Is Political Friendship Possible?
Hannah Arendt and Care for the World
Hannah Arendt says that friendship is a public phenomenon, not a matter of private interest.
A friend, in her sense, isn’t someone you grab a beer with after work, or even someone you confide in. A friend, in her sense, may or may not be someone you visit in the hospital or congratulate upon an achievement. A friend is an equal with whom one disagrees, and whom one needs, to clarify one’s care for the world. That sounds highfalutin and also strange.
In one way, Arendt extends Aristotle’s definition of the friend as a “second self.” But in another sense, Arendt claims friendship is a category best described by agnostic discourse, genuine debate. Friends must have mutual respect for each other, but can disagree on core issues. This feels very different than the idea of friends as people who basically confirm each other’s biases and cheer each other on. Perhaps Arendt’s view is counter-cultural, exposing many friends to be acquaintances or companions, but not what Jewish tradition calls chevrutas—disputants whose intimacy sometimes leads them to the verge of blows.
Can you think of examples of public friendships? I.e., pairs of conversationalists whose posture is rooted in good faith and dissent? Whose orientation is political, not personal (for Arendt, the two are separate)—and thus, concerned with issues of collective action rather than private interest? Is this a category that resonates?
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