistory itself-thatis thebreakin tradition
whichtookplaceat thebeginning ofthiscentury- hadalready
relieved
himof thistaskofdestruction and he onlyneededto
benddown,as itwere,toselecthisprecious fragmentsfromthe
pileofdebris.48
Arendtwas well aware thatby arguingthatthe activity
of
46
Arendt,"Walter Benjamin," p. 193.
47 I would like to thankMaurizio P. D'Entreves for
firstdrawingmyattentionto this
link between Arendt and Benjamin in the firstchapter of his doctoral dissertation,
"The Political Philosophy of Hannah Arendt: A Reconstruction and Critical
Evaluation,"Boston University,1989.
40
Arendt,"Walter Benjamin," p. 200.

190 SOCIAL RESEARCH
storytellerwas like thatof the pearl diver and of the collector,

she was consciouslyleaving out poetry. Although she praises
Benjamin for being ultimatelya poet, between the poet who
sings to eternalize the city and to save from oblivion those
deeds of human greatnessand the modern storyteller who has
no identifiablehuman city,there is no more kinship.The loss
as Brecht knew,was not the loss of a place or
of the Vaterstadt,
an environment;49the city meant home, tradition, and
generationallytransmittedremembrance.If the loss of the city
dried up the sources of poetry,the storyteller,like the pearl
diver and the collector,but unlike the poet, was stillfree to dig
under the rubble of history,and to bring to the surface
whateverpearls could be recovered fromthe debris.
vs. "Discursive"Public Space

Tension:"Agonistic"
The Unresolved
If one readsArendt'saccountof the"riseof thesocial"and

thedeclineof publicspace in thecontextof herhistoriograph-
we can no longerview her accountas a
ical considerations,
butmustunderstanditas theattempt
nostalgicVerfallsgechichte
to thinkthroughthe human historysedimentedin layersof
languageand concepts.In thisprocedure,we identifythose
momentsof rupture,displacement, and dislocationin history.
At such momentslanguage is the witnessto the more
profoundtransformations takingplace in humanlife.Such a
a history concepts,is an act of remember-
Begriffsgeschichte, of
ing,in thesenseof a creativeact of rethinkingwhichsetsfree
thelostpotentialsof the past. "The historyof revolutions ...
could be told in a parable formas the tale of an age-old
49 In her
essay on Brecht, Arendt quotes "Of Poor B.B.": "We have sat, an easy
on
generation/Inhouses held to be indestructable./Thuswe built those tall boxes
the/islandof Manhattan/And those thinaerials thatamuse the/Atlantic swell./Ofthose
cities will remain what passed/throughthem, the wind!/The house makes glad the
eater: he/clearsit out./Weknowthatwe are onlytenants,provisionalones/Andafterus
willcome: nothingworthtalking/about." See also B. Brecht,"Die Rückkehr."

treasurewhich,underthe mostvariedcircumstances, appears

abruptly, unexpectedly,and disappearsagain,underdifferent
mysterious as thoughit werea fatamorgana"00
conditions,
Arendt'sthought,however,is not free fromaspectsof an
Ursprungsphilosophiewhichpositsan originalstateor temporal
pointas the privilegedone. As opposed to rupture,displace-
ment,and dislocation,this view emphasizesthe continuity
betweenoriginand the presentand seeks to uncoverat the
privilegedorigin the lost and concealed essence of the
phenomena.I would suggestthat there are two strainsin
Arendt's thought,one correspondingto the method of
fragmentary historiography and inspiredbyWalterBenjamin;
the other,inspiredby the phenomenologyof Husserl and
Heidegger,and accordingto whichmemoryis viewedas the
mimeticrecollectionof the lost originsof phenomena as
containedin somefundamental humanexperience.Alongthis
secondlineof interpretation, remindersaboundin TheHuman
Condition concerning"theoriginalmeaningof politics"or the
lostdistinction betweenthe "private"and the "public."51
In thisessayI have arguedthatin thefinalanalysisit is the
Benjaminesquemethodof fragmentary historiography that
governsArendt'sactivity as a politicaltheorist.But the legacy
of Ursprungsphilosophieis neverquite lost.A discussionof two
of her majortheoretical conceptsmayillustrate thisdeep and
unresolvedtensionin her thought.
ArendtbelievedthatGreekphilosophy, moreoftenthannot,
distortedtheexperienceof Greekpolitics.Plato,in particular,
withhisexemplary hostilitytowardthefragility,indeterminacy,
and unpredictabilityofhumanaffairs, introduced conceptsfrom
therealmofpoiesis(making)to thinkaboutpolitics.A techne, a
craft, has rulesthatcan be learned and taught;furthermore, it
is reasonablethatthose inexperiencedin a particulartechne
submitto the authority of thosewithknowledgeand experi-
50
Arendt,BetweenPast and Future,
p. 5.
51Arendt,Human
pp. 23, 28, 38ff.
Condition,

192 SOCIAL RESEARCH
enee. As is well known,Socrates uses thistechneanalogy in the

Republicto justifythe distinctionbetween the various classes.
For Arendt,what is ominous for politicsin this Platonic argu-
mentis the claim thatpoliticalmatterscan be so thoughtof that
those who know dictate and those who do not know obey the
rules. Arendt stumbles upon the moral problem implied by
statementssuch as "but we were just obedient servantsof the
higher-ups"in her reflectionson personal responsibilityunder
dictatorshipand the issue of collectiveguilt. Her thoughtson
thislatterquestionare theninextricablylinkedwithher Begriffs-
geschichteof concepts like politics,techne,and rule:
The argumentis alwaysthesame: Everyorganization demands

obedienceto superiorsas well as obedienceto the laws of the
land. Obedienceis a virtue;withoutit no body politicand no
otherorganizationcould survive.. . . Whatis wronghereis the
word "obedience."Only a child obeys;if an adult "obeys"he
actuallysupportsthe organizationor the authority of the law
thatclaims"obedience."52
Arendt then analyzes whyobedience seems like such a natural

virtuein politicsin lightof the Platoniclegacy thatteaches that
the body politic consists of the rulers and the ruled. These
notions,however,have
moreaccuratenotionsof the relations

supplanted earlierand,I think,
betweenmen in the sphereof concertedaction.These earlier
notionssaid thateveryaction,accomplishedby a pluralityof
men,can be dividedinto two stages-the beginning,whichis
in whichmany
initiatedbya "leader,"and theaccomplishment,
join in orderto see throughwhatthenbecomesa commonen-
terprise.53
As thispassage indicates,again the language of Ursprungsphilos-
ophie- the "earlier notions" which are also the more correct
ones -erupts in the midstof Arendt's search for the fractured
52H. Arendt,"Personal TheListener

UnderDictatorship," 72 (August
Responsibility
1964):200.
53Ibid.;
myemphases.

and forgotten meaningsof terms-politicsas theexperienceof

coordinatedactionor of "actionin concert."
The secondexamplethatwould illustrateArendt'sequivo-
cationbetweenfragmentary historyand Ursprungsphilosophie is
theveryconceptof publicspace. This topographical figure of
speechis suggestedat theend of TheOrigins to
ofTotalitarianism
compare various forms of politicalrule. Constitutionalgovern-
mentis likenedto movingwithina space wherethelaw is like
thehedgeserectedbetweenthebuildingsand one orientsone-
selfupon knownterritory; tyranny is likea desert.Undercon-
ditionsof tyranny one movesin an unknown,vastand open
space,wherethewillof thetyrantoccasionallybefallsone like
the sandstormovertaking the deserttraveler.Totalitarianism
has no spatialtopology:it is like an iron band, compressing
people increasingly togetheruntiltheyare formedintoone.54
Indeed,ifone readsArendt'sconceptof the publicspace in
thecontextof hertheoryof totalitarianism, thewordacquiresa
ratherdifferent focusthanwhatappearstobe moredominantin
thecontextof TheHumanCondition. I wouldliketouse theterms
"agonistic" versus"discursive" spacetocapturethiscontrast. Ac-
cording to the firstreading, the public realm representsthat
space of appearancein whichmoraland politicalqualitiesare
revealed,displayed,sharedwithothers.This is a competitive
space,in whichone competesforrecognition, precedence,and
acclaim;ultimately it is the space in which one seeksa guarantee
againstthefutility and thepassageofall thingshuman:"Forthe
poliswas for the Greeks,as therespublicawas forthe Romans,
firstof all theirguaranteeagainstthefutility of individuallife,
thespace protected this
against futility and reserved fortherel-
ativepermanence, ifnotimmortality, of mortals."55
By contrast, the discursive view of publicspace suggeststhat
such a space emerges wheneverand wherevermen56act
54
p. 466.
Arendt,Originsof Totalitarianism,
55
Arendt,Human Condition, p. 56.
HannahArendts persistent
denialot the womens issue, and herrefusalto link
theexclusionof womenfrompoliticsand thisagonisticand predominantly
together

194 SOCIAL RESEARCH
togetherin concert. Public space is the space "where freedom

can appear."57It is a space not necessarilyin any topographical
or institutionalsense: a townhall or a citysquare where people
do not "act in concert"is not a public space; likewise,a private
dining room in which people gather to hear a samizdator in
which dissidents meet with foreignerscan become a public
space; a field or a forestcan also become public spaces if they
are the object and the location of an "action in concert."What
constitutesthese diverse topographiesinto public spaces is the
presence of common action coordinated through speech and
persuasion. Violence can occur in privateand in public, but its
language is essentiallyprivate because it is the language of
pain. Force, like violence, can be located in both realms. In a
way, it has no language, and nature remains its quintessential
source. It moves withouthaving to persuade or to hurt.Power,
however,is the only force that emanates from action, and it
comes from the mutual action of a group of human beings:
once in action,one can make thingshappen, thus becoming a
source of "force."
The distinctionbetween the agonisticand discursivepublic
spaces is to some extent an artificialdistinction,for in every
public space something of who one is, one's strengthsand
weaknesses,is revealed; and even a dramaturgicalspace exists
because people care to talk and act together.Nonetheless,this
distinctioncorresponds to the tension between the Greek and
the modern experiences of politics. For the moderns, the
public space is essentiallyporous: the distinctionbetween the
social and the political makes no sense in the modern world,
not because all politicshas become administrationand because
the economy has become the quintessentialpublic in modern
male conceptionof public space, is astounding. The "absence" of women as collective

politicalactorsin Arendt'stheory- individualslike Rosa Luxemburg are present- is a
difficultquestion, but to begin thinking about this means first challenging the
private-publicsplitin her thoughtas thiscorresponds to the traditionalseparation of
spheres between the sexes (men = public life; women = privatesphere).
57
Arendt,BetweenPast and Future,p. 4.

societies,but primarilybecause the struggleto make something

public is a struggle for justice. With the entryof every new
group into the public space of politics after the French and
American revolutions,the scope of the public gets extended.
The emancipation of workersmade propertyrelations into a
politicalissue, the emancipation of women has meant that the
familyand the so-called privatesphere become politicalissues;
the attainment of rights by nonwhite and non-Christian
peoples has meant thatculturalquestions of collectiveself-and
other-representations have become "public" issues. Not only is
it the "lost treasure" of revolutions that eventually all can
partake in them, but equally, when freedom emerges from
action in concert,there can be no agenda to predefine the topic
of public conversation. The very definition of this agenda
entails a struggleforjustice and for freedom.
Perhaps the episode which best illustratesthis blind spot in
Hannah Arendt's thought is that of school desegregation in
LittleRock, Arkansas. Arendt interpretedthe demands of the
black parents, upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court, to have
their children admitted into previously all-white schools, as
being like the desire of the social parvenu to gain recognition
in a societythat did not care to admit him. This time around
Arendt failed to make the "fine distinction"and confused an
issue of publicjustice- equalityof educational access- withan
issue of social preference- who my friends are or whom I
invite to dinner. It is to her credit, however, that after the
interventionof the black novelist Ralph Ellison, she had the
grace to reverse her position.58
There is littlequestion thatArendt's thinkingon thismatter
was clouded less by her polis-inspiredvision of public space
than by her historicalmemoryofJewishemancipationand the
paradoxes it entailed,creatingparvenus,pariahs,or totalsocial
58See H. Arendt,"Reflections
on LittleRock,"Dissent
6 (Winter1959):45-56; Ralph
Ellisonin R.P. Warren,ed., WhoSpeaks
fortheNegro?(NewYork,1965),pp. 342-344;
and Arendtto Ralph Ellisonin a letterof July29, 1965, citedin Young-Breuhl,
Hannah Arendt,p. 316.

196 SOCIAL RESEARCH
conformists. Undoubtedly, though, the tensions between

Arendt, the modernist,the storytellerof revolutions,and the
sad witnessof totalitarianism;Arendt, the brilliantstudent of
Martin Heidegger and Karl Jaspers, the philosopher of the
polis and of itslostglory;Arendt,the German-Jewwho did not
cease defending the Muttersprache and the legacy of Goethe,
Kant, and Schillerto those Anglo-Americanliberalswho saw in
National Socialism the bankruptcyof classical German culture,
these tensions remain. And it is these tensions which inspire
the method of political theory as storytelling,a form of
storytellingwhich, in Arendt's hands, is transformedinto a
redemptivenarrative,redeeming the memoryof the dead, the
defeated and the vanquished by making present to us once
more their failed hopes, their untrodden paths, and unful-
filleddreams.
* This article is a revised and shortened version of the German original, which
appeared as "Hannah Arendtund die erloesende Kraftdes Erzaehlens,"in Dan Diner,
Denken nach Auschwitz(Frankfurt:Fischer Verlag, 1988), pp.
ed., Zivilisationsbruch:
150-175. I would like to thankJerome Kohn for his encouragementand suggestions
in preparingthisversion.


Redemptive Power of Narrative

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Redemptive Power of Narrative

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Hannah Arendt and the Redemptive Power of Narrative

Author(s): SEYLA BENHABIB

This content downloaded from 169.230.243.252 on Fri, 30 Jan 2015 15:33:40 PM

1 he question ofJewishidentity and the fateof theJewish

SOCIAL RESEARCH, Vol. 57, No. 1 (Spring 1990)

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person was safeguarded onlyinsofaras one was a memberof a

Fromthebeginningthe paradoxinvolvedin thedeclarationof

On these matters Arendt was a political modernist who

2 H. Arendt,The (NewYork,1979),p. 291.

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Arendtsees in thisprocesstheoccludingof thepoliticalbythe

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her continuingadulation of Greek spiritualand politicallife,

9 Withthe whichhave taken place in 1989 in Eastern

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(a historyof decline). Rather,it must be

Hannah Arendtdid not engage in methodologicalreflec-

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cantlyto place the present in an inevitableline of continuity

The book,therefore, does not reallydeal withthe "origins"of

forspontaneityis essentialforpoliticallife,forthe buildingof the cityis due to such an

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Indeed, from the standpointof establisheddisciplinary

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the work, which prompted one of Arendt's infrequent

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constantly blurred.This totallyfabricated universereflects the

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and practicehad blamed the Jews for a crime theycommitted

19In Arendt'saccountof modernanti-Semitism, thehistorical-institutional roleof

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play a special role in rendering"autonomy"a historical

Loneliness,the common ground for terror,the essence of

Even if it is possibleto interpret

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questions remain: Why did Arendt resort to such an indirect

21See Manfred Funke, ed., Totalitarisme:Ein Studien-Reader zur Herrschaftsanalyse

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These empirical and historical problems of Arendt's

If thebookdoesseemunbalancedin the space it give to Germany,

I am personallyless sanguinethatthisintelligent defenseof

masssocietyand the abolitionof traditional classes,ratherthanprecedingStalinist

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still, one could capture what was most exemplary about

25Alexis de in America,ed. J. P. Mayer,tr. George Lawrence

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The PoliticsofMemoryand theMoralityofHistoriography

For Hannah Arendt,writingabout totalitarianism, but in

Historicization and Salvation.All "historiography is necessarily

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ends, failuresand ruptures.Not only does thismethod of frag-

Empathy,Imagination,and HistoricalJudgment.Arendt main-

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shared reality from the standpoint of all involved and

30WhenArendtdiscussesNietzsche in TheLifeoftheMind,vol.2, Willing

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standpoint of others.31 According to some commentators,

The PitfallsofAnalogicalThinking.One of Arendt's chief quar-

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happened in the death camps. Subsequently,and largelyas a

TheMoral ResonanceofNarrativeLanguage. Arendt's firstcritics

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have been equivalent to moral complicity."To describe the