Hannah Arendt and Leo Strauss: German Émigrés and American Political Thought after World War II

by Edited by Peter Graf Kielmansegg , Horst Mewes , Elisabeth Glaser-Schmidt

• ISBN13: 9780521599368
• ISBN10: 0521599369
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1997-06-13
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Summary

This volume on Hannah Arendt's and Leo Strauss' impact on American political science after 1933 contains essays presented at an international conference held at the University of Colorado at Boulder in 1991. The book explores the influence that Arendt's and Strauss' experiences of inter-war Germany had on their perception of democracy and their judgment of American liberal democracy. Although they represented different political attitudes, both thinkers interpreted the modern American political system as a response to totalitarianism. The contributors analyse how their èmigrè experience both influenced their American work and also had an impact on the formation of the discipline of political science in postwar Germany. Arendt's and Strauss' experiences thus aptly illustrate the transfer and transformation of political ideas in the World War II era.

Table of Contents

Introduction Peter Graf Kielmansegg

Part I. Hanah Arendt: 1. Hannah Arendt and the theory of democracy: a critical reconstruction Helmut Dubiel

2. The questionable influence of Arendt (and Strauss) George Kateb

3. Hannah Arendt: a German-American Jew views the United States and looks back to Germany Ernst Vollrath

Part II. Leo Strauss: 4. Reflections on Leo Strauss and American education Timothy Fuller

5. Leo Strauss: the quest for truth in times of perplexity Jü

rgen Gebhardt

6. Leo Strauss and Martin Heidegger: Greek antiquity and the meaning of modernity Horst Mewes

7. Leo Strauss: German origin and American impact Alfons Sö

llner

8. The Modern World of Leo Strauss Robert P. Pippin

Part III. Roundtable Discussion: Bibliography

Contributors

Index.