Hannah Arendt one of the most influential scholars who defines Nazism as totalitarianism and describes totalitarianism as a novel form of government and domination (Arendt, 1953 : 303). Arendt explains how totalitarianism operates to transform the society into a total domination as follows, Wherever it rose to power, it developed entirely new political institutions and destroyed all social, legal and political institutions and destroyed all social, legal and political traditions of the country...totalitarian government always transformed classes into masses, supplanted the party system, not by one-party dictatorships, 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 (Arendt, 1953 : 303). Thus, according to Arendt, totalitarianism is “a chaotic, non-utilitarian, manically dynamic movement of destruction” (Canovan, 1999 : 26). In the light of the aforementioned characteristics of totalitarianism defined, Hannah Arendt claims that totalitarianism is incomprehensible since it is not possible to judge or predict its actions through any traditional, legal, moral or common sense (Arendt, 1953 : 303). Therefore, Arendt evaluates the regimes under Hitler and Stalin rule “not only wicked but also senseless, of a kind that could not be deduced from humanly comprehensible motives” (Canovan, 1999 : 25). Arendt aims to offer an intellectual constraints for the analysis of Hitler’s
Do you think the World is an inch away from becoming in totalitarianism? Animal farm, by George Orwell, is a novel about razor-edged fairy tale that was written about a farm taken by its intelligent, mistreated Animals who believe their freedom is taken away in a devastated totalitarian society. It also include how the Animals on the farm are set out to create their own progress of justice and equality from the human beings. There are numerous differences between totalitarian society in the book and in America today, but there is multiply similarities too. A similarities of totalitarian in the book is that totalitarian is represented by Propaganda, which Propaganda is used to spread idea’s everyday.
In the book, Arendt describes how the Nazi establishment manipulated individuals like Eichmann, using propaganda tactics and the suppression of free thought to force them to follow the regime's orders. Arendt argues that Eichmann was trapped in a bureaucratic system in which he followed orders without question, convinced that he was doing the right thing. Furthermore, Arendt also emphasizes the role of conformism in Eichmann's involvement in the Holocaust. Instead of making decisions and thinking critically, Eichmann simply followed orders to fit into the system.
In the wake of the second world war, the consensus amongst historians was that the power of Hitler in the third Reich was that of omnipotent and outright, and his control over such was definitive. This has been reason of debate following the emergence of interpretation through revisionist Historians such as Martin Broszat. Broszat argues that Hitler was a weak and indecisive leader dependent upon the actions of his subordinates through which manipulated him by way of their competing and overlapping power structures. This has found its way to the conclusive ‘structuralist’ vs ‘intentionalist’ debate for which historians such as Karl Dietrich Bracher take acceptance to the fact of competition amongst rival power structures however lays greater
“And if all others accepted the lie which the Party imposed—if all records told the same tale—then the lie passed into history and became truth. ' Who controls the past' ran the Party slogan, 'controls the future: who controls the present controls the past” (Orwell). Throughout history, and particularly since the authoritarian regimes of the twentieth century, historians have struggled to understand the fundamental factors behind dictators’ ascendancy to power. Why did the fascists and communists do what they did, and how did an otherwise freedom-loving populace allow such tyranny to occur? What contributed to the Nazi Party’s majority in the Reichstag after the July 1932 elections?
What Arendt did do was open a massive divide between two versions of a painful past: a monstrosity or a normality. Arendt’s critics wanted Eichmann to be the clearest verdict of evil that history has put on record. Arendt disputed not that he was evil, but rather the nature and consequence of such evil. Arendt casts Eichmann into a theory of evil and a narrative of history which, to many of her counterparts, is not only outrageous but perhaps terrifying.
Throughout history governments have evolved in their laws and ruling tactics. It has also changed the way literature has been portrayed to the readers. This essay is based on Totalitarian government. Totalitarianism is a form of government that whereabouts the fact that the ruler and government is an absolute control over the state. Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin and Benito Mussolini are some of the dictators that had total control over the people and state.
As a conclusion, Arendt define totalitarianism as a combination of total terror and ideology with the potential of destructive power existing within both Nazi Germany and Stalin’s rule in Soviet Russia. Arendt’s argument was criticized massively since it draws similarities between a communist regime and national socialism which have completely different economic base and the structure of the party system (Kershaw, 2004 : 239). Moreover, there are differences between Nazism and Stalinism in terms of the role of the leader (Sauer, 1967 : 419). While fascist regimes are identical with their leaders, Bolshevism is relatively less dependent on the leaders in order to survive and maintain the social and political order. (Sauer, 1967 : 419).
This philosophy dictates that everyone in a society are equal and that all aspects of life are controlled by the state (Waugh, 2001). Unlike his counterpart, Hitler practiced Nazism during his tenure as Nazi Germany’s totalitarian (Waugh, 2001). Nazism asserts that everyone has unconditionally pledged their loyalty to the ‘Führer’ and that the Aryan race was superior to all other races (Waugh, 2001). Such contrasting beliefs would eventually play an integral role in discerning both men. Both tyrants were also segregated by their dissimilar
Who was Johanna “Hannah” Arendt? She was a Jew that escaped Europe during the Holocaust and became a German-born political theorist. Most of what she dealt with involved power and politics. After reading, “The Banality of Evil”, “Eichmann in Jerusalem (1963)”, and watching the documentary, “Civilian at war” we gain a better understanding on Hannah Arendt's theories. Through viewing these pieces of information we can learn what Banality means, why Arendt chooses banality to describe mens actions like Eichmann, and how/why her understanding of this complicate our understanding of the Holocaust and the atrocities of WWII after watching “Civilian at war”.
As Hannah Arendt explain in chapter 9 of The Origin of Totalitarianism, on the idea of where did totalitarian regime all started from, “ Nothing perhaps illustrates the general disintegration of political life better than this vague, pervasive hatred of everybody and everything, without a focus
When studying totalitarian rulers in both history and in books, the strategies they use in order to keep their citizens complacent and in check become apparent. To understand these tactics, it’s crucial to know how a totalitarian government functions. As the name suggests, a leader has total power over the government and manages its people by means of persuasion and influence. These leaders have strong senses of nationalism, wanting to make their countries the best and most powerful. Yet, they do all they can to oppress their constituents so they don’t rebel.
The novel’s use of totalitarian government is relevant in today’s government use of
History is defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary as “a chronological record of significant events; events of the past” (Merriam-Webster). That’s generally what people think of when they hear the word “history”, but not everyone was/is satisfied with that term for the definition. Hannah Arendt, the writer of “The Concept of History”, stated that “These single instances, deeds or events, interrupt the circular movement of daily life… The subject matter of history is these interruptions – the extraordinary” (Arendt). By defining history as such, Arendt gives off the impression that history is for the greats or for those who were lucky enough to go on a life adventure.
The fact that Eichmann states “Where would we end up if everyone would have his own thoughts?” (ardent 1963) is telling in the way in which states are constructed. For Ardent most of the population is not the ‘extraordinary individual” that Schmitt describes leading a population to glory. The question is therefore how a formerly law-abiding member of the middle class deemed psychologically “normal” not driven by any personal vengeance or ideology could be persuaded to run concentration camps and help the mass administrative murder purely by ‘middle class ambition’ this for Arendt is because man doesn’t have the ability to think beyond cliché. Undermining the entire concept of individualism and self determination.
Political theorists such as Hannah Arendt have noted that the members of a totalitarian state “can be reached by neither experience nor argument; identification with the movement and total conformism seem to have destroyed the very capacity for experience.” At this point, you may think that our current western liberal democracy is too strong to fall under the influence of someone like Hitler. But is that the case, and is the process currently underway? Arendt argues that the successes of totalitarian movements hinges dismissal of two illusions commonly believed and are in the hearts of current democratic states.