Hannah Arendt | Quotes, philosophies and timeless wisdom

"There is a strange interdependence between thoughtlessness and evil." Hannah Arendt

"The chief qualification of a mass leader has become unending infallibility; he can never admit an error." Hannah Arendt

"We are free to change the world and start something new in it." Hannah Arendt

"In their moral justification, the argument of the lesser evil has played a prominent role. If you are confronted with two evils, the argument runs, it is your duty to opt for the lesser one, whereas it is irresponsible to refuse to choose altogether. Its weakness has always been that those who choose the lesser evil forget quickly that they chose evil.[....] Acceptance of the lesser evil is deliberately used to accustom officials, as well as the population at large, to accept the evil itself." Hannah Arendt

"The real goal of totalitarian ideology is not the transformation of the external conditions of human existence and not the revolutionary reorganization of the social order, but the transformation of human nature itself, which, as it is, constantly opposes the totalitarian process. … What is at stake in total domination is really the essence of man." Hannah Arendt

"Violence is an expression of impotence." Hannah Arendt

"Although tyranny...may successfully rule over foreign peoples, it can stay in power only if it destroys first of all the national institutions of its own people." Hannah Arendt

"Power corresponds to the human ability not just to act but to act in concert. Power is never the property of an individual; it belongs to a group and remains in existence only so long as the group keeps together. When we say of somebody that he is 'in power' we actually refer to his being empowered by a certain number of people to act in their name. The moment the group, from which the power originated to begin with ... disappears, 'his power' also vanishes." Hannah Arendt

"Storytelling reveals meaning without committing the error of defining it." Hannah Arendt

"To think and to be fully alive are the same." Hannah Arendt

"When evil is allowed to compete with good, evil has an emotional populist appeal that wins out unless good men and women stand as a vanguard against abuse." Hannah Arendt

"This inability to think created the possibility for many ordinary men to commit evil deeds on a gigantic scale, the like of which had never been seen before. The manifestation of the wind of thought is not knowledge but the ability to tell right from wrong, beautiful from ugly. And I hope that thinking gives people the strength to prevent catastrophes in these rare moments when the chips are down." Hannah Arendt

"The trouble with Eichmann was precisely that so many were like him, and that the many were neither perverted nor sadistic, that they were, and still are, terribly and terrifyingly normal. From the viewpoint of our legal institutions and of our moral standards of judgment, this normality was much more terrifying than all the atrocities put together." Hannah Arendt

"Politically speaking, tribal nationalism [patriotism] always insists that its own people are surrounded by 'a world of enemies' - 'one against all' - and that a fundamental difference exists between this people and all others. It claims its people to be unique, individual, incompatible with all others, and denies theoretically the very possibility of a common mankind long before it is used to destroy the humanity of man." Hannah Arendt