Med den israelske efterretningstjenestes tilfangetagelse af Adolf Eichmann i 1961 blev en af de mest berømte retssager mod en tidligere naziforbryder indledt. Eichmann var i Det tredje Rige ansvarlig for transporten af jøder til koncentrationslejrene. Ved retten i Jerusalem blev han kendt skyldig i forbrydelser mod menneskeheden og blev som følge af dommen henrettet. Den tysk-amerikanske filosof Hannah Arendt dækkede den lange retssag for ugemagasinet The New Yorker, og skrev senere sine beretninger sammen i bogen Eichmann in Jerusalem - A Report on the Banality of Evil (1963).

Arendt hævdede, at Eichmann ikke var ond i klassisk forstand. Han udviste ingen patologiske træk, men var tværtimod frygtindgydende normal. Hans 'eneste' skavank var, at han ikke tænkte; at han var banal - en banalitet, som ikke var væsensforskellig fra den, Arendt hævdede var karakteristisk for det moderne massemenneske. Arendts beretning blev en af de væsentligste analyser af nazismen og den totalitære stats subjekter, og samtidig central for forståelsen af hendes øvrige forfatterskab og for den moralske dømmekrafts krise i det moderne massesamfund.

Ondskabens Banalitet rummer en række diskussioner og perspektiveringer af Hannah Arendts bog om Eichmann. Både i forhold til hendes øvrige værk, til anden forskning i nazismens masseudryddelser og totalitære personlighedstyper og i forhold til nutidige problemer omkring embedsmandsadfærd og etnisk udrensning.

Carsten Bagge Lausten, ph.d., er lektor ved Institut for Statskundskab, Aarhus Universitet. Jacob Dahl Rendtorff, ph.d., er lektor ved Institut for Samfundsvidenskab og Erhvervsøkonomi, Roskilde Universitetscenter.

English
When Adolf Eichmann was captured by the Israeli intelligence service in 1961, one of the most renowned trials against a former Nazi criminal was initiated. In the Third Reich, Eichmann was responsible for the deportation of Jews to concentration camps. At the court in Jerusalem, he was found guilty in crimes against the Jewish people and as a consequence of the verdict, he was executed. The German-American philosopher Hannah Arendt covered the long trial for the weekly magazine The New Yorker and she later collected the articles for her book Eichmann in Jerusalem - A Report on the Banality of Evil (1963).

Arendt claimed that Eichmann was not evil in the ordinary sense of the word. He showed no pathological traits, but was rather frighteningly normal. His "only" flaw was that he did not think; that he was banal - a banality that was not basically different from the one Arendt claimed was characteristic of the modern mass human being. Arendt's account became one of the most important studies of Nazism and the subjects of the totalitarian state, and also central to the understanding of her other writings and to the crisis of the moral judgement in the modern mass society.

Ondskabens banalitet (The Banality of Evil) contains a number of discussions of and perspectives on Hannah Arendt's book on Eichmann, both in relation to her other writings, to other research into Nazi mass extermination and totalitarian types of personalities, and in relation to contemporary problems concerning the code of conduct of officials and ethnical cleansing.

Carsten Bagge Laustsen, PhD, is ass. professor in the Department of Political Science at Aarhus University. Jacob Dahl Rendtorff, PhD, is ass. professor in the Department for Social Sciences at Roskilde University.

Arendt, Eichmann og det ondes banalitet s. 9-26

En human verden? s. 27-60

Humanitet, pluralitet og ret s. 61-90

Ondskabens banalitet og den autoritære personlighed s. 91-123

Bøddel og offer s. 125-153

Eichmanns Kant s. 155-195

Moralsk blindhed i diktatur og demokrati s. 197-225

Pligt og personligt ansvar i forvaltningen s. 227-247

Ondskab i Bosnien s. 249-285

Erindring og apori s. 287-311