THESIS
2018
Abstract
In the theory of Hannah Arendt, the Greek city-state, the Roman Republic and Empire,
and the Medieval Church are all paradigmatic political experiences for embracing a
remarkable range of members and the substantiating decent orders. The notion of political
experience, which primarily is a historical narrative of the well-ordered public sphere,
also implicates the effort of the community member to for maintenance. On the basis of
three political experiences above, Arendt criticizes the political turbulence and
catastrophic changes in the modern times. On the other hand, the tension between
philosophy and politics centers her reflection on the political experience as philosophy
potentially isolates individual agents from the political community. She holds that Plato
initiated th...[
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In the theory of Hannah Arendt, the Greek city-state, the Roman Republic and Empire,
and the Medieval Church are all paradigmatic political experiences for embracing a
remarkable range of members and the substantiating decent orders. The notion of political
experience, which primarily is a historical narrative of the well-ordered public sphere,
also implicates the effort of the community member to for maintenance. On the basis of
three political experiences above, Arendt criticizes the political turbulence and
catastrophic changes in the modern times. On the other hand, the tension between
philosophy and politics centers her reflection on the political experience as philosophy
potentially isolates individual agents from the political community. She holds that Plato
initiated this tension by demonizing the political affairs and claiming the individual
citizens could fulfill the spiritual ideal merely through personal philosophizing instead of
public participation.
This thesis construes the Arendtian political experience and the public sphere in
temporality and spatiality and with the context of phenomenological tradition and argues
that in considering some lethal flaws of overemphasizing the political participation,
Arendt in her late years resorts to philosophy for the mental bases that facilitate the
political actions. The spatiality of public sphere can be interpreted as the interpersonal
relationships in the dialogues over public issues. Similar inspiration comes from Edmund
Husserl’s intersubjectivity and Martin Heidegger’s Being-with (Mitsein), but the risk is
being fallen in the public opinions. Therefore, Arendt introduces the mental faculty of
judgment to distinguish the personal and public views. Arendt is also aware of history and
time that are likely to override the human subjectivity in historical narrative and thus
introduces the thinking and willing to substantiate the freewill as facilitating the political
actions beyond temporality. In this sense, Arendt finally achieves a compromise between
philosophy and politics.
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