Hannah Arendt on Truth and Public Honor: Why Judgment and Forgiveness Require Civic Pedagogy.

Sule, Fransiskus and Guazon, Hector (2026) Hannah Arendt on Truth and Public Honor: Why Judgment and Forgiveness Require Civic Pedagogy. Diskursus, 22 (1). pp. 151-186. ISSN 1412-3878; 2580-1686

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Abstract

This article addresses the question what becomes of a common world when the state bestows public honor amid unresolved authoritarian harm and contested facts, focusing on Indonesia’s 2025 designation of former President Soeharto as pahlawan nasional (national hero). Using an interpretive qualitative design grounded in document analysis of official statements, civic testimony, and public commentary, and informed by Hannah Arendt’s accounts of factual truth, judgment, punishment, and forgiveness, the article clarifies the political stakes of hero-making in a post-authoritarian public sphere. It argues, first, that factual truth is politically vulnerable and requires witnesses and institutions if it is to remain publicly binding; where those supports fail, honor can function as organized forgetting. Second, public honor is not an extension of private affection but a judgment that must remain communicable and contestable in plural public sphere, rather than enforced through “lovers versus haters” pressure. Third, forgiveness, in Arendt’s sense, interrupts retaliation but presupposes truth and responsibility; without accountability, “forgive and forget” becomes a technology of impunity. The article concludes by outlining a civic pedagogy of counter-memory and enlarged judgment after honor has been conferred. Keywords: Hannah Arendt, factual truth, public judgment, forgiveness, public honor, defactualization

Item Type:	Article
Subjects:	B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > BR Christianity A General Works > B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > BR Christianity H Social Sciences > HM Sociology
Divisions:	Program Pascasarjana > Program Pascasarjana Filsafat
Depositing User:	ThM .-
Date Deposited:	17 Apr 2026 10:39
Last Modified:	17 Apr 2026 10:39
URI:	http://repo.driyarkara.ac.id/id/eprint/2560

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