Arendt and Solzhenitsyn - Essay Example

December 12, 2008 ARENDT AND SOLZHENITSYN ON METHODS TO BRUTALIZE POPULATIONS The atrocities that characterized the beginnings of the twentieth century have clearly manifested the drastic impression of terrible inhumanity. Both the works of Arendt and Solzhenitsyn are descriptive of the evil perpetrations that were wrought by the German's Nazi regime and the Russian's repressive communistic reign. The two books were written from two different viewpoints, while Hannah Arendt gives her narrative revolving around the desk bound murderer in Eichmann and the Holocaust, that of the work of Alexander Solzhenitsyn was derived from the story of that one particular day in the life of a camp prisoner, Ivan Denisovich Shukhov. This paper aims to particularly focus on how the vivid depictions of the Nazi and Soviet crisis in both books have been instrumental in providing global readers a wide-eyed awakening to a path to peace and to a future hope of minimizing global and political violence. To achieve this would mean understanding the rationale and causal effects of the perpetrations of the inhumanity in the genocidal murders and the grueling experiences in the Soviet prison camps, and eventually rethinking whether the same would have been possible were it not for the modern methods that were adopted to further brutalize the population. Arendt and Solzhenitsyn not only witnessed the tragic events of the mid-twentieth century, both of them had first hand experiences of the horrendous fates of the era. These particular events in both their lives have led them to write on Eichmann and The Holocaust and One Day In The Life of Ivan Denisovich, respectively. Several researches have probed on the questions of how and why the holocaust happened and why of all places did it occur in Germany. The book on the Holocaust provided several excerpts from Arendt's previous commentaries on the trial of this Nazi named Adolf Eichmann, a Gestapo chief, who later history would place as the man responsible for the mass extermination of all the Jews who were held in concentration camps. While many writings have ascribed the root cause of the holocaust to that of the anti-Semitic views of Adolph Hitler, Arendt in her book pinned the guilt to Eichmann, after the arrogant Eichmann himself openly boasted that he would die laughing with the feeling of great satisfaction in having brought millions of Jews to their death. There were a number of cultural and historical issues that evolved from the trial of Eichmann and most were considered either as pernicious to or are erosions of the justice system. Amongst the European countries, it is easily noticeable that in the twentieth century, Germany had the most radical form of capitalism that would in effect, exclude all other socialist labor movements. This fascism has been characterized by anti-Semitism and extreme racism. Due to this inherently murderous ideology for an elect race, the Jews eventually were scorned upon to be an inferior race. Arendt concludes in her book that the hanging of Eichmann was justified for the reason that he had supported and executed the policy of the Reich to be a superior race, ultimately having the effect of being the only ones who can inhabit the earth. The book of Solzhenitsyn sets the story on the Soviet labor camp and describes an entire one day in the life of the prisoner Ivan Denisovich Shukhov. This literary masterpiece was the first ever to openly give an account of Stalin's repressive governance. This book made known that the prisoners in the Gulag system were never allowed to leave the camps despite the end of their prison terms. The theme created in this book focused on authoritarian oppression and the many difficult ways of surviving labor camps, especially from the cruelty of the prison officials. Through Ivan Denisovich Shukhov, Solzhenitsyn has provided the world with the many tragic and traumatic experiences that a prisoner suffered in the prison camps. This open depiction led to a powerful indictment that made the USSR accountable for sins against humanity, which we now popularly refer to as crimes against human rights. While both authors dwell on the brutal inhumanities committed by two totalitarian regimes, Arendt centers the blame on Eichmann for supporting and executing Hitler's policies on racism and anti-Semitism, while Solzhenitsyn, on the other hand, puts the blame on Stalin and his repressive communistic governance. At this point, it would seem that the common and most obvious characteristic of these dictatorial reigns is the bureaucratization of mass killings. The brutalization of populations is tantamount to the complete denial of universal rights possessed by every person regardless of nationality, religion, race or creed. The human sufferings narrated in the books of Arendt and Solzhenitsyn were very clear despicable atrocities in the Nazi and Soviet histories. Should history however put the blame on specific nations or its mandated officials Instrumental to these heinous crimes may also be rooted to the progress made by the Industrial Revolution, the creation of new and modern arms, weapons, not to exclude the gas chambers that were used by the Nazis, the development and expansion of the railroad system which made travel easy notably for the 20th century Jews and many other new trends in modern technology. The extent of damage which was brought about in the genocidal murders of the Jews by the German Nazis show a greater sense of technological modes of destruction in that, weapons and gas chambers were used to exterminate people as so depicted by Arendt in her book. Thus, it can be said that the Nazis are worse offenders as far as technology of death is concerned. The Russian communists, on the other hand utilized the natural sufferings of human life to destroy the individual natural capacities for survival. This then, on the other hand, makes the communists worse offenders when it comes to the elaborate prison system as enshrined in the book by Solzhenitsyn. As a finis, the human devastation wrought by the horrors of innocent people being forced to suffer or being brought to their death as shown in the books of Arendt and Solzhenitsyn calls not only for a solution, but likewise makes it imperative to recognize a political action and policy to put an end to it. Such horrors and the idea of evil can become less terrible and even less real, if freedom can be fostered and human rights respected, in the technologically advanced and contemporary modern society today. Equally important is the depth of understanding history through literature's poignancy. Read More