Hannah Arendt on Violence, Speech,

Hannah Arendt on Violence, Speech, And Power

In her essay, "Communicative Power," Hannah Arendt explores the relationship between power and other institutions, namely violence, from a humanistic and collectivist standpoint, painting a portrait of power in the public realm. By discussing the relationship between power and violence, as well as the importance of words in creating power, Arendt provides a unique explanation for the existence of violence and power in the public realm.

Although Arendt cites several scholars, theorists and philosophers who propose the view that "violence is nothing more than the most flagrant manifestation of power" (59), she suggests this is only the case if one views the government as "an instrument of oppression in the hands of the ruling class" (59). If one does not view governments, or states, as a simple body of rules meant to cage an unwieldy people, than the definitions that yolk violence and power are quite incorrect, Arendt argues. She suggests that power "is an instrument of rule, " arguing that if power were merely a manifestation of violence, the government would be no different than a gun-wilding thief (60). Furthermore, Arendt argues that power "corresponds not just to act but to act in concert," while violence is similar to Arendt's definition of strength -- "an individual entity," which is inherent in a person or an object (64). Violence, Arendt suggests, is individual in nature while power is collective in nature. A person can only be "in power" if it is a group of people who have put him or her there (65). Thus, when a revolutionary coup is attempted, the coup uses power, as a group, but does no use violence, which is an individual characteristic, though this is not to say that a certain individual may not use violence in concert with the group's use of power. Although a tyrant is sometimes in power, Arendt claims in her book, the Human Condition, that the tyrant could not have gotten there without the support of people, his or her army, and that the tyrant's power is still not as effective as if he or she had been elected by a larger segment of the population (27). Thus, power in the public realm is, by definition, a manifestation of the people, and it is the people who have the power to change the government's rule if they so desire.

Although Arendt's definition of the relationship between violence and power offers an explanation into how the cruelest of dictators can remain in power, her book, the Human Condition, Arendt also makes a case for the importance of speech in securing that public power that will allow rule in the public realm. To make this argument, Arendt begins by summarizing Aristotle, who stated that just two facets were "necessary and present in human communities" -- speech and action. Arendt suggests that from these necessary facets arose the "realm of human affairs" (25). Furthermore, Arendt describes the importance of speech in the early Greek democracy, in which words were considered a precursor to and more important than thought (25). In fact, it was speech that made the distinction between those who lived in society and those who did not, as the lowest of the low -- "slaves and barbarians" -- signaled the fact that they were not included in the society by being "deprived, of course, not of the faculty of speech, but of way of life in which speech and only speech made sense and where the central concern of all citizens was to talk to each other" (27).