Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gvvz8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-24T19:06:09.502Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

“The Slow Boring of Hard Boards”: Methodical Thinking and the Work of Politics

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 September 2013

Mary G. Dietz
Affiliation:
University of Minnesota

Abstract

From the perspective of quite different theoretical traditions, Simone Weil and Hannah Arendt present nearly identical and equally powerful critiques of technological determinism in modernity. Yet unlike Arendt, Weil develops a concept of work that draws a distinction between technology and instrumental action as “methodical thinking.” As a result, Weil's theory of action embraces something that Arendt's theatrical politics rejects—a concept of liberatory instrumentality, or purposeful performance. I shall reassess some of the inadequacies of Arendt's concept of work and develop Simone Weil's concept of methodical thinking in order to argue for a more neighborly affinity between work:interaction and purposeful:theatrical performance than Arendtian public realm theory, for all its power, currently allows. If such an affinity is possible, then public realm theory might be more adequately equipped to deliver on what I take to be its promise as an emancipatory project in late modernity.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1994

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Agger, Ben. 1979. “Work and Authority in Marcuse and Habermas.” Human Studies 2:191208.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Arendt, Hannah. 1953. “The Ex-communists.” Commonweal 57:595–99.Google Scholar
Arendt, Hannah. 1958a. The Human Condition. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Arendt, Hannah. 1958b. “Totalitarian Imperialism: Reflections on the Hungarian Revolution.” Journal of Politics 20:543.Google Scholar
Arendt, Hannah. 1963. Eichmann in Jerusalem. New York: Penguin.Google Scholar
Arendt, Hannah. 1969. Between Past and Future. New York: Viking.Google Scholar
Arendt, Hannah. 1970. On Revolution. New York: Viking.Google Scholar
Bakan, Mildred. 1979. “Hannah Arendt's Concepts of Labor and Work.” In Hannah Arendt: Recovery of the Public World, ed. Hill, Melvyn A.. New York: St. Martin's.Google Scholar
Benhabib, Seyla. 1992. “Models of Public Space: Hannah Arendt, the Liberal Tradition, and Jürgen Habermas.” In Habermas and the Public Sphere, ed. Calhoun, Craig. Cambridge: Massachusetts Institute of Technology Press.Google Scholar
Bernstein, Richard. 1983. Beyond Objectivism and Relativism: Science, Hermeneutics, and Praxis. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.Google Scholar
Biskowski, Lawrence J. 1993. “Practical Foundations for Political Judgment: Arendt on Action and World.” Journal of Politics 55:867–87.Google Scholar
Blum, Lawrence, and Seidler, Victor. 1989. A Truer Liberty: Simone Weil and Marxism. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.Google Scholar
Dietz, Mary G. 1989. Between the Human and the Divine: The Political Thought of Simone Weil. Totowa, NJ: Rowman & Littlefield.Google Scholar
Elster, Jon. 1983. Sour Grapes: Studies in the Subversion of Rationality. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Entrèves, Maurizio Passerin d' 1989a. “Agency, Identity, and Culture: Hannah Arendt's Conception of Citizenship.” Praxis International 9:124.Google Scholar
Entrèves, Maurizio Passerin d' 1989b. “Freedom, Plurality, Solidarity: Hannah Arendt's Theory of Action.” Philosophy and Social Criticism 15:319–50.Google Scholar
Eyerman, Ron, and Shipway, David. 1981. “Habermas on Work and Culture.” Theory and Society 10:547–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Finley, Moses I. 1983. Politics in the Ancient World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Finnegan, William. 1992a. “The Sporting Scene: Surfing.” Pt. 1. New Yorker, 24 August, pp. 3459.Google Scholar
Finnegan, William. 1992b. “The Sporting Scene: Surfing.” Pt. 2. New Yorker, 31 August, pp. 3958.Google Scholar
Giddens, Anthony. 1982. “Labour and Interaction.” In Habermas: Critical Debates, ed. Thompson, John B. and Held, David. Cambridge, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Press.Google Scholar
Habermas, Jürgen. 1973. Theory and Practice. Trans. Viertel, John. Boston: Beacon.Google Scholar
Habermas, Jürgen. 1977. “Hannah Arendt's Communications Concept of Power.” Social Research 44:324.Google Scholar
Havel, Václev. 1985. “The Power of the Powerless.” In The Power of the Powerless, ed. Keane, John. Armonk, NY: Sharpe.Google Scholar
Havel, Václev. 1990. Disturbing the Peace. Trans. Wilson, Paul. New York: Knopf.Google Scholar
Hinchman, Sandra K. 1984. “Common Sense and Political Barbarism in the Theory of Hannah Arendt.” Polity 17:317–39.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Honneth, Axel. 1982. “Work and Instrumental Action.” New German Critique 26:3154.Google Scholar
Honig, Bonnie. 1992. “Toward an Agonistic Feminism: Arendt and the Politics of Identity.” In Feminists Theorize the Political, ed. Butler, Judith and Scott, Joan W.. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Ignatieff, Michael. 1990. “The Limits of Sainthood.” New Republic 202, June 18, 4046.Google Scholar
Issac, Jeffrey C. 1989. “Arendt, Camus, and Postmodern Politics.” Praxis International 9:4871.Google Scholar
Jay, Martin. 1978. “Hannah Arendt: Opposing Views.” Partisan Review 45:348–67.Google Scholar
Kateb, George. 1984. Hannah Arendt: Politics, Conscience, Evil. Totowa, NJ: Rowman & Littlefield.Google Scholar
Keane, John. 1975. “On Tools and Language: Habermas on Work and Interaction.” New German Critique 6:82100.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Knauer, James. 1980. “Motive and Goal in Hannah Arendt's Concept of Political Action.” American Political Science Review 74:721–23.Google Scholar
Knauer, James. 1985. “Rethinking Arendt's Vita Activa: Toward a Theory of Democratic Praxis.” Praxis International 5:185–94.Google Scholar
Lessing, Doris. 1992. “The Humanities and Culture Heroes.” In Partisan Review 4:722–51.Google Scholar
McCarthy, Thomas. 1981. The Critical Theory of Jürgen Habermas. Cambridge: Massachusetts Institute of Technology Press.Google Scholar
McLellan, David. 1990. Utopian Pessimist: The Life and Thought of Simone Weil. New York: Poseidon.Google Scholar
Michnik, Adam, and Habermas, Jürgen. 1994. “More Humanity, Fewer Illusions'—a Talk Between Adam Michnik and Jürgen Habermas.” New York Review of Books 41:2429.Google Scholar
Nevin, Thomas R. 1991. Simone Weil: Portrait of a Self-Exiled Jew. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.Google Scholar
Nietzsche, Friedrich. 1968. “Twilight of the Idols” and “The Anti-Christ.” Trans. Hollingdale, R. J.. New York: Penguin Books.Google Scholar
Nussbaum, Martha. 1986. The Fragility of Goodness: Luck and Ethics in Greek Tragedy and Philosophy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Oakeshott, Michael. 1962. Rationalism in Politics. New York: Methuen.Google Scholar
Parekh, Biku. 1979. “Hannah Arendt's Critique of Marx.” In Hannah Arendt: The Recovery of the Public World, ed. Hill, Melvyn A.. New York: St. Martins.Google Scholar
Pitkin, Hanna Fenichel. 1974. “Michael Oakeshott and the Roots of Conservatism.” In The New Conservatives: A Critique from the Left, ed. Coser, Lewis A. and Howe, Irving. New York: Quadrangle and New York Times.Google Scholar
Rasmussen, David M. 1990. Reading Habermas. Cambridge, MA: Basil Blackwell.Google Scholar
Schwartz, Joseph M. 1989. “;Arendt's Politics: The Elusive Search for Substance.” Praxis International 9:2547.Google Scholar
Udovicki, Jasminka. 1983. “The Uses of Freedom and the Human Condition.” Praxis International 3:5461.Google Scholar
Villa, Dana. 1992. “Postmodernism and the Public Sphere.” American Political Science Review 86:712–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weber, Max. 1946. From Max Weber, ed. Gerth, Hans H. and Wright Mills, T.. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Weber, Max. 1958. The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. Trans. Talcott Parsons. New York: Charles Scribners & Sons.Google Scholar
Weil, Simone. 1952a. The Need for Roots. Trans. Wills, Arthur. Boston: Beacon.Google Scholar
Weil, Simone. 1952b. The Notebooks of Simone Weil. 2 Vols. Trans. Wills, Arthur. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.Google Scholar
Weil, Simone. 1968. On Science, Necessity, and the Love of God. Trans. Rees, Richard. London: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Weil, Simone. 1973. Oppression and Liberty. Trans. Wills, Arthur and Petrie, John. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press.Google Scholar
Weil, Simone. 1977. “Factory Work.” In The Simone Weil Reader, ed. Panichas, George. New York: McKay.Google Scholar
White, Stephen K. 1988. The Recent Work of Jürgen Habermas: Reason, Justice, and Modernity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Wiggins, David. 1978. “Deliberation and Practical Reason.” In Practical Reasoning, ed. Raz, Joseph. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Winch, Peter. 1989. Simone Weil: “The Just Balance.” Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Winfield, Richard. 1975. “The Dilemma of Labor.” Telos 24:115–28.Google Scholar
Wolin, Sheldon. 1960. Politics and Vision: Continuity and Innovation in Western Political Thought. Boston: Little, Brown.Google Scholar
Wolin, Sheldon. 1972. “Political Theory as a Vocation.” In Machiavelli and the Nature of Political Thought, ed. Fleisher, Martin. New York: Atheneum.Google Scholar
Submit a response

Comments

No Comments have been published for this article.