Published: 11 Jan 2026
Last updated: 14 Jan 2026
Eichmann and the Holocaust
- Release date: 2005
- Genre: Non-fiction, History, Philosophy, Politics
- Themes/Moods: Medium-paced, Informative, Reflective
- Rating: 3/5
A book (im)famous for the “banality of evil” quote - but this is really a discussion and dissection of the Eichmann Trial across several articles Arendt had written (and in this version, condensed down to approx. half its length), more specifically serving a psychological evaluation of Eichmann himself, a (distressing and depressing) outline of Jewish collaboration within the Nazi regime with regard to the Final Solution specifically, and finally a meta-discussion/analysis of the trial itself and its perceived legitimacy (especially around the circumstances that came about, namely the abduction to conduct said trial, the right for Israel to conduct said trial and the perceived “show trial” aspect, namely turning the trial into a global education of what Jews had suffered during the Holocaust and by extension ‘anti-semitism’ itself on trial, rather than focusing on Eichmann and the finer details of his specific crimes). Needless to say, its quite a thought-provoking, if tough read - and one can only simply opine and pass judgement on the various arguments that Arendt puts forward in retrospect, namely the following arguments.
- The namesake “banality of evil”, the implied discreditation that all Nazi criminals were inherently and manifestly psychopathic in nature, or at least that there can be seemingly regular, normal people with the ‘appropriate’ incentives, twisted into committing unspeakable acts - and how we want evil people to be “outwardly evil” rather than distressingly like ourselves.
- This phrase itself has had a life of its own and the largest cultural impact, almost to a fault - within the context of the book it feels somewhat of a throwaway comment, trying to describe that evil itself may not be apparent/obviously proclaim itself as being evil (the twin adages of ’never attributing malice which can be sufficiently explained by incompetence’ combined with ‘any sufficiently advanced incompetence is indistinguishable to malice’ come to mind) - “Just following orders” was a common refrain/excuse for many individuals during the Nuremburg trials, and without specific evidence to the contrary, I can easily believe some individuals using that excuse “honestly” rather than simply being the perceived best tactic to avoid punishment. Similarly, due to its position in the book (namely, right after Eichmann’s inane final statement and execution), it could have just been a pithy quote to sum up the banal “performance” that Eichmann conducted during his last days - and nothing more than that.
- The analysis of Eichmann itself, the commentary on “inability to speak” turning into an “inability to think”, “thoughtless evil”
- I find the picture built up by Arendt of Eichmann to be an odd one - most obviously his lack of intelligence is on full display, but there does feel an inherent contradiction between his ability to repeat “officialese”/“stock phrases”/“slogans” consistently whilst having a rather faulty memory outside of his work personally. Similarly, there’s the aspect of Eichmann always “deferring/taking orders” from his superiors, but there is one sole and singular example of disobedience presented that Eichmann performs. It is not quite as clear cut as I think Arendt makes it to be.
- Overall, what Arendt constructs is while convincing (as evidenced by the trial’s numerous psychologists failing to find anything ‘wrong’ with Eichmann per se), it is not beyond reasonable doubt (as the judges disagreed, and in research later it appears that Eichmann was indeed putting on a Jekyll-and-Hyde-esque act for the trial) - and in fact the argument of “thoughtless evil”, or that the appropriate incentives (i.e. a large enough paycheque) again feels more applicable to groups or sections of people rather than the specific example of Eichmann himself, even if Arendt fundamentally states that moral choices exist, even under totalitarianism and when politically powerless.
- The total lack of inward opposition within Germany, both with regard to the Nazi party itself and specifically the Jewish collaboration, greasing the wheels to allow the Final Solution be far smoother and far more successful than it had any right to be - an implicit commentary on the danger faced when trying to fit into a totalitarian society when not a fervent believer/supporter of the regime. Do you take the “secret infiltration” approach and take the risk of having to be more “outwardly Nazi” than the average party member to fit in? Do you simply silently labour under your regular post under the notion of keeping the job away from an actual fanatic believer? Or do you simply withdraw from public life and selfishly save oneself? An atmosphere of terror (with heavy-handed violent reprisals if necessary to maintain terror) has a great psychological effect on the populous and goes some way to explain the “totality of the moral collapse” seen within German, and by extension European society - however even if these adverse circumstances (in the expanded/original book) Arendt points to the relatively passive Danish Resistance movement (more broadly, the concept of non-violent action/resistance) as an antidote to the atmosphere of terror, to both inoculate the ‘indigenous Danish’ population but along with the Reich’s own personnel.
- This reminds me similarly on the USA’s Simple Sabotage Field Manual, recently de-classified, outlining and instructing German-occupied citizens on how to be effective spies and saboteurs through pure malicious incompetence.
- The commentary on being one of the quote-on-quote “regular” people within totalitarian society and both the downside of each common choice of ‘fitting’ with the ‘answer’ of non-violent resistance, specifically in these governments and societies where any sort of organised resistance has been overwhelmingly crushed (and massive reprisals threatened at any sign of re-organisation) is an instructive lesson to take - although one would have to wonder how applicable the Danish resistance it was itself due to the unique nature of its occupation.
- The final bit which I struggled forming a real opinion was the questioning of the trial itself, as despite being the effective catalyst - it feels ’less important’ than the cross-examination of Eichmann itself and the discussion around the Final Solution and society’s rather wholesale cooperation, even if begrudgingly or self-inwardly opposed to the whole ordeal - and even I feel a need to get more background information on this (e.g. the de-Nazification process in general, and what was actually intended for this and the Nuremburg trials to achieve/claimed to have achieved and their actual success in retrospect.)
Lastly, on the book itself - I did find Arendt’s writing style quite difficult to read and parse properly, its fairly clear its been edited and compiled into a book rather than written as one cohesive whole, and there is a lot (even in this abridged version) that remains both controversial (the allegations of Jewish cooperation are rather emphasised, while the fact that those who did resist where summarily killed like any other is glossed over, the fact that Arendt was accused of “blaming the victims” is unsurprising on the re-read) but also… unnecessary? Or at the very least, not all of the ideas come together - but perhaps this is down the “misadvertisement” of the book’s themes as what its famous for is surprisingly unrepresentative of the book as a whole. Whilst extremely thought-provoking as a book, I would struggle to recommended this as a read outside of those who almost certainly have this on their radar already.
