Apology to Hannah Arendt's The Human Condition 60 years after its first edition

Abstract

We analyze the actuality of Hannah Arendt's The human condition having as reference the incomprehension that it provoked. We aim to present the work in relation to the other writings of Arendt highlighting the relevance of aligning the concepts of The human condition with these, starting from her critique of the tradition of political thought. The main question is: what does Arendt want? Other questions arise from this, such as background, motivations, purposes, theme, and method. The research is bibliographical and uses reading, analysis, comprehension and the theoretical reconstruction of the works of Arendt and her commentators as procedures. We point at the relevance of Arendt's critique of the modern world and the alienation of the men and women who comprise it. The urgency of life's needs has defeated politics and the advent of social policy led to the decline of the public domain. Such problems still remain and become worse, and therefore Arendt's work persists. Hence, it's possible to ascertain the actuality of Arendt's work 60 years after her reflection on what we are doing in the world.