Provocative title, but the quote comes from this piece by Ron Rosenbaum in The Observer. Most of us have heard of the phrase "banality of evil", through its ubiquity in undergraduate humanities seminar discussions. Rosenbaum's argument is essentially twofold - first, that the whole idea of the banality of evil is a "fashionable but vacuous cliché" used in place of any serious consideration of or reflection on the monstrousness of the holocaust and its perpetrators. Secondly, that the basis for the concept comes from Hannah Arendt's credulity in covering the Eichmann trial for the New Yorker. Essentially, it didn't feature in her analysis that Eichmann could be lying to save face.
How much validity is there in either of these arguments? Was Arendt's coverage of the Eichmann trial unreflective, and is her theory of the banality of evil as poor as Rosenbaum is making out?
so your just asking people to weigh in on the debate over Arendt. tl;dr the problem is there is significant debate over what exactly "the banality of evil" actually means
Of course, there are a few problems with this analysis, a few holes in her theory. Even if it were true about Eichmann, for instance, that he was a schnook with no strong feelings just following orders,
That's not how i (and her supporters) read Arendt. Arendt was talking about how he gave up critical thinking and embraced ideology
I'm going to give you a block quote from Cory Robin because it illustrates the opposing view:
Arendt heard this defense, and though she never accepted the notion that Eichmann was an obedient soldier (she thought he was a great deal worse than that), she did conclude that Eichmann had “an inability to think, namely, to think from the standpoint of somebody else.” Eichmann was hermetically sealed off from the world, from the perspective of people who weren’t Nazis. Because the “more decisive flaw in Eichmann’s character was his almost total inability ever to look at anything from the other fellow’s point of view,” he “never realized what he was doing.” He knew he was sending Jews to their death; he just didn’t grasp the moral significance of that act, wherein its evil lay, how others, including his victims and their families, might see it.
This was my takeaway as well (though the other interpretation has been there since the beginning: famously Milgram's experiments were motivated by the other (false) interpretation of Arendt's work. This is the fundamental concern about this debate and deciding who is right pretty much begs the question (though you can always still argue Eichmann was an exception).
So my take on this issue is obviously that the critics are often responding to strawmen but as it continues to be debated there isn't a position of authority on this issue.
http://coreyrobin.com/2014/10/26/dayenu-in-reverse-the-passover-canon-of-arendts-critics/
read through this if you want a counterpoint to the article you read.
Honestly i would consider reposting this asking for a history of Eichman/banality debate. I think more people will respond and the answers will be richer.