Review of Hannah Arendt, “On Revolution” (1963)
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What comes to mind when you hear the word “revolution?” Perhaps crowds of people with torches and pitchforks storming the Bastille, as in Paris, 1789? Or a signing of a declaration of independence, as in Philadelphia in 1776? A conspiracy of radical intellectuals, ala Lenin and Trotsky, as in Russia in 1917? Do we think of wide-reaching foundational changes, as in the Industrial Revolution (c. 1800), the Scientific Revolution (c. 1600), the Neolithic Revolution (c. 10,000 B.C.E.)? Or do we take the word in its original, scientific meaning to refer to the revolutions of celestial bodies?
On Revolution (1963) is Hannah Arendt’s conceptual history of revolution. Reflecting the etymology of the term to revolve is the natural meaning of revolution: the ever-present return of a larger cycle. On the other hand is the opposite, historical meaning of revolution as a radical break with existing conditions. Arendt fills in the space between these two conceptions by exploring other conceptual dichotomies such as freedom/emancipation and councils/party, and through a comparative study of the American and French revolutions. Like the men of those revolutions, she uses Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome as points of reference for her discussion.
On Revolution is not a partisan text. It does not tell us what we should think, simply that we should think. After demarcating that conceptual territory with the natural and historical meanings of revolution, Arendt fills in that territory with explorations of related dichotomies, such as freedom/emancipation and councils/party. Other dichotomies explored include public/private (and the synthetic category of the social), and the problem of establishing a new form of governance for the ages vs having a revolution for every generation (that is the problem of representation expressed through time rather than space).
Of special interest to the political Left is Arendt’s discussion of the professional revolutionary, which emerged with the French Revolution. This species of radical intellectual did not cause revolutions but studied them, the better to capture and ride them when they spontaneously burst forth. But in transforming the concept of a radical break into an identifiable and controllable pattern, the professional revolutionary unwittingly (?) transformed historical revolution back into natural revolution. After all, if a revolution is supposed to be a radical break, then how could it follow established, predictable patterns?
The actors in the Russian Revolution believed that the particular pattern of the French Revolution reflected a universal pattern of all revolutions. Just as the French revolutionaries inflicted a terror, so did the Bolsheviks. Just as there was a “Thermidorean” period of reaction, so did Trotsky characterize Stalin as a “Thermidorean,” and charged him with “Bonapartism.” The professional revolutionary’s scientizing of revolution was prelude to Marx’s scientizing of socialism in the 19th century. Socialists usually see these as positive developments. But Arendt’s critique suggests that the scientific turn in socialism may actually be a moment of capture; a moment when the revolutionary way of thinking was scientifically enlightened at the expense of its authentically radical content, and thereby integrated. The moment revolution is assumed to follow a predictable pattern, historical materialism reverts back to the idealism that it never was able to entirely escape. If we pursue this line of thinking, we might ask what it would mean to decolonize socialism?
On the other hand, how can we entirely leave the past behind? Even the revolution which eventually abolishes the State and class society and ushers in a humane world will still have some continuities with the past. If the eternal return/radical break dichotomy of revolution frames the larger discussion, Arendt fills in that framework with several other dichotomies. One is freedom/emancipation. This is one spot where the reference to antiquity becomes relevant.
To the Ancient Greek, the ideal life was that of the hero such as Achilles or Odysseus. Yet few individuals were cut out for such a life, and even those heroes relied on poets such as Homer to remember and tell of their exploits to later generations. In the life of the polis, the Athenian citizen could engage in a simulation of that heroic life. Public speeches, popular legislation, and Athenian democracy were a way for each citizen to leave their mark in the world in the manner of a hero, and to be seen and remembered by their fellow citizens.
Both Arendt and the American founding fathers inherited the same concept of freedom. Freedom is the freedom to engage meaningfully in the public life of the society; it is always the freedom to be political, the freedom to have a say, the freedom to be seen and heard. It is specific, yet also incredibly powerful if taken seriously. It is distinct from emancipation, say, from slavery or poverty. At first glance the freedom/emancipation distinction maps onto the distinction between positive freedoms (freedom to) and negative freedoms (freedom from). But it is a specific positive freedom, to be a political being, not simply a synonym for positive freedoms in general.
An authentically free society, then, would allow all its citizens to participate to the same degree in the political sphere. In a complex society such as ours, arranged in the manner it is, with over 300 million people, that is simply not possible, nor necessarily desirable. The United States would benefit from more direct democracy in certain areas, but I don’t know anyone who wishes to spend all day in committee meetings. From the freedom/emancipation dichotomy we are led to the problem of representation.
The moment revolution is assumed to follow a predictable pattern, historical materialism reverts back to the idealism that it never was able to entirely escape.
Arendt discusses representation in terms of councils/party. The former are the self-constituted political organs of the people which emerge spontaneously at every revolution. The party is an organization of the status quo, run by professional revolutionaries, which exists to “safeguard” the course of revolutions after they break out. If it seems clear that Arendt prefers the council system (as do I), she is far from being uncritical. Like the other dichotomies she draws out, this sketch of the limits of each definition gives a general picture of how the distinction constitutes political discourse.
Parts of On Revolution cry out for a more profound conceptual history of revolution that Arendt does not pursue. For instance, if we assume the historical meaning of revolution, and if we take seriously Marx’s dictum that all history is the history of class struggle, then there has only been one true revolution to date. That is the Neolithic Revolution which established the State and class society with it. It happened over several thousand years, and is characterized by the emergence of complex, sedentary, highly stratified and centralized agricultural societies. Mesopotamia, India, Egypt, China, the Amazon, and the Andes, have all been identified as “cradles of civilization.” Every revolution since then has merely been a re arrangement of the fundamental class and state society.
Yet the Neolithic Revolution is not like the French, American, Haitian, Bolshevik, or other revolutions. In The Origins of the Family, Private Property, and the State (1884) Friedrich Engels argued that the Neolithic Revolution was spurred by the creation of agricultural surpluses, and the State and social hierarchy emerged to facilitate proper distribution of the surplus. Others, such as Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guatarri in A Thousand Plateaus (1980), argue that the existence of agricultural surplus assumes the prior existence of the State which may facilitate the extraction of surplus in the first place. It all seems to emerge, as Deleuze and Guatarri note, in a single stroke. It is not evolutionary, but authentically revolutionary. Yet it also occurred over several thousand years rather than in a few days or weeks, and the people engaged in it had no understanding of the consequences of what they were doing. More recent research has delved further into the Neolithic Revolution, and On Revolution obviously predates A Thousand Plateaus. Although Arendt does not touch on this most fundamental revolution, she does end on a profound note about beginnings.
Arendt notes that what is so intriguing or even magical about revolution is simply that it represents a new beginning in all its drama. For Arendt, the hope of humanity is that there is always a new generation being born to replace the previous generations, and thus society can always remake itself. The real content of a political revolution is not the dramatic overthrow of the status quo but the establishing of a new structure of power. The phenomenon of the beginning is foundational to Arendt’s thought, even more than whatever mysterious “cause” may be lurking behind that beginning. What caused the Neolithic Revolution is less interesting than that the Neolithic Revolution itself happened, that it represented something new. That is not only a feature of this book, as Arendt has also discussed the importance of beginnings in The Human Condition.
That in turn leads to her rose-colored view of the American Revolution and of Thomas Jefferson in particular. In a post-Howard Zinn America Arendt’s attitude to the founding fathers feels overly admiring. She was so enamored with them because she saw in the American Revolution a radical beginning of a new form of governance, a new world order. Yet it was not happening in the remote past, as when Aeneas founded Rome, when God gave Moses the tablets on Sinai, or when Jesus was crucified. It was happening in the here and now, and everyone involved and watching had a sense of the magnitude of what they were witnessing. And it was because of that sense of a radical beginning that the written constitution took on the religious valence to the American people almost immediately, which it retains to this day.
On Revolution is a difficult book. Partially it is difficult to read, as Arendt writes here in long sentences with multiple nested phrases. The editor who decided that passages in foreign languages (which range from Greek to Latin to French) do not need accompanying translation should probably lose their job. But it is also difficult in a good way. It is intelligent, not just intellectual, thoughtful, not just provocative, and the view it gives you in the end is worth the rocky pilgrimage.
