Name: The Origins of Totalitarianism
ISBN: 9780241316757

Hannah Arendt

'How could such a book speak so powerfully to our present moment? The short answer is that we, too, live in dark times' Washington Post Hannah Arendt's chilling analysis of the conditions that led to the Nazi and Soviet totalitarian regimes is a warning from history about the fragility of freedom, exploring how propaganda, scapegoats, terror and political isolation all aided the slide towards total domination. 'A non-fiction bookend to Nineteen Eighty-Four' The New York Times 'The political theorist who wrote about the Nazis and the 'banality of evil' has become a surprise bestseller' Guardian

The Origins of Totalitarianism

Emily McMeans

“In the thirties it became increasingly difficult to distinguish clearly between stateless refugees and normal resident aliens.”

“Totalitarian government always turned classes into masses, supplanted the party system, not by a one party dictatorship but by a mass movement, shifted the center of power from the army to the police, and established a foreign policy Openly directed towards world domination.”

“How could such a book speak so powerfully to our present moment? The short answer is that we, too, live in dark times, even if they are different and perhaps less dark, and “Origins” raises a set of fundamental questions about how tyranny can arise and the dangerous forms of inhumanity to which it can lead.” —Jeffrey C. Isaac, The Washington Post The Origins of Totalitarianism begins with the rise of anti-Semitism in central and western Europe in the 1800s and continues with an examination of European colonial imperialism from 1884 to the outbreak of World War I. Arendt explores the institutions and operations of totalitarian movements, focusing on the two genuine forms of totalitarian government in our time—Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia—which she adroitly recognizes were two sides of the same coin, rather than opposing philosophies of Right and Left. From this vantage point, she discusses the evolution of classes into masses, the role of propaganda in dealing with the nontotalitarian world, the use of terror, and the nature of isolation and loneliness as preconditions for total domination.

Matthew Royal

The two examples of totalitarianism Earth has on record are the only ones from which we can generalize. While I'm wary of the accuracy of a 2-data point trend line, Hannah Arendt has some interesting observations that serve as warning signs for our society today. Rather than fixating on words labeling ideas, such as "socialism" or "nationalist," Arendt analyzes societal trends that seem to incubate totalitarianism: racism, absolutism, single-party political environments. 

Interestingly, totalitarianism doesn't formally replace the previous system in which it metastasized. This book makes me simultaneously realize I need to read more fundamental political theory (Hobbes, Marx) and grow skeptical that any ideologically driven system has all the answers.

Nazi leadership believed: "The more accurately we recognize and observe the laws of nature and life, ... so much the more do we conform to the will of the Almighty. The more insight we have into the will of the Almighty, the greater will be our successes." The idea was adapted by Stalin in support of dialectical materialism, and the regime practiced the theory that the masses ignore the facts before their eyes, and follow only their imaginations, the best of which are the most consistent. So consistency of ideology wins out over facts. This sounds disturbingly familiar to me, living in the USA today, with the perceived tension between evidence-based approaches and "it will all work out if we just double down on this idea."

Finally, totalitarianism was only possible after the people were insulated from non-sympathizers by the complete politicization of every area of live. Things previously not considered "political" became arms of the ruling party. The party explicitly duplicated Civic and Professional groups in order to undermine and replace the originals, then pushed the idea that "Everything outside the movement is dying," and the only way forward is through the party. All of this is easily attained through Facebook and our filter bubbles now. 

While we're still missing a single party system, the US is not far removed from the ideal growth requirements for totalitarianism. It's a reminder to stay vigilant:
 - seek out friends with viewpoints different from my own, and engage thoughtfully with them, 
 - consume information with an active attention to how it can be manipulated and skewed, and 
 - evaluate the actions that seem necessary from my most solidly held ideals in the light of whether they dehumanize others.

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Julius Gehrig

A truly remarkable book. 

This is a book that you need to read in long stretches, that you need to set aside time for. But it will be more than worth your time if you do. 

Hannah Arendt’s writing style is hard to read at first because it stays away from simplification, and goes into detail wherever it can. But that’s exactly what makes her writing so satisfying once you get into it and lose yourself in it. 

Like probably many others currently I picked up this book expecting that it would provide me with some kind of simple insight on how to understand what’s going on in the world right now, and how I should act based on that. But taking the time to read the whole thing, and not skipping to the end for simple answers is exactly what her conclusion is about. 

What I took away from it was that this search for some kind of simple conclusion from which you can explain everything around you through deductive reasoning is what makes ideological thinking based on historical or natural „laws“ so dangerous.

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Tulio

Martha F.

Matt Boegner

Andy Sporring

Ahmed Salem

Noha Abdelaziz

Andrea Ordoñez 

Moray Lyle McIntosh

En Los orígenes del totalitarismo Hannah Arendt desentraña las corrientes subterráneas en la historia europea que prepararon el advenimiento del fenómeno totalitario y caracteriza las instituciones, la ideología y la práctica de los regímenes estalinista y hitleriano. La primera parte —Antisemitismo— está dedicada al ascenso y expansión a lo largo del siglo XIX de una ideología que terminaría por convertirse en catalizador del movimiento nazi, mientras que la segunda —Imperialismo— analiza la génesis y los rasgos del imperialismo europeo desde finales del siglo XIX hasta la Gran Guerra de 1914, y la tercera —Totalitarismo— está dedicada al análisis de los totalitarismos nazi y soviético no como “una exacerbación de los regímenes dictatoriales anteriores”, sino en términos de su “radical novedad histórica”, tal y como explica Salvador Giner en su prólogo a la presente edición en un volumen de este clásico de la filosofía moral política. De Hannah Arendt (1906-1975) Alianza Editorial ha publicado también Sobre la revolución y Sobre la violencia.