Freedom And Action - Hannah Arendt's Theory Of Action

As a political philosopher,Hannah Arendt lived a life emerged with both modern and postmodern ideologies.Her unique historical circumstances have made her thoughts full of modern expressions as well as postmodern concerns.The thoughts that stand in the center of her theories are the responses she made to her age about the notorious events,such as Jews suffering from genocide,the wanton expansion of bourgeoisie,the loss of freedom and public world and so on.All of these triggered her to criticize the western political and philosophical tradition.She pointed out that political philosophy should return the concerns to politics,and only action is the most important human activities to win freedom and create public realm.This thesis,which consists of six chapters,will mainly focus on the two dimensions of freedom and action.The author tries to elaborate that under the circumstance of modern society suffering from modern crisis,how can human beings restore the true value from freedom.Therefore,the author will in the first chapter show the topic's theoretical meaning and its research status at home and abroad,pointing out Arendt's influences and how the scholars responds to her thoughts.Afterwards,the author will analyze and investigate what have led Arendt to adopt her political and philosophical path from the aspects of theoretical factors and subjective reasons.Right behind the second chapter,the author will start with an introduction of “what is freedom”,and then take a study on how Arendt reshape the definition of freedom in her perspective of view and come to the conclusion that her view of freedom is an important and indispensable part of the action theory.As for the forth chapter,the author will proceed form the view of action,together with the explanation of labor and work,and reach a conclusion that why action is the most important activities in vita activity.Then the author will in the fifth chapter combine the relationship between freedom and action to make an overall exposition on Arendt's action theory and point out that these two factors are indispensable.Finally in the sixth chapter,the author will make a comprehensive assessment of Arendt's action theory.Although her theory has suffered many criticisms and doubts from many scholars,we can still get positive inspirations from it.Her theory still influence our modern view of life and is worthy of our reflection.