William Peter Baehr

Hannah Arendt, Totalitarianism and the social sciences

This book examines the nature of totalitarianism as interpreted by some of the finest minds of the twentieth century. It focuses on Hannah Arendts claim that totalitarianism was an entirely unprecedented regime and that the social sciences had integrally misconstrued it. A sociologist who is a critical admirer of Arendt, Baehr looks sympathetically at Arendts objections to social science and shows that her complaints were in many respects justified. Avoiding broad disciplinary endorsements or dismissals, Baehr reconstructs the theoretical and political stakes of Arendts encounters with prominent social scientists such as David Riesman, Raymond Aron, and Jules Monnerot. In presenting the first systematic appraisal of Arendts critique of the social sciences, Baehr examines what it means to see an event as unprecedented. Furthermore, he adapts Arendt and Arons philosophies to shed light on modern Islamist terrorism and to ask whether it should be categorized alongside Stalinism and National Socialism as totalitarian.

The informers: Hannah Arendt's appraisal of Whittaker Chambers and the ex-Communists

By the time that Hannah Arendts The Origins of Totalitarianism was published in 1951, one totalitarian regime lay in ruins while another – Soviet Communism – stood newly reenergized. Stalins prestige, burnished by victory, had never been greater. The cold war was re-dividing the world. And, in the United States, the fear of Communism was a pervasive feature of the political landscape. The revelation that the State Department and other government ministries, in the 1930s and beyond, had been penetrated by American Communists, prompted public outrage against the miscreants. It aroused corresponding curiosity about those who had once embraced the Marxist creed but who now publicly renounced it. One such person was Whittaker Chambers (1901–1961) – Communist spy, Communist defector, and key witness in the perjury trial of Alger Hiss. Into this imbroglio stepped Hannah Arendt. She was by turns suspicious and dismissive. Who were the ex-Communists? Why had they broken with Communism? How thorough or deep-roote...

Fascism, ethnic cleansing, and the ‘new militarism’ : assessing the recent historical sociology of Michael Mann

Abstract For over 30 years, Michael Mann has been engaged in a project of impressive span and erudition: a historical sociology of power from ancient civilizations to the modern era. This essay examines Manns recent contributions to this enterprise, namely, two major books on fascism and ethnic cleansing, and a third text devoted to the putative ‘militarist’ security policy of the United States. The reviews argument is that, for all Manns learning, his historical sociology of fascism is over‐generalized and his concept of democracy (key to his discussion of ethnic cleansing) is too vague. Manns polemic against the current Bush administration is also found wanting, principally for its moral evasions. The essay concludes with a reminder of the hard choices that responsible politicians, as distinct from academics free of political responsibility, are compelled to make.