The thinking that resulted in this thesis has its roots in the first televised images that marked my childhood. The destruction of Beirut under the Israeli fire was the news item during my first school holidays. I was seven years old and I remember seeing Menachem Begin's impassionate speeches, thinking that they made sense. Knowing that Hitler was the ultimate evil, and hearing that Arafat was like Hitler, how could it be wrong to destroy him? But when I looked among the images of people in Beirut to find the Nazis, all I could see were people who looked poor, quiet or scared. Nothing like the tall and erect Nazis, shouting out orders in their uniforms and shiny boots. I was confused. And this confusion bred a lifelong interest in what was really going on in Israel. How could a people that had suffered so much cause so much suffering? Why were they telling the world that they were fighting the Nazis? And why did the world believe them?

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This thesis argues that Hannah Arendt is correct to suggest that thinking enables judgment, even though Arendt never fully formulates this idea herself. I provide a critical reading of Arendts essay Thinking and Moral Considerations and of her series of lectures on Kants political philosophy. I argue that Arendts concept of impartiality can provide the bridge between the concepts of thinking and judging that is otherwise lacking in her account of these faculties. I argue that Arendts philosophy can be construed as an ethically relevant theory: despite the fact that Arendt offers no moral prescriptions, she describes a process of thinking through which ethical decisions can be made. Arendts work is therefore highly relevant as a critique of relativism, nihilism and the skeptical notion that judgments are arbitrary.

Texte abrégé de: Dissertation--Otto-Suhr-Institut--Freie Universitat Berlin, 1999. / Bibliogr. p. 304-316.

Este trabalho pretende discutir alguns elementos presentes nas figuras de Sócrates e Adolf Eichmann tal como descritos por Hannah Arendt. A aparentemente indecorosa aproximação ganha sentido por meio da noção arendtiana de pensamento, que encontra em Sócrates seu modelo e cuja falta caracteriza Eichmann. Para tanto, reconstruímos a crítica arendtiana à modernidade por meio da ideia de alienação do mundo, que acompanha a modernidade desde seu nascimento passando pelo período do imperialismo e culminando na sociedade de massas, da qual Eichmann pode ser tomado como exemplo concreto. Em contraposição, discutimos Sócrates como exemplo de pensador ainda não marcado pela hostilidade que, segundo Arendt, nossa tradição filosófica estabeleceu contra a política. Por fim, discute-se a inacabada teoria arendtiana do juízo, atividade intimamente relacionada ao pensamento e que certamente permitiria a Eichmann uma resposta mais consistente à pergunta: por que não entrar para a SS? / This work intends to discuss some of the elements concerning Socrates and Adolf Eichmann as described by Hannah Arendt. The apparently inappropriate rapprochement reveals its sense through Arendts idea of thinking, to which Socrates provides a model and the lack of which marks Eichmann. In order to let our point clear, we reconstruct Arendts criticism against modernity focusing on the idea of world alienation, present in modernity since its beginning, through the whole period of imperialism and reaching its peak in modern mass societies, of which Eichmann can be seen as a concrete model. On the other hand, we discuss Socrates as an example of thinker whose activity is still free from the hostility that, according to Arendt, our tradition of political philosophy established against politics. At last, we discuss the Arendts unfinished theory of judgment, activity closely related to thinking and that certainly would provide Eichmann a more consistent answer to the question: Why not join the SS?

Este trabalho pretende discutir alguns elementos presentes nas figuras de Sócrates e Adolf Eichmann tal como descritos por Hannah Arendt. A aparentemente indecorosa aproximação ganha sentido por meio da noção arendtiana de pensamento, que encontra em Sócrates seu modelo e cuja falta caracteriza Eichmann. Para tanto, reconstruímos a crítica arendtiana à modernidade por meio da ideia de alienação do mundo, que acompanha a modernidade desde seu nascimento passando pelo período do imperialismo e culminando na sociedade de massas, da qual Eichmann pode ser tomado como exemplo concreto. Em contraposição, discutimos Sócrates como exemplo de pensador ainda não marcado pela hostilidade que, segundo Arendt, nossa tradição filosófica estabeleceu contra a política. Por fim, discute-se a inacabada teoria arendtiana do juízo, atividade intimamente relacionada ao pensamento e que certamente permitiria a Eichmann uma resposta mais consistente à pergunta: por que não entrar para a SS? / This work intends to discuss some of the elements concerning Socrates and Adolf Eichmann as described by Hannah Arendt. The apparently inappropriate rapprochement reveals its sense through Arendts idea of thinking, to which Socrates provides a model and the lack of which marks Eichmann. In order to let our point clear, we reconstruct Arendts criticism against modernity focusing on the idea of world alienation, present in modernity since its beginning, through the whole period of imperialism and reaching its peak in modern mass societies, of which Eichmann can be seen as a concrete model. On the other hand, we discuss Socrates as an example of thinker whose activity is still free from the hostility that, according to Arendt, our tradition of political philosophy established against politics. At last, we discuss the Arendts unfinished theory of judgment, activity closely related to thinking and that certainly would provide Eichmann a more consistent answer to the question: Why not join the SS?

Made available in DSpace on 2014-07-29T15:06:26Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Eden_Farias.pdf: 507724 bytes, checksum: 9b523cf2a27a82cf9797fbb4fa4709fa (MD5) Previous issue date: 2011-08-18 / This work explores the meaning of the expression Banality of Evil, coined by Hannah Arendt in her investigation about Adolf Eichmann in Jerusalem. It intends to question its meaning to the logistics of extermination in the Holocaust. Investigates on the one hand, aspects of a moral collapse about our common understandings about the problem of evil, and by the other, the context of bureaucracy that propitiated the novelty of this new form of evil by its singular lack of roots as well as political and moral implications in relation to individual responsibility. Through the conceptual analysis of the problem of evil, along with a series of mismatches in the reasons for doing evil, we propose an interpretation of the meaning of the Banality of Evil. / Este trabalho investiga o significado da expressão Banalidade do Mal cunhada por Hannah Arendt em suas investigações sobre Adolf Eichmann em Jerusalém. Preza-se pelo questionamento do seu significado frente à logística de extermínio do Holocausto. Investiga-se, por um lado, aspectos de um colapso moral a respeito de nossas usuais compreensões acerca do problema do mal e, por outro, o contexto de burocratização do extermínio que propiciou o ineditismo dessa nova forma de mal por sua singular ausência de raízes, bem como as implicações políticas e morais em relação à responsabilidade individual. Através da análise conceitual do problema do mal, juntamente a uma série de descompassos presentes nas razões para se fazer o mal, propomos uma interpretação do significado da Banalidade do Mal.

Submitted by Luciana Ferreira (lucgeral@gmail.com) on 2016-01-28T11:34:00Z No. of bitstreams: 2 Dissertação - Bruno Abnner Lourenzatto Silveira - 2014.pdf: 754705 bytes, checksum: 1380d0f6a8719773711a6f2db8af6059 (MD5) license_rdf: 23148 bytes, checksum: 9da0b6dfac957114c6a7714714b86306 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Luciana Ferreira (lucgeral@gmail.com) on 2016-01-28T11:36:34Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 2 Dissertação - Bruno Abnner Lourenzatto Silveira - 2014.pdf: 754705 bytes, checksum: 1380d0f6a8719773711a6f2db8af6059 (MD5) license_rdf: 23148 bytes, checksum: 9da0b6dfac957114c6a7714714b86306 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-01-28T11:36:34Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 Dissertação - Bruno Abnner Lourenzatto Silveira - 2014.pdf: 754705 bytes, checksum: 1380d0f6a8719773711a6f2db8af6059 (MD5) license_rdf: 23148 bytes, checksum: 9da0b6dfac957114c6a7714714b86306 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014-02-25 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior - CAPES / In 1993 with the establishment of the Nazis regime in Germany, Hannah Arendt joined the Zionism to face the totalitarian regime. Yet in 1933, fleeing from persecutions against Jews, she went to Paris and after that to the United States of America (place where she established her new residence later). In the 60’s Arendt returned to Jerusalem as a reporter to cover the judgment of the Nazi’s ex-bureaucrat, Adolf Eichmann, found by the secret police of Israel living in Argentina. On this occasion, as the correspondent of the North-American magazine The New Yorker, she published her impressions about the judgment. Thereafter, her articles are reunited and published it the book Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil. This dissertation work aims to solve the complexity which involved the elaboration of these texts, taking into consideration the relation of Hannah Arendt with the Zionists, as well as the categories and concepts previously presented in her works, which oriented her reflection during the judgment. In order to accomplish this comprehensive exercise, a dialogue was established between Eichmann in Jerusalem and other works as The Origins of Totalitarianism, as well as other articles and texts of Hannah Arendt. / Em 1933, com o estabelecimento do regime nazista na Alemanha, Hannah Arendt se filiou ao sionismo para enfrentar o regime totalitário. No mesmo ano, fugindo de perseguições contra os judeus, ela segue para Paris e, posteriormente, para os Estados Unidos da América, onde estabeleceu nova residência. Na década de 1960, Arendt vai para Jerusalém como repórter para cobrir o julgamento do ex-burocrata nazista, Adolf Eichmann, encontrado pela polícia secreta de Israel vivendo na Argentina. Nesta ocasião, trabalhacomo correspondente da revista norte-americana The New Yorker, onde publica seus artigos sobre o julgamento. Futuramente, esses artigos seriam reunidos e publicados no livro Eichmann em Jerusalém: um relato sobre a banalidade do mal. Esta dissertação procura analisar a elaboração destes textos, levando em consideração a relação de Hannah Arendt com os sionistas, assim como as categorias e conceitos que nortearam sua reflexão durante o julgamento. Para a realização desse objetivo, estabeleceu-se um diálogo entre Eichmann em Jerusalém e outras obras da autora, como, por exemplo, Origens do totalitarismo.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-25T19:20:17Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Ruth Kelson.pdf: 920154 bytes, checksum: 207a341e9ab105b0b58f0319d1c443df (MD5) Previous issue date: 2011-10-27 / This dissertation intends to enlarge the scope of the concept Banality of Evil, a term coined by Hannah Arendt to qualify an Evil that had not yet been detected as a particular form and that she had observed in the Nazi Adolph Eichmann during his trial in Jerusalem in 1962. She called it an Evil without roots, which is like a fungus in the surface. She found it in a nonperson, in someone that doesn t think , that doesn t perform the dialogue me-with-myself and acts in heteronomy, under an external command to which it obeys without assuming personal responsibility for its moral consequences. This concept helps to elucidate the way totalitarianisms of the modern era acts and the attitude of those that only follow orders , without considering the monstrosities that they can embed. The first condition for this new form of Evil was man s preceding transformation in a pure animal laborans, dedicated nearly exclusively to his survival as a species. Transformed in a thing, as a mean and not an end in itself, man acquired the condition of superficiality from which it could derive the logic of extermination. The second condition was the destruction of the sacredness of man in modern times. With the death of God, he was transformed into a simple thing, able to be molded, used and discarded. The third condition is the predominance of the process in the world today which has an autonomous dynamics and is independent of man and his decisions. Zigmunt Baumann added to Hannah Arendt s vision a new comprehension of the mechanisms and motives that can slip into this form of Evil: the fight against the indeterminate, the chaotic and the ambivalence, trying to create a controlled and less threatening world. But, in the fight against ambivalence, an even greater chaos is created around this orders that are built. In this world on which one wants to impose the order of a deterministic law or project, the bureaucrat is the main agent of this form of Evil. The question of the Banality of Evil raises the question of what are the means at our disposal to oppose it / Com esta dissertação, pretende-se ampliar a abrangência do conceito de Banalidade do Mal, um termo criado por Hannah Arendt para qualificar um Mal que não fora ainda detectado com uma forma própria e que ela observou no nazista Adolf Eichmann durante seu julgamento em Jerusalém em 1962. Ela o chamou de um Mal sem raízes, que é como um fungo na superfície. Localizou-o em uma não-pessoa, em alguém que não pensa , que não realiza o diálogo de mim-comigo-mesmo e age em heteronomia, sob uma determinação exterior à qual obedece sem se responsabilizar pessoalmente por suas conseqüências morais. Este conceito ajuda a elucidar a forma de agir dos totalitarismos da era moderna e a atitude daqueles que somente cumprem ordens , sem levar em conta a monstruosidade que elas podem trazer embutidas. A primeira condição para esta nova forma do Mal foi a transformação prévia do homem num puro animal laborans, dedicado quase que exclusivamente à sua sobrevivência como espécie. Transformado em coisa, em meio e não em fim em si mesmo, o homem adquiriu a condição de superfluidade da qual pode derivar a lógica do extermínio. A segunda condição foi a destituição da sacralidade do homem na modernidade. Com a morte de Deus, o homem se tornou simples coisa, passível de ser moldado, usado ou descartado. A terceira condição é o predomínio do processo no mundo atual, que tem uma dinâmica autônoma e independe do homem e de suas decisões. Zigmunt Baumann acrescentou à visão de Hannah Arendt uma nova compreensão dos mecanismos e motivos que podem resvalar para esta forma de Mal: a luta contra o indeterminado, o caótico e a ambivalência, com o objetivo de criar um mundo controlado e menos ameaçador. Porém, na luta contra a ambivalência, cria-se um caos ainda maior em torno a estas ordens que são construídas. Neste mundo em que se pretende impor a ordem de uma lei determinística ou de um projeto, o burocrata é o principal agente da Banalidade do Mal. A questão desta forma de Mal suscita a pergunta de quais meios dispomos para nos contrapormos a ela

This thesis analyses the fabled public exchange of letters that occurred between political theorist Hannah Arendt and historian of Jewish religion Gershom Scholem in 1964 following the historic trial of Adolf Eichmann and Arendt's subsequent publication of her report of the event, Eichmann in Jerusalem. The thesis covers the historical issues that form the contextual background to the exchange. It involves the introduction of the two participants as defining Jewish intellectuals of the past century, the course of the trial itself and the political and ideological problems it entailed as well as the turbulent history of the reception of Arendt's book. It is down to these four factors that guaranteed the eminence of the exchange of letters analysed in the thesis. Oft-quoted as the exchange is, there has been no proper analysis of it to this date. To accomplish this task, the thesis adopts the theoretical-methodological framework of discourse analysis in general, and the version of rhetorically oriented discursive psychology, proposed mainly in the publications of Potter and Wetherell (1987) and Billig (1996), in particular. This approach allows the thesis to provide a fine-grained analysis of the various ways of textual construction. Firstly, the ways examined concern the significance, worth and value of the debate itself, as formulated by both of the participants. Secondly, they involve the construction of the attempt to establish definite versions of the content of the book. Thirdly, they cover the textual acts of accounting for that content, or the practice of misinterpretation of that content, respectively. What all these three aspects have in common is the positioning of the problems touched upon in a moral and political context, and ultimately approaching them in terms of the identities of the participants. In this sense, versions of the events and ways of accounting for it will not only aim at producing accurate descriptions of events but in the forms of an implied morality or politics an implied "action-plan" for the future as well. The construction of Arendt and Scholem is, hence, analysed in terms of its argumentative organisation in order to undermine the other's counterversion and to establish its own as the definite one. While, structurally, there are many similarities in the two letters, what distinguishes them is that they conceive of their objects (i.e. the text), subject positions, and political or moral values according to which they should be assessed in quite diametrically opposite ways. This thesis not only registers the various rhetorical ways the participants fashion their versions as definite ones, but also accounts for the differences in their contents.