In The Human Condition, Arendt borrows a phrase that she takes from Herodotus called isonomia, which is the principle of equal liberty. And she says you need to have a political community which is capable of responding to isonomia, or this principle of equal liberty. And it’s — basically, the principle of equal liberty says, “Well, how come I’ve got total freedom of movement and you haven’t? How come my child gets a really good education and yours doesn’t? How come my mom can grow vegetables in her garden, and your mother’s garden’s just been blown to bits? That’s not good enough.”And she says we need to have — there needs to be enough in the way we think about political democratic life to allow citizens and people to act on the principle of equal liberty. And on the one hand, the situation we have now is a kind of phobic repudiation of vulnerability, everyone’s vulnerability, which is very, very bad.
- LYNDSEY STONEBRIDGE here