Some might argue that the concept of evil is outdated in our relativistic age. And yet—how can we speak of war crimes, cruelty, or the neglect of human dignity without invoking the word evil? Perhaps it’s time to take it seriously again, to revisit the thinkers who have grappled with its meaning.

One of them, of course, is Hannah Arendt.

This is a conversation about Hannah Arendt and the concept of evil, which took place in Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine, on June 1st, at the Kyiv Book Arsenal—one of the country’s major literary events. Despite the ongoing war, the fair was full of people.

My guest was Marci Shore, an American intellectual, historian, and university professor. She specializes in 20th-century European intellectual history, with a particular focus on Hannah Arendt. This year, Marci co-curated the Kyiv Book Arsenal’s focus topic, alongside Oksana Forostyna.

My name is Volodymyr Yermolenko. I’m a Ukrainian philosopher, the editor-in-chief of UkraineWorld, and the president of PEN Ukraine.

UkraineWorld is an English language media outlet about Ukraine run by Internews Ukraine, one of the country’s leading media NGOs.

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Contents:

00:00 Intro

01:18 Support our work

04:44 Why is Hannah Arendt essential to understanding the 20th and 21st centuries?

06:16 What is Hannah Arendt's concept of 'radical evil'?

07:48 How are people made superfluous?

10:12 How has World War II shaped Arendt’s thought?

17:17 From “radical evil” to the “banality of evil”: connecting Arendt’s key concepts.

26:34 Marci Shore on the current situation in America

30:46 Thoughts on human dignity

32:14 Is the idea that 'everyone is replaceable' starting to repeat itself?

34:49 Why Sartre’s idea of “nothingness” might be dangerous?

42:14 Hannah Arendt: vita activa versus vita contemplativa

50:15 Outro