Why read Arendt today?

PalmArendt is in vogue. Her thought continues to be studied and updated to understand the present, despite her being a thinker of the last century. This is an undeniable fact, given the number of books and studies dedicated to Arendt. From the outset, interest in Arendt is conditioned and mediated by the dynamism of publishers and the business decision to make her works available to readers through reissues and new editions. The publishing drive to promote Arendt's universe stems from the conviction that it is a profitable and secure investment, a market opportunity that cannot be missed. The publishing strategy takes as its starting point certain significant dates in Arendt's biography. Specifically, publishers are timing a significant portion of their publications to coincide with the commemoration in 2025 of the fiftieth anniversary of her death and the celebration in 2026 of the one hundred and twentieth anniversary of her birth. Publishers contribute to creating a trend and awakening public interest in Arendt, drawing on the notable increase in academic studies and works. In any case, the element that ultimately explains Arendt's enduring relevance and the unstoppable increase in publications lies in the themes she addresses, especially those linked to ethics and politics, such as militarism, violence, the hegemony of the far right, radical and banal evil, and interpretive approaches. A significant portion of the studies has focused on her political thought and, more specifically, on the study of politics as action, a space and sphere of freedom, and republican citizenship. Another set of studies has offered a radical interpretation of democracy, highlighting the agonistic dimension of politics, based on conflict and plurality. Phenomenology has been interested in studying the influence of Heidegger and Jaspers on Arendt and has explored the concept of natality and the more experiential dimension of her thought. For their part, proponents of cosmopolitanism in the Kantian tradition have seen in Arendt a cornerstone for understanding human rights within the context of the human condition of stateless persons and refugees, as well as an opportunity to assert the right to rights for these groups without state legal protection.

Totalitarianism

The contemporary political context, marked by the rise of the far right worldwide, invites us to read the political thinker who has most thoroughly analyzed and understood the origins and characteristics of totalitarianism and who has provided a conceptual toolbox for continuing to reflect on this phenomenon and its mutation in the 21st century. In any case, her analyses have continued through studies on neo-totalitarianism, linked to new technological forms of domination, control, and surveillance, the destruction of truth, and the atomization of citizenship. Totalitarianism and its variants are also revisited from critical theory with the broadening of the notion of total control. In turn, reading Arendt allows us to understand the origins of the crisis of liberal democracy. Her diagnosis has continued with critical studies that focus on the defense of the public sphere, on political action as a creative practice, on the vindication of pluralism and dialogue, on the denunciation of the impoverishment and degeneration of a democracy centered on consensus and management, and on the social wounds opened by unconventional neo-establishment. On the other hand, approaches to Arendtian ethics have also been very productive, fostering the development of an ethics based on individual responsibility and the obligation to think and judge for oneself, within a shared social and political context that preserves plurality and freedom of thought and action.

The shocking news about the organized human hunts in the Bosnian War once again validates Arendtian's interpretation of the origin of human evil as the suspension of moral judgment. The war in Ukraine has revived the specter of total war on a global scale, and along with European questioning of NATO and the effectiveness of this defense system subordinated to the United States, it fuels the fear of widespread armed conflict and provokes a resurgence of the militaristic spirit of states, which is evident in the patriotic climate favorable to the reinstatement of military service. A clear example of this warmongering is the measure announced by the French government to implement paid voluntary military service for 18- and 19-year-olds starting in 2026.

Arendt's tense relationship with Zionism resonates in the present and invites reflection on the concept of Israel and the religious, national, cultural, and ethnic identity of the Jewish people within a context of ongoing conflict. Furthermore, the genocide in Gaza puts the state of Israel in the spotlight and brings to mind the problems Arendt foresaw regarding the creation of an Israeli state in Palestinian territory. At the time, in the midst of World War II, Arendt advocated for the creation of a Jewish army as a response to the persecution and extermination initiated by the Nazi regime, which, paradoxically, in the name of survival and security, has carried out its own genocide against the Palestinian population of Gaza, while simultaneously contributing to the sowing of the Arab-Israeli conflict.

Refugees and stateless persons

It is increasingly necessary to consider Arendt's reflections on refugees and stateless persons, and to update their connections with the migration crises caused by the climate emergency, capitalism, and armed conflicts. Arendt's relational anthropological conception naturally leads to the recognition of fragility and interdependence, and to the appreciation of feminized care work.

Arendt's thinking on plurality and identity connects with contemporary debates and with the ideological struggle against xenophobic and racist tendencies that articulate discourses favoring the imposition of ethnic and cultural homogeneity. Arendt's thought, which revolves around the category of plurality, has also inspired the development of difference feminism, post-identity feminism, which, like Arendt, values fluid and evolving identities, and the active presence of women in the public sphere. The feminist appropriation of Arendt's work doesn't correspond to any commitment on the part of the thinker, since she never declared herself a feminist, nor did she contribute much to the development of this movement, given that she always maintained she hadn't experienced any discrimination for being a woman. In Catalonia, there are endogenous factors that further accentuate the interest in Arendt. Thus, her thinking on civil disobedience, power, and its legal limits connects with the experience of the failed process toward independence. Arendt's reflections on citizenship and the occupation of public space provide a solid basis for criticizing gentrification and the tourist overcrowding of Barcelona. Finally, I like to think that behind the academic revival of Arendt in Catalonia there is also a desire to elevate culture and increase the publishing catalog with essential texts for understanding the 20th and 21st centuries.