Hannah Arendt on Revolution - A Conversation

In conjunction with the 100th anniversary of the Russian Revolution International Symposium, the Hannah Arendt Center, Russian and Eurasian Studies Program, German Studies Program, and Center for Civic Engagement presented a conversation on Hannah Arendt’s On Revolution. The event was moderated by Thomas Wild (Bard / Hannah Arendt Center), with introductions by Oleg Minin.

The Russian Revolution is largely absent from Hannah Arendt’s book-length exploration of modern revolutions. This absence comes from Arendt’s understanding of the Russian Revolution as a social revolution that follows the model of the French Revolution, and thus one that failed to offer anything new to our understanding of revolutions. Arendt’s dismissal of the Russian Revolution and her critique of social revolutions have been controversial, and widely criticized for ignoring the driving force of revolutions to help the poor.

In spite of this, Arendt does return to the question of the Russian Revolution when she writes on councils (soviets). In this, she values the heritage of 1917, only to recognize that councils were soon suppressed by the Bolshevik Party.

In this discussion between two Arendt scholars, Berkowitz and Magun, will ask whether Arendt was right in seeing the Russian Revolution as derivative of the French Revolution, whether her dismissal of social revolutions can be defended, and whether the revolution of her liking is possible in the present historical circumstances.

Archived event can be found here: http://hac.bard.edu/event/index.php?e...