Political Evil and the Challenge of Forgiveness

At the beginning of the 21st Century, there is no scarcity of political events that one can easily associate with the label "evil". Genocide, totalitarianism, and torture are just some of the many faces of evil that continue to confront us today. Understanding the complex nature of atrocities is an essential precondition for learning from past mistakes and preventing future catastrophes.

In organising this film festival, we were guided by Hannah Arendt's great insight that storytelling can best disclose the complexity of evil and of complicity in it. The two films and the academic workshop problematize the various faces of political evil and highlight the challenges it poses to forgiveness. Our hope is that they will engage the audience in a nuanced reflection about the individual's responsibility and capacity to resist and overcome political evil in its multiple impersonations.

Programme

June 2nd, 20:30
Film projection: Forgiveness (2004, Ian Gabriel)
FREE ADMISSION
Comments by Sonali Chakravarti, Wesleyan University (US) and Andrew Schaap, University of Exeter (UK).

June 10th, 20:30
Film projection: Hannah Arendt (2012, Margarethe von Trotta)
FREE ADMISSION
Comments by Werner Bonefeld and Mihaela Mihai, University of York.

Organisers: Mihaela Mihai, Politics Department and Paul Gready, Geraldine Richard, Hanna Rönty, Anne-Marie Lombard and Jessica Jandura, Centre for Applied Human Rights, University of York.

For more information, please visit the York Human Rights Film Festival web page.