A NEW GUARANTEE ON EARTH - ARENDT,HANNAH ON HUMAN-DIGNITY AND THE POLITICS OF HUMAN-RIGHTS

While the writings of Hannah Arendt have received an extraordinary amo unt of scholarly attention, few commentators have seen her as a theori st concerned with questions of human rights. I argue that the problem of human rights was central to Arendt's political theory. While she do es not elaborate a theory of human rights as such, and while she avoid s the juridical approaches so common among human lights theorists and advocates, her conception of political action is intended to secure an elemental human dignity that is systematically jeopardized by the imp eratives of national sovereignty.