We continue our reading of Hannah Arendt’s essay “Civil Disobedience” from Crises of the Republic. Host Roger Berkowitz frames it through Mary McCarthy’s critique that civil disobedience is fundamentally conscientious, citing Socrates, Thoreau, and Gandhi. Berkowitz explains Arendt’s radical distinction between conscience (singular, inner dialogue) and politics (plural, public), arguing that grounding politics in morality risks tyranny and civil war, and that justice for Arendt is primarily the preservation of liberty for minorities against majorities. He outlines Arendt’s claim that the American “spirit of the laws” is consent understood horizontally as mutual promise, from which collective dissent follows, making civil disobedience coherent with American constitutionalism and a safeguard amid accelerating change. Arendt critiques ideological movements, links consent to voluntary association, and proposes civil disobedience as an institutional check when courts abdicate via the political questions doctrine, even calling for a constitutional amendment. "Consent implies dissent and not individual dissent, but collective dissent."
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ABOUT:
Produced by the Hannah Arendt Center at Bard College, this podcast offers close readings of Arendt's books alongside engaging interviews and thought-provoking conversations. Released weekly, each episode provides listeners with a deeper understanding of Arendt's philosophy and its relevance to contemporary issues. Available on all major podcast platforms, listeners join us on a captivating intellectual journey through the mind of Hannah Arendt.
New episodes every Friday morning! Join Roger Berkowitz, Founder and Academic Director of the Hannah Arendt Center for Politics and Humanities at Bard College, as he discusses the works of German Jewish political theorist Hannah Arendt (1906-1975).
THE HANNAH ARENDT CENTER:
The Hannah Arendt Center provides an intellectual space for passionate, uncensored, and nonpartisan thinking that reframes and deepens the fundamental questions facing our nation and our world. Become a member and enjoy several benefits including live access to our Virtual Reading Group that takes place most Fridays, and upon which this podcast is based: https://hac.bard.edu/membership/
More information can be found on our website: https://hac.bard.edu/ Follow us on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/hannaharendt/ and Instagram https://www.instagram.com/hannaharendtcenteratbard/
THE HOST:
Roger Berkowitz is the Founder and Academic Director of the Hannah Arendt Center at Bard College. He is the editor of On Civil Disobedience: Henry David Thoreau and Hannah Arendt (2024), The Perils of Invention: Lying, Technology, and the Human Condition, and co-editor of Thinking in Dark Times: Hannah Arendt on Ethics and Politics (2009), and Artifacts of Thinking: Reading Hannah Arendt’s Denktagebuch (2017). Berkowitz edits the HA: Yearbook and the weekly newsletter Amor Mundi. He is the winner of the 2019 Hannah Arendt Prize for Political Thought given by the Heinrich Böll Foundation in Germany.
EDITED BY:
Alex Fox Tschan is the editor & co-producer of the “Reading Hannah Arendt with Roger Berkowitz” podcast. He is a working musician, creative producer, & audio/visual editor at his Brooklyn-based studio, The Fox & The Sound. With 25 years of recording & performance experience, Tschan’s recent projects range from indie-pop albums to audiobooks for McNally Jackson. A full spread of his work & collaborations can be found at pastelhell.com.
1 hr and 54 mins