Political Responsibility: Reflections based on Hannah Arendt and Eric Weil

Abstract

This article discusses political responsibility based on the works of Hannah Arendt and Eric Weil. For this purpose, it initially addresses the “German question”, highlighting a markedly “anti-political” scenario as a fruitful field to reflect on responsibility as a political phenomenon. Then, it exposes the Weilian critique of the traditional split between morals and politics and, starting from a similar terrain, Arendtian analysis of the political implications of thought. Finally, we take political responsibility as an object of investigation by the two authors, either from the blurring of the distinction between guilt and responsibility in Arendt or the focus on the political subject in Weil. From what follows, it is possible to conclude by pointing to the importance of educating people for the exercise of democracy, conceived in two fundamental senses, namely, as a form of government and as a mode of social organization.

Keywords: political responsibility, politics, moral, Hannah Arendt. Eric Weil