To commemorate the 50th anniversary of Hannah Arendt’s death, this conference aims to explore a largely overlooked theme in Arendtian political thought: the proposal of a federal council system. Her vision is primarily examined in On Revolution, where Arendt’s famous comparison between the American and French Revolutions culminates in a celebration of the rare historical appearance of such system, reflecting her “romantic sympathy” for it, while also making clear the e ort she makes to envision new local, participatory, and radically democratic institutions.

By highlighting a political constellation of events ranging from the Athenian city-state and medieval municipalities to the Roman Republic, Thomas Jefferson’s townships, the Paris Commune of 1871, Rosa Luxemburg’s council communist tradition, the establishment of Jewish kibbutzim in the early 1930s and 1940s, concluding with the Hungarian Revolution in 1956, the reason why Arendt presents these historical examples to such an extent can be traced to the desire to advocate for a possible rehabilitation of a participatory, and radically active democracy which would correspond with democracy’s nature herself.

While Arendt critiques modern representative politics, which are based on the party system and the principle of sovereignty, the council system works as a counter-argument that envisions a democratic body politic grounded on political equality, plurality, and more importantly, on the civic engagement and shared deliberation of the people in the public sphere. In this context, the proposal of the council system not only puts the entire conceptual framework of Arendt’s political thought into a different perspective—such as her notions of foundation, constitution, institution, revolution, the promise of politics and freedom, and her distinction between the political and the socio-economic realms—but also raises the question of whether this council tradition still operates as an alternative to our current neoliberal scenario.

The event will take place at “Polo Didattico Zanotto”, located at Viale Università, 4, Verona

25th June

Venue: Room T.1 (ground floor)
5 p.m. Welcome

5.30 p.m.   Keynote Speaker
Marci Shore (University of Toronto) – “Alles Denken ist Nachdenken”: Care for Democracy, Care for the Soul, and the Limits of the Nonpolitical.” in conversation with Olivia Guaraldo (Università di Verona)

7 p.m. Reception (Venue: Chiostro Santa Maria delle Vittorie) and Arendt Jazz Hour with Joris Roelofs.

26th June

09.30 a.m.

Session 1a – Chair: Daniele Bassi (Università degli Studi dell’Insubria)
Venue: Room 1.1 (first floor)

Rosa Luxemburg and the Others

• Giulia Longoni (Università degli Studi di Milano – La Statale): Rosa Luxemburg and Hannah Arendt between Revolution and Counciliarism     
• Rosario Fernández Ossandón (Universidad de Chile): Care as a Political Action Readings between Feminist Philosophy and Hannah Arendt

Anarchism and/or Federalism?

• Sandra Rossetti (Independent Researcher): “Anarchic” Resonances in Hannah Arendt’s Thought
  
• Mattia Bottino (Alma Mater Studiorum – Università di Bologna): An Account of Deliberative Federalism: Towards a Leap in Federal Studies

Session 1b – Chair: Giacomo Mormino (Università di Verona)
Venue: Room 1.2 (first floor)

Relating narratives

• Marco di Crescenzo (Università degli Studi di Urbino – Carlo Bo): The Literary Value of Institutionalized Remembrance: A Tale of Redemption. Exploring the Political-Literary Analogies between American Jeremiads and Hannah Arendt’s On Revolution
• Jo-Anne Dillanbough (University of Cambridge): Traces, Imperial Ruins and Intellectual Afterlives: Arendt, Sebald, and the Unfinished Legacies of Empire

American Tunes

• Maria Teresa Pacilè (Università degli Studi di Messina): Tocqueville’s legacy in Hannah Arendt’s Political Philosophy: Councils and Participatory Processes  
• Magnus Ferguson (University of Chicago): Arendt’s Theatre for Ideas

12.30 a.m.  Lunch break: Catered Reception (Venue: Chiostro Santa Maria delle Vittorie)

2.30 p.m.

Session 2a – Chair:  Maria Björkholm (Åbo Akademi)
Venue: Room 1.1 (first floor)

Lasting Memories

• Kazue Koishikawa (University of Tsukuba): The Paradox of Council Tradition in Arendt: The Existential Core of Understanding
• Kun-Feng Tu (National Sun Yat-sen University): Authority as the Promise of Freedom Reconsidering the Conceptual Relationship between Power and Authority in Hannah Arendt’s Political Thought

Practicing Hope

• Yasemin Sari and Florian Grosser (Seattle University / University of Chicago): From Practice to Theory: Arendt’s Counciliarism Reconsidered
• Shree Agnihotri (The London School of Economics and Political Science): Law and Hope: Reimagining Arendt’s Council Democracy as a Juridical and Political Framework                                                          

Session 2b – Chair: Gabriele Parrino (Scuola Normale Superiore)
Venue: Room 1.2 (first floor)

The Freedom to be Free

• Jennifer Gaffney (Loyola University Chicago): Hannah Arendt and the Haitian Revolution: Accounting for History in Deliberative Politics
• Mathijs van de Sande (Radboud Universiteit) Between the Social Republic and Council Democracy: Marx and Arendt on the Paris Commune of 1871

Lost Treasures

• Elvira Roncalli (Carroll College): The Taste of Public Freedom: Politics as “Islands” in a Sea or “Oases” in a Desert
• Sofia Merli (Scuola Normale Superiore): Solidarność and Charta 77 as Islands of Civic Engagement in light of Hannah Arendt’s Counciliarism

5.30 p.m.  Coffee break

6 p.m. Keynote Speaker
Angela Taraborrelli (Università degli Studi di Cagliari) – The Role of the Council System in Arendt’s Cosmopolitan Vision, in conversation with Roger Berkowitz (Founder and Academic Director of the Hannah Arendt Center for Politics and Humanities – Bard College) – Venue: Room 1.1 (first floor)

8:30 p.m. Social Dinner

27th June

09.00 a.m.   A Discussion and Workshop on Reimagining Democracy Today Through Citizen Assemblies with Roger Berkowitz (Bard College), Claudia Chwalisz (Founder and CEO of DemocracyNext), David Van Reybrouck (Writer) – Venue: Room 1.1 (first floor)

11.30 a.m. Coffee Break

12.00 p.m.  Keynote Speaker
Shmuel Lederman (University of Haifa) – Rethinking Arendt’s Councils amidst the War in Gaza in conversation with Matteo Bortolini (Università di Padova) – Venue: Room 1.1 (first floor)

1.30 p.m.  Lunch break: Catered Reception (Venue: Chiostro Santa Maria delle Vittorie)

3 p.m.

Session 3a – Chair: Anna Argirò (Hannah Arendt Center for Political Studies – Verona)
Venue: Room 1.1 (first floor)

As a Fata Morgana I

• Jacky Tai (National Sun Yat-sen University): Council as an Apparatus of the People: Reading Arendt under Authoritarianism
• Davide Grasso (Università di Torino): Hannah Arendt and the Paradigm of Democratic Modernity

As a Fata Morgana II

• Fouâd Oveisy (York University): Strategic Imagination is a Democratic Necessity: The Case of the Rojava Revolution
• Niklas Plätzer (University of Chicago): Arendt after Empire: On Revolution in the World

Session 3b – Chair: Natascia Tosel (Università di Verona)
Venue: Room 1.2 (first floor)

Antiquity Anew

• Dino Piovan (Alma Mater Studiorum  – Università di Bologna): Arendt and the Ancient Greek Democracy
• Steffen Herrmann (FernUniversität in Hagen): Contestatory Institutions for a Republic of Councils. An Actualization

Modernity Reconsidered

• Dana Villa (University of Notre Dame): As “Alternative Model of the State”?: The Limits of Arendt’s Celebration of the Council System
• Viktoria Huegel (Universität Wien): From Authority to Authoritarianism, and back again? Arendt’s Critique of Modernity and the Salvation of Authority

6 p.m.    Closing Remarks