The Politics of Mercy, Forgiveness and Love: A Nietzschean Appraisal

Abstract

This paper critically examines Hannah Arendt's claim that we should conceive
forgiveness as a specifically political or worldly virtue. According to
Arendt, the virtue of forgiveness is necessary if we are to halt the reactive
rancour that always threatens to destroy the space of politics. This paper suggests
that in building her case for the politics of forgiveness Arendt confusingly
intermingles three conceptual threads – mercy, Christian forgiveness
and forgiveness driven by eros. Drawing on Nietzsche's scattered analyses of
these threads, it argues that all three of these modalities of forgiveness jeopardize
rather than restore the circuits of mutual recognition that are integral
to democratic communities. Nietzsche shows that these shadings of unconditional
or unilateral forgiveness do not necessarily arise from a will to live together,
as Arendt assumes, but are anchored in and oriented by our need to
console ourselves for the narcissistic wounding we inevitably suffer in the
struggle for recognition.

South African Journal of Philosophy Vol. 26 (1) 2007: pp. 56-69