Fit to Enter the World

Hannah Arendt on Politics, Economics, and the Welfare State

Bibliographic Data

ID3327976
AuthorsSteven Klein (0000-0001-7224-9161, University of Chicago, corresponding author)
Year2014
Volume108
Issue4
Pages856-869
Publication date2014-11-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueAmerican Political Science Review (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0003-0554 • E-ISSN: 1537-5943
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s0003055414000409
OpenAlexW2150657470
LanguageEN
Citations received18
References cited38

What is the significance of the welfare state and struggles over social and economic needs for democratic politics? This article turns to Hannah Arendt's thought to articulate new possibilities for relating democratic agency and the welfare state, possibilities neglected by currently dominant deliberative and radical democratic approaches. Against critics who claim that Arendt seeks to purify politics of economic and social problems, I argue that she presents a sophisticated account of the vital importance of economic matters for public life. For Arendt, the danger is not the invasion of politics by economics, but rather the loss of the worldly, mediating institutions that allow economic matters to appear as objects of public concern. Reconstructing her account of these mediating institutions, I show that Arendt's analysis opens up novel insights into the relationship between democratic action and welfare institutions, drawing attention to how such institutions transform material necessity into shared objects of attachment, judgment, and action

Action (physics · Agency (philosophy · Democracy · Economics · Law and economics · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Positive economics · Social science · Sociology · State (computer science · Welfare · Welfare state · Hannah Arendt's Political Philosophy · Law

Tools

Open DOISci-Hub