As society structured itself around its prodigious ability to produce factory-made products, human beings began to regard themselves as inherently acquisitive beings whose very nature was bent toward nihilistic accumulation. As businessmen ascended to the top of society, more people imagined themselves as prospective robber barons and regarded their fellow human beings as rivals. And by the early twentieth century, this self-image, what Arendt refers to as “Hobbesian” (in short, nasty and brutish), was growing more prevalent, particularly among the de-classed.
