At a moment when many suggest that the end of an era has been reached, and when struggles against climate change, exploitation, neocolonialism, patriarchy, and racism proliferate, what role can Arendt’s account of political beginnings play in the conceptualization of a new time? Arendt has been celebrated as a key theorist of politics, freedom, and judgement. Yet she has also been questioned when it comes to her understanding of the social question, the public-private divide, or the persistence of structures of systemic injustice. Is her work then still timely for understanding how to begin anew?
This conference will test the wide influence and perseverance, the attraction but also the criticism, of Arendt’s thought by recentering her approach to political beginnings. Arendt’s attempts to understand political beginnings animate her work. From her doctoral dissertation on Augustine to her posthumous book, The Life of the Mind, beginnings are omnipresent in her oeuvre. Conceiving Arendt’s attempts as an open legacy, digging up the plurality and worldliness, the tragic and agonistic character of beginnings, the conference aims to investigate how and why political beginnings are set off ‘not by the strength of one architect but by the combined power of the many’.
In English
14:00 Welcome and Introduction by Facundo Vega
14:00 Panel I
Samuel Moyn:
Hannah Arendt among the Cold War Liberals
Rahel Jaeggi:
Arendt on Revolution
Eva Geulen:
Revolution between Beginning and Founding
moderated by Robin Celikates
15:45 Coffee break
16:00 Panel II
Fina Birulés:
The World at Stake. Hannah Arendt
Thomas Meyer:
A New Beginning? Experiences with Hannah Arendt
Anne Eusterschulte:
The Politics of ‘Willing’: Hannah Arendt’s Critique of Fatalism
moderated by Ross Shields
16:30 Panel III
Thomas Khurana:
The First Right. Arendt on the Naturalization and Politicization of Subjective Rights
Diego Rossello:
From Animal Labor to Animal Citizenship in Arendt and Critical Animal Studies
moderated by Anne Eusterschulte
18:00 Coffee break
18:30 Panel IV
Bonnie Honig:
‘Constant Mutual Release?’ Toward an Arendtian Politics of Forgiveness
Rodolphe Gasché:
The Vulgate of Philosophy, and its Prospects
Adriana Cavarero:
Hannah Arendt: Interacting Pluralities and Political Emotions
moderated by Barbara Hahn
With
Fina Birulés
Adriana Cavarero
Anne Eusterschulte
Rodolphe Gasché
Eva Geulen
Bonnie Honig
Rahel Jaeggi
Thomas Khurana
Thomas Meyer
Samuel Moyn
Diego Rossello
Organized by
Facundo Vega
An ICI event in cooperation with the Center for Post-Kantian Philosophy (University of Potsdam)

The audience is presumed to consent to a possible recording on the part of the ICI Berlin.
If you would like to attend the event yet might require assistance, please contact Event Management.