Hannah Arendt on Educational Thinking and Practice in Dark Times: Education for a World in Crisis

In her renowned and provocative essay, The Crisis in Education, Hannah Arendt observed that a 'crisis becomes a disaster only when we respond to it with preformed judgements, that is, with prejudices'. Taken as a whole, Arendt's work provides an enduring provocation to think and to make judgements about education and the issues that impact on it, such as political, economic and cultural disruption and uncertainty. Drawing together the leading thinkers on Arendtian ideas and education, this collection explores the role and promise education can have in preparing the future generation to understand, to think about and to act within the world. Concluding the same essay on the crisis in education, Arendt declared education to be the point at which love for the world meets love for those who are newcomers to it. The authors respond to Arendt's call for responsibility and authority in education, providing a leading edge thinking, analysis and agenda setting for public education systems and the world in dark times.

Wayne Veck is Senior Lecturer in Education at Winchester University, UK, having started his teaching career as a teacher of English to students from Afghanistan and Iraq seeking refuge in the UK.

Helen M. Gunter is Professor of Educational Policy at the University of Manchester, UK, and is a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences.