Research Hannah Arendt’s concept “Banality of Evil” and her book The Origins of Totalitarianism and facts about Adolf Eichmann (even in Wikipedia) as much as you can. List the facts you found in short bullet points. For each of your points include a citation or link to the source of facts.
Hannah Arendt
- October 1906-December 1975
- Born in Germany
- German-Jewish philosopher and political theorist
- Bold in asking unpopular questions about the thoughtless embrace of science
- Believed human rights were not useful
- Questioned the racial integration in schools
- Defended interracial marriage
- Worked with Youth Aliyah to rescue Jewish youth in France
- First woman professor at Princeton
- Also taught at UChic, UC Berkeley, Wesleyan U, The New School
- Wrote The Origins of Totalitarianism in 1951 about the foundations of the Nazi and Stalinist regimes
- Wrote The Human Condition, her own account of retreat from public life
- Wrote Revolution in 1963 about American’s foundational democracy and political freedom
- Received backlash for her controversial views
- Coined term “banality of evil”
- Denied Eichmann’s evilness
- He wasn’t evil, but he was a thoughtless follower
- Upon first impressions, seemed like an ordinary man
- Denied Eichmann’s evilness
https://hac.bard.edu/about/hannaharendt/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hannah_Arendt#Legacy
Arendt wrote the book Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil
- Argues that Eichmann (Eichmann was a Nazi official, responsible for the detention and transportation of Jews to concentration camps) was not a monster. She claims that his motives didn’t root from a place of hatred.
- Eichmann was a joiner. He feared to live a life with no direction and leader. The Nazi movement brought a sense of importance to him.
- Didn’t justify Eichmann’s actions by any means, just provided a different perspective
- Used the term “banality of evil” to describe this phenomenon
- She saw that modern society fears the “disorderly life of democratic freedoms and embraces the comfortable security of administrative bureaucracy.”
- Neither denies nor claims Eichmann was evil
- Believed Eichmann should’ve been hanged for his evil deeds
- She claimed Eichmann participated in the greatest evil act in the history of mankind because of his fear of being isolated overruling his ability to critically assess the devastating consequences of the Nazi movement
https://hac.bard.edu/about/hannaharendt/
Adolf Eichmann
- Born on March 19, 1906 in Germany
- Died May 31, 1962
- A major leader in the Holocaust
- Worked as an ordinary traveling salesman prior to World War II
- Lost his job due to the Great Depression
- Initially resisted the violent movement against the Jews
- This proves Arendt’s “banality of evil”
- A man who was against the violence ended up turning into one of the major organizers of the Holocaust
- Joined Nazi Party in April of 1932
- Organized the identification, assembly, and transportation of the Jewish
- Named chief executioner
- Participated in the greatest evil act in the history of mankind because of his inability to think for himself
- Found and captured in Argentina in 1960
- Under questioning, he claimed he wasn’t anti-semitic
- Eichmann claimed that he actually sought to physically avoid the killings
- Hanged by the State of Israel
https://hac.bard.edu/about/hannaharendt/
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Adolf-Eichmann
The Origins of Totalitarianism
- Structured into 3 essays: Anti-semitism, Imperialism, and Totalitarianism
- Discussed history and foundational role that anti-semitism and imperialism had in the rise of totalitarianism
- Racism was used a tool for imperialism and nationalism
- Seeks to explain why totalitarianism was more prevalent within Europe
- The mistake of equating nationalism and imperialism
- Slight difference between dictatorship and totalitarianism
- Dictatorships CAN be totalitarianistic, but doesn’t have to be by definition
- Appeal to giving in to totalitarianism is protection from isolation, danger, and insecurity
- Totalitarian regimes instilled fear with the inevitability of war
- More likely in bigger populations
- This fear was completely exploited in Europe
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Origins_of_Totalitarianism
https://notevenpast.org/hannah-arendts-the-origins-of-totalitarianism/
Hannah Arendt became famous for questioning societal norms. Her ideas were different from society, and she received lots of backlash for it. Almost all revolutionary ideas seem outlandish at first. The idea that Eichmann wasn’t an extraordinarily evil person did not sit well with the public, even though I think she describes a valid point. I think given the circumstances, Eichmann was fairly normal, relatively speaking. If people in today’s world were put in the same situation as Eichmann, I think there is a high chance that a lot of them would act somewhat similarly to Eichmann. No matter how high of moral standards they claim, it’s impossible to say how one would truly act merely because the situation has the power to influence more than people might realize.
