Hannah Arendt’s View on Decline of Sympathy in Totalitarian Systems

The present research aims at investigating the significant relationship between totalitarian systems and moral concepts including Sympathy as a form of social responsibilities and a manifestation of personal ethics amongst the members of the society with an emphasis on Arendt's views, the well-known German-American philosopher and historiographer. She believes that Nazism and Stalinism are two instances of such ruling systems in the 20th century relying on a set of specific theoretical foundations featuring some unique characteristics that completely distinguish them from other totalitarian, democratic, etc. systems in terms of practicing politics and addressing moral concepts.How does personal ethics decline in a society in totalitarian systems? Which methods are used to undermine social responsibility amongst people? Arendt observes that to achieve these goals, such political systems at first convert the society into a mass society through the special tools they own such as extensive promotion of their ideas, intimidation, and spread of some particular ideologies. In fact, they are similar to the people marooned in the wilderness. Finally, the people enslaved by the totalitarian ruling systems find some ethical concepts such as Sympathy completely meaningless.