A German Jewish philosopher who fled the Nazis and took refuge in the United States, where she became one of the great political thinkers of the twentieth century. She studied totalitarianism, freedom, and human action. Following the trial of Adolf Eichmann, she showed that enormous crimes can be committed by ordinary people who simply stop thinking.
Core ideas
Evil can be banal: it comes from unthinking obedience, not only from monsters
Politics is acting and speaking together with others in a free public space
Totalitarian regimes destroy plurality and isolate people through terror
The tradition: Political philosophy
Political philosophy thinks about power, freedom, and life in common. Arendt avoided labels, but she made collective action and public space the center of her reflection on what makes us human.
