The political development in recent years has led to a debate in media about politi-cal lies, “alternative facts”, “fake news” and contempt for facts in politics. A new, interdisciplinary field of academic research has grown forth, where these issues are addressed within the framework of what is called “post-truth” and “post-truth politics”. However, this discussion risks playing into the hands of the propaganda unless we investigate what kind of lies that are studied and the strategies behind them for creating credibility and legitimacy. The present article develops what Hannah Arendt and Alexandre Koyré identified as an unexpected “invention” in the history of the political lie. It is a key element in the establishment of totalitarian regimes, but it can appear also under non-totalitarian conditions. It is exemplified with Donald Trump’s campaign about the “stolen” election, the Russian “troll fac-tory” Internet Research Agency and “Battlefield” – a group of keyboard warriors associated with the Sweden Democrats.

In 2016, the Oxford Dictionary named “post-truth” the word of the year. In the ongoing debate about post-truth it is generally assumed that facts and truth have ceased to be relevant to politics. However, questions are seldom raised about the role of truth-claims in politics, why facts matter in political contexts, or what we even mean with words such as fact and lies in politics. A general aim of the present study is to shed light on these questions. Not, however, by engaging directly in the debate about post-truth, but by investigating the relation between politics and truth in the philosophical work of Hannah Arendt and Martin Heidegger.

In 1945 Arendt suggested that fascism had invented a way of “lying the truth”. She later came to call this invention the modern political lie, seeing it as one of the key elements that crystallized into totalitarianism. The study explores the paradoxical relation between politics and truth in totalitarian movements, which can reinvent itself in non-totalitarian forms in contemporary democracies. Parts of Arendt’s analysis are implicit but can be made explicit against the background of Heidegger’s political writings. Heidegger is not an advocate of the modern political lie, nonetheless his writings from the 1930s, while a member of the National Socialist party, reflect aspects of the paradoxical relation between politics and truth in totalitarian movements. Studying Heidegger and Arendt together can therefore shed light on the specific problems that Arendt addressed regarding truth and lying in politics. 

The study investigates the relation between politics and truth in Heidegger and Arendt respectively, but also the relation between their works. It shows that there is a proto-political aspect already in Heidegger’s early articulations of truth as aletheia and explores the central role of truth in his political writings from the 1930s. Against the background of Heidegger, Arendt’s works on the modern political lie are analyzed. The study also investigates the concept of truth developed by Arendt in works after The Origins of Totalitarianism, arguing that it should be seen partly as a response to the modern political lie. 

2016 utnämndes “post-sanning” till årets ord av The Oxford Dictionary. Ett generellt antagande i den pågående debatten om post-sanning är att fakta och sanning saknar betydelse i post-sanningspolitik. Vad man däremot sällan diskuterar är vilken roll sanningsanspråk kan spela i politiska sammanhang, varför fakta överhuvudtaget är relevant i politiken eller vad vi ens menar med sanning, fakta och lögn i politiska kontexter. Ett generellt syfte i avhandlingen är att belysa de frågorna, men inte genom att kommentera post-sanningsdebatten. Istället närmar sig avhandlingen de frågorna genom att undersöka relationen mellan sanning och politik hos två filosofer: Hannah Arendt och Martin Heidegger. 

I en essä från 1945 skrev Arendt att fascismen hade uppfunnit ett sätt att ”ljuga sanningen”. Senare beskrev hon denna uppfinning, som enligt henne utgör ett av de nyckelelement som kristalliserade sig till totalitarism, för modern politisk lögn. Avhandlingen undersöker den paradoxala relation mellan sanning och politik som Arendt identifierade – en relation som kan återuppfinna sig själv i icke-totalitära former i samtida demokratier. Hennes analys är delvis implicit, men kan göras explicit mot bakgrund av Heideggers politiska texter. Heidegger är inte någon företrädare för den moderna politiska lögnen men under den period på 1930-talet då han var medlem i nazistpartiet kommer den motsägelsefulla relationen mellan sanning och politik i totalitära rörelser likväl till uttryck i hans politiska texter. Genom att studera Heidegger och Arendt tillsammans kan man därför klargöra de problem Arendt adresserar i sina arbeten om modern politisk lögn.