Hannah Arendt and Isaiah Berlin: Freedom, Politics and Humanity

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For the first time, the full story of the conflict between two of the twentieth centurys most important thinkers and how their profound disagreements continue to offer important lessons for political theory and philosophy

Two of the most iconic thinkers of the twentieth century, Hannah Arendt (19061975) and Isaiah Berlin (19091997) fundamentally disagreed on central issues in politics, history and philosophy. In spite of their overlapping lives and experiences as Jewish migr intellectuals, Berlin disliked Arendt intensely, saying that she represented everything that I detest most, while Arendt met Berlins hostility with indifference and suspicion. Written in a lively style, and filled with drama, tragedy and passion, Hannah Arendt and Isaiah Berlin tells, for the first time, the full story of the fraught relationship between these towering figures, and shows how their profoundly different views continue to offer important lessons for political thought today.

Drawing on a wealth of new archival material, Kei Hiruta traces the ArendtBerlin conflict, from their first meeting in wartime New York through their widening intellectual chasm during the 1950s, the controversy over Arendts 1963 book Eichmann in Jerusalem, their final missed opportunity to engage with each other at a 1967 conference and Berlins continuing animosity toward Arendt after her death. Hiruta blends political philosophy and intellectual history to examine key issues that simultaneously connected and divided Arendt and Berlin, including the nature of totalitarianism, evil and the Holocaust, human agency and moral responsibility, Zionism, American democracy, British imperialism and the Hungarian Revolution. But, most of all, Arendt and Berlin disagreed over a question that goes to the heart of the human condition: what does it mean to be free

Reviews

"One of Bloombergs Best Nonfiction Books of 2021"
"Shortlisted for the Gladstone Book Prize, Royal Historical Society"
"Shortlisted for the ECPR Political Theory Prize, European Consortium for Political Research"
"[A] path-breaking study. . . . The hitherto unexplored relationship between these two giants is fascinating not just for its simmering acrimony but because, as a pair, they are as much alike as they are antipodes."---Norman Lebrecht, Wall Street Journal
"An impeccably researched work, providing lucid explanation of the political thought of both Arendt and Berlin, and successfully brings the arguments of both (and their flaws) into sharp relief."---Caroline Ashcroft, Perspectives on Politics
"The tone of the book is thoughtful and equable; the writing is admirably clear; and Hiruta certainly provides a fair and detailed chronology of the Arendt/Berlin encounters and of Berlins various expressions of hostility."---Jeremy Waldron, Society
"Contextualized, dialogical, and even-handed."---Richard Shorten, The Review of Politics
"Historically careful and theoretically rich."---Shmuel Lederman, German Studies Review

Author Bio

Kei Hiruta is lecturer in philosophy at the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies.