Kant, Arendt and the Eichmann case:

on the Misunderstanding of the Kantian categorical imperative

Abstract

In this article, - I argue that Kant’s thought is decisive for the philosophical construction of Hannah Arendt’s account of the trial of Adolf Eichmann. In the first section, based on Fundamental Principles of Metaphysics of Morals and on Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil, I show how, based on Kant’s work, Arendt analyzes three of Eichmann’s mistakes concerning Kantian morality, they are: the confusion between legality and morality, the absence of will autonomy and the indistinction between actions conform to duty and by duty. In the second section, I show how Arendt builds the thesis that Eichmann is incapable of exercising his faculty of thought, that is, incapable of putting himself in the other’s shoes, of reaching a broader point of view, relying on Kant’s moral philosophy and aesthetics.