Walter Benjamin's Images of Revolution in "On the Concept of History"

This thesis examines Benjamin’s reflections on the notion of revolution in “On the Concept of History.” I argue that in the document Benjamin offers a constellation of images of revolution. These are, first and foremost, images deployed against images—they oppose a positivistic, mechanistic, progressive image of history, and the consequences of said image for how political action is to be conceived. On the other hand, these images highlight one of Benjamin’s main preoccupations—namely, the need for a recasting of the relationship between the (oppressed) past and the present.