Journal of Speculative Philosophy, Vol. 21, No. 3, 2007.

Copyright 2008 The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA.

166
Eichmanns Kant
CARSTEN BAGGE LAUSTSEN AND RASMUS UGILT
Aarhus Universitet
1. Distorted Kantianism
What was most disturbing in Adolf Eichmanns trial in Jerusalem was his claim that
in practice he had followed Kants categorical imperative. Had Arendt not stated
that Eichmann was incapable of moral reection, that his obedience was blind?
Arendt believed that Eichmanns being expressed a banality of evil, that is, an evil
emanating not from a will (to do evil) but from a lack of thinking. Eichmann was
not a pathological criminal; banality was a quality of his being rather than of his
evil, which was monstrous (Arendt 1978a, 4). Eichmann followed the law but did
so blindly, without ethical reection. He chose not to measure his acts up against
moral standards. But how could he then consider himself to be a Kantian? Moreover,
how can it at all be of interest to someone concerned with Kantian moral philosophy
to deal with the challenge lurking in Eichmanns claim to Kantianism?
It is important to note that Arendt tells us that Eichmann distorted Kants
categorical imperative. She does not claim that Eichmanns use of Kant had totally
failed. At any rate, Eichmann needed to legitimize his acts, and he did this by
expressing veneration for Kants moral philosophy. Of course all ethical doctrines
can be distorted, and the idea that Kants philosophy paved the way for the Holocaust
is absurd. In fact, one could argue that the ethical project of Nazism was more
communitarian than deontological in nature. Our point, however, is a different
one: by investigating Eichmanns distortion one can illuminate and rephrase the
crucial requirements of a Kantian ethics. In this we proceed, in line with other
postfoundational approaches, via negativa. Eichmann is investigated as the nega-
tive other of Kantian moral philosophy, an other that the Kantian philosopher
must necessarily consider in order to position him- or herself critically.
1
Critical should here be understood in the proper Kantian sense, meaning
the endeavor reason undertakes in order to come to terms with itself. Coming to
terms with oneself does not mean nding an absolute or secure foundation but,
rather, realizing the aporias inherent in ones own being. Thus the Kantian critical
project is a project of nding the limits within which reason is able to operate
free of aporias. In the present context of moral philosophy this could easily be
taken as the project of nding a way for the actualization of the moral law, of
P S J
JSP 21-3_02.indd 166 5/16/08 12:43:50 PM
167
EICHMANNS KANT
giving reason room to be active in the phenomenal world. In this way Eichmann
seems to be an instance where morality has completely failed in becoming thus
actualized. As we shall see it is rather the opposite that is the case: the story of
Eichmann is a story of how the moral law is all too easily actualized.
The possibility for Eichmanns distortion is already given in the rst
formulation of the categorical imperative (to make ones maxim a universal law).
The moral law is not obeyed for specic causes but solely because it is a law. The
moral act is to be understood not as an expression of the good but as pure duty:
your duty is . . . to do your duty (iek 1996, 79). This, for Eichmann, became
the duty to follow the Fhrers will. Precisely because this duty was imperative
(categorical) he could avoid thinking. For him there existed no difference between
the Fhrers will and the moral law or, in more general terms, between legality and
morality. He could thus recognize his subjection to Hitlers will as an unproblematic
act. He had personally sworn him the oath of allegiance, and this included an
obligation toward his word of command (Arendt 1992, 149). The Fhrers word
was given immediately and imperatively. It had the power of the law (Gesetzkraft)
and hence was not to be doubted (Arendt 1992, 148).
2
What is central here, however, is the role of moral psychology in Kant. There
is a connection in Kant between the moral law and the recognition of guilt and sin.
What drives the moral subject is a feeling of never having acted morally enough.
The moral subject is always in decit. In contrast, Eichmann could be absolutely
secure in his conviction that what he did was the right thing, because for him practical
reason had emerged and come to terms with itself in the gure of the Fhrer.
The distortion Eichmann makes of Kantianism is therefore not simply
one of misinterpretation; nor is it one of simply defecting from various crucial
tenets within Kants moral philosophy (although it might justly be argued that
Eichmann indeed does both). The real challenge of Eichmanns Kant is found in
the idea that Eichmann in a sense establishes an actual fulllment of the project
of Kantian moral philosophy. He successfully integrates the universal moral law
in the particular and phenomenal (in the gure of the Fhrer), thus allowing
reason to come to terms with itself as practical reason. Eichmann thereby gives
us a second challenge to Kantian moral philosophy, the rst being the problem
of how reason is able to become actualized in the phenomenal world once we
have accepted that the categorical imperative is the adequate expression of the
will as guided by reason. The second challenge of Eichmann, on the other hand,
tells us that once we have established a way for reason to come to terms with
itself as a functioning practical reason in the phenomenal world, we are exactly
not morally secured.
Only a few social theorists have reflected on the relation between
Kantianism and Nazism. We meet this theme in Arendts diagnostic philosophy,
specically in her discussion of Eichmanns morality. A similar reection is
central to Horkheimer and Adornos Dialektik der Aufklrung (2001, 88127),
to Lacans Kant avec Sade (1971) and his (1992) seminar on ethics, and nally
JSP 21-3_02.indd 167 5/16/08 12:43:51 PM
168
CARSTEN BAGGE LAUSTSEN AND RASMUS UGILT
to ieks (1997, 4585, 21342, 1999) social theory. In this article we relate
Arendts reection to the Lacanian approach, which understands the distortion
of Kantianism in the light of Marquis de Sades practice and thought. Although
the concept of Sadism traditionally refers to a subject who nds enjoyment in
inicting pain on others, this description does not t Arendts characterization
of Eichmanns evil as banal, as an evil that cannot be reduced to pathology. If,
however, the Sadist is conceptualized as one who instrumentalizes oneself for
a master, as Lacan and iek do, this brings us closer to Arendts description
of Eichmanns obedience to the Fhrer. Thus we nd that the suspension of the
self brings the references to Kant, Sade, and Nazism together. Signicantly in
this respect, Lacan and iek work in a paradigm almost identical to Arendts.
Almost! Because as we shall see there are also crucial differences that need to
be addressed in order for us to get at an adequate understanding of Kants moral
philosophy. These differences are condensed in the problem of evil, wherefore
we must investigate the various stances taken by Lacan, iek, and Arendt toward
the problem of evil.
2. The Unselsh Evil: Banal, Radical, or Demonic?
In the trial Eichmann could quote the categorical imperative in a more or less cor-
rect form: I meant by my remark about Kant that the principle of my will must
always be such that it can become the principle of general laws (quoted in Arendt
1992, 136). He went on to claim that he had read Kants Kritik der praktischen
Vernunft (1974). Further, he explained that he ceased to live according to Kantian
principles at the moment when he was given his task in the Endlsung. Hereafter, he
would nd reconciliation in the idea that he was not in control of his own actions.
However, Arendt does not fully accept Eichmanns claim that he had left Kantian
principles behind; the act of depositing his conscience in the Fhrer was a conse-
quence of his Kantianism. Arendt writes on Eichmanns use of the categorical
imperative that Eichmann had . . . distorted it to read: Act as if the principle of
your actions were the same as that of the legislator or of the law of the landor,
in Hans Franks formulation of the categorical imperative in the Third Reich,
which Eichmann might have known: Act in such a way that the Fhrer, if he
knew your action, would approve it (1992, 136). Eichmanns distortion of the
categorical imperative is consistent with what Arendt and Eichmann himself call
a version of Kant for the household use of the little man (Arendt 1992, 136). In
this respect Arendt (1992, 242) is aware that Eichmann describes himself as an
idealist: as a man who lived for his idea and was ready to sacrice everything
for it, including his family and himself. He was, because he was idealist, ready
to obey all orders. He had feelings and needs, but they should retreat if they came
into conict with his idea (Arendt 1992, 42). Or to see the same problematic
from a slightly different angle, with a notably commending (categorical and
JSP 21-3_02.indd 168 5/16/08 12:43:51 PM
169
EICHMANNS KANT
imperative) form: And just as the law in civilized countries assumes that the voice
of conscience tells everybody Thou shalt not kill, even though mans natural
desires and inclinations may at times be murderous, so the law of Hitlers land
demanded that the voice of conscience tell everybody: Thou shalt kill, although
the organizers of the massacres knew full well that murder is against the normal
desires and inclinations of most people (Arendt 1992, 150). Nazism could thus
interpret killing as a moral act. It was an act where one bracketed ones subjective
preferences and considerations, an act that could thus be understood as ethical.
The question is whether this feeling of duty toward the Fhrerthe readiness to
killand Eichmanns Kantianism are not in reality of a piece. Following Hans
Franks translation of the categorical imperative the answer is yes. Just as Kan-
tianism demands the complete disregard of all selsh considerations and motives,
the Fhrer demanded that everybody unselshly work for the Fatherland. What
was disquieting regarding Eichmanns evil was, according to Arendt, the fact that
it was without personal motives. He did not want to do evil, but following the
Fhrers will implied an evil of the most radical kind. As Bernstein emphasizes
in his Radical Evil (2002, 218), Eichmanns evil did not originate in evil motives.
Instead, it originated in a curious lack of thought (Bernstein 2002, 219).
What Eichmann did was to distort the categorical imperative by
understanding it as a rule to be followed blindly. Arendt claims that the idea of
this banal evil (referring to the thoughtlessness of his rule following) breaks with
her former more metaphysical understanding of the radical evil in The Origins
of Totalitarianism (1973, 245; see also Bernstein 1996, 137ff.). Whereas radical
evil has a depth, banal evil is a surface phenomenon (Arendt 1978b, 251) based
on lack of thinking, judgment, and will to act politically (Arendt 1978a, 34). If
we, however, underline that Eichmann acted according to a principle and out of
duty, there opens up an obvious relation to the characterization of the evil in The
Origins of Totalitarianism. Both kinds of evil are unselsh. It is prevalent, and
consistent with Arendts own claims, to differentiate between banal and radical
evil. Indeed most scholarly accounts on Arendts understanding of evil stress the
differences between the two concepts.
3
However, here it is urgent to stress some
similarities between the two concepts. For this comparison a short outline of
Arendts concept of radical evil is necessary.
Radical evil emerges in a system in which the human being is made
superuous, that is, reduced to an object that can be replaced by any other ( Arendt
1973, 438, 457). Arendt stresses, therefore, that the crimes of the Nazis were
crimes against humanity and not just against the Jews (Bernstein 2002, 217).
This fundamental offence against the humanity of the human being sets new stan-
dards for hitherto seen evils, which is why it is radical. Such evil is hard to grasp.
The philosophical tradition and Christianity have always understood evil as being
determined by a lack, as a secondary phenomenon that can be eliminated (Arendt
1973, 459). The Holocaust, in contrast, expresses an explicitly evil will that cannot
be understood in other ways than simply as evil. Paradoxically it might in fact
JSP 21-3_02.indd 169 5/16/08 12:43:51 PM
170
CARSTEN BAGGE LAUSTSEN AND RASMUS UGILT
be Arendts most radical take on the question of evil to claim that evil is rst and
foremost evil (and not a aw). Arendts thesis on radical evil consists of several
mutually connected elements. First, she claims that the radical evil is radical in
the sense that it is beyond human cognition. It is also radical in the sense of being
unforgivable and irreconcilable (Arendt 1973, 433, 459, 1994, 1314). She does
not claim this on the basis of the numbers of those killed but, instead, with refer-
ence to why they were killed. Following this, the radical in radical evil emanates
from the fact that there was no reason to kill the Jews. The Holocaust broke with
every utilitarian doctrine and with the idea that every human being has an inherent
value. The concentration camps stood as the symbol of this radical evil: It is not
only the non-utilitarian character of the camps themselvesthe senselessness of
punishing completely innocent people, the failure to keep them in a condition so
that protable work might be extorted from them, the superuousness of fright-
ening a completely subdued populationwhich gives them their distinctive and
disturbing qualities, but their anti-utilitarian function, the fact that not even the
supreme emergencies of military activities were allowed to interfere with these
demographic policies. It was as though the Nazis were convinced that it was of
greater importance to run extermination factories than to win the war (Arendt
1994, 233). Such principled evil had not been seen before. It is striking that the
Nazis increased the speed of the extermination of Jews when they started to lose
the war and thereby wasted decisive resources that could have been employed
in the war. It was as if their idealism mattered most, even more than their own
lives and the fate of Germany. Following this diagnosis Arendt criticizes Kant for
remaining wholly within the Western philosophical tradition, within which we
cannot conceive of a radical evil (1973, 459).
This critique of Kant is important for various reasons. First of all there is a
terminological problem here. Arendt writes of Kant that he is the only philosopher
who, in the word he coined for it [radical evil], at least must have suspected the
existence of this evil [radical evil in Arendts sense] even though he immediately
rationalized it in the concept of a perverted ill will that could be explained by
comprehensible motives (1973, 459). The problem is that Kant never intended to
use the signier radical evil to denominate the concept of a principled evil, such
as the one Arendt nds in the camps. For such an evil for the sake of evil alone
Kant uses another term: demonic evil. This demonic evil seems to t Arendts
concept of radical evil like a glove. Kant therefore did not just coin the term Arendt
is looking for and proceed to use it differently; he in fact coined another term
and used it in exactly the way Arendt thought he had missed. However, Kant then
went on to deny the possibility of the demonical, and thus Arendt is right in her
critique despite the terminological confusion. The reason for Kants denial of the
demonical is important though, as should be obvious from the following.
The project of Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten can be adequately
understood as the project of determining characteristics of a good will. This project
nds its solution in the categorical imperative. The beauty of this solution is the
JSP 21-3_02.indd 170 5/16/08 12:43:51 PM
171
EICHMANNS KANT
explicit inexplicitness of this imperative. In the rst formulation the categorical
imperative tells us that our will is good as long as we can will that the maxim of
our action should be a universal law. The categorical imperative thus does not tell us
what we should will, let alone what the universal law might be; it only tells us that
we should be able to universalize the maxims of our actions in the way mentioned
above. If we are able to will that the maxim for our action should be a universal
law, then we can be sure that the maxim is a good one. It is thus the very principled
character of the will that is to guarantee that the will is good. Therefore, demonic
evil is a concept the reality of which Kant must deny if he is to maintain the analysis
of the good will given in the Grundlegung. He (2003, B 32) simply states that it
does not apply to human beings. Arendts claim against Kant should consequently
be understood as the claim that history has proven Kant wrong. In Auschwitz she
nds exactly the kind of evil that Kant denies: a will that is principled in the way
that it is free from any pathological desires. The killing of the Jews in Auschwitz
was done for the sake of the deed itself. Bernstein further sharpens this claim by
stating that we cannot have a truly Kantian understanding of human freedom without
admitting that demonic evil is possible: There is no free choice (Willkr) unless
there is the free choice to be morally evil, and even devilish (2002, 42).
4
We are
thus in need of not two but three concepts of evil as radical, banal, and demonic.
How do these concepts relate and intertwine?
In hindsight one could claim that both radical evil and banal evil in Arendts
perspective are exercised without utilitarian rationalizations and considerations.
Eichmanns idealism mirrors here the idealism of the Nazi ideology. Both built
on invariable and fundamental principles. In Nazism acts were prescribed as
moral acts aiming to realize Gods kingdom on earth. Similarly, Eichmann
considered himself to be a moral human being bound to a higher mission. In
both cases one is subjected to a higher master; one shows ones obedience by
giving way to what one nds immediately unacceptable, for instance, killing.
The unacceptable nature of the acts serves as a proof of the unselshness and
hence morality of the acts.
One could conceive of the banal and the radical aspects of Nazisms evil
as two sides of the same coin: the banal evil denes the executioners, while the
radical evil describes the actions the victims are exposed to. What is, then, the
name of this coin, if it is not the demonic evil? Both radical evil and banal evil
are evils performed on principle and thus t the description of the demonic. The
question is then where this leaves us Kantian moral philosophers; can there be
anything left of Kantian moral philosophy if demonic evil is admitted?
To answer this question we will start anew the discussion of the relationship
between evil and Kantianism, focusing this time on Lacans and ieks takes on
the possibilities of distorting the categorical imperative. Here, again, the discussion
has the concept of demonic evil as its nodal point, but this time the conclusion is
the opposite of the previous one: neither Eichmann nor Nazism seems to follow
a purely demonic principle.
JSP 21-3_02.indd 171 5/16/08 12:43:51 PM
172
CARSTEN BAGGE LAUSTSEN AND RASMUS UGILT
3. Kant with Sade
What interests Lacan in Kants moral philosophy is primarily the notion of
conscience or the inner voice. The inner voice is that which utters the categorical
imperative in the morally just person. In other words Lacan is not concerned with
the question of the goodness of the will, with which Kant was preoccupied. His
prime interest is instead the question of what it tells us of the subject that it is able
to abide by the unconditional sollen (should) of Kants categorical imperative. As
we mentioned above the unconditionedness of the Kantian duty is found in the
idea that what duty prescribes simply is to do ones duty.
In order to appreciate the full impact of the Lacanian intervention into Kantian
moral philosophy we must remind ourselves of what was previously mentioned about
the general project of Kants critique of practical reason. The critique of practical
reason is (again) understood as the project of reason coming to terms with itself as
practical reason. Coming to terms with oneself should be understood in the way of
nding unity within the self. The idea of a practical reason coming to terms with
itself is therefore an idea of a possible unity within the human subject as a practical
or acting subject. The function of the categorical imperative in establishing this unity
should be evident from the following consideration. The categorical imperative tells
us that we should only act in such a way that we can will that the maxim behind
our action should be a universal law. The will expressed in the maxim should, in
other words, be in concord with the will that wills the maxim as a universal law.
If will is in discord with itself, and the will of the maxim needs to separate itself
from the will that wills universalization in order still to be willing the same, then
the act is morally inexcusable (i.e., I want to steal but cannot at the same time will
that it should be a universal law that one should steal when one wants to). In the
morally justied act, however, one is able to will both what is expressed in the
maxim behind the act and that the maxim should be a universal law. In such an act
the will is in concord with itself; the willing subject is a unity.
Against such an idea of a unied subject Lacan demonstrates that Kants
moral subject is indeed decentered. This he nds expressed in the ability of the
subject to abide the unconditional demand of the inner voice; he thus argues
that this voice has the character of a superego that bombards the subject with
demands impossible to fulll (iek 1991, 232). This diagnosis brings Lacans
Kant close to Marquis de Sade inasmuch as Sade denes Sadism not only as the
act of hurting the victim but also as acts performed to satisfy a higher masters
will. The Kantian superego (the inner voice or conscience) is, Lacan argues, a
manifestation of such a master. The Sadean executioner is acting in an ethical
way by attempting to please a master with no mercy.
Lacan claims that Sade is more honest than Kant for he openly admits the
decentering of the subject (it is split in a subject giving and a subject obeying the
law). Sade suggests a maxim that should be followed in the same unconditional
way as the Kantian imperative demands; this maxim prescribes everybodys
JSP 21-3_02.indd 172 5/16/08 12:43:52 PM
173
EICHMANNS KANT
search for unlimited enjoyment (Lacan 1992, 79). In this search everybody has
free access to everybodys body: I have the right of enjoyment over your body,
anyone can say to me, and I will exercise this right, without any limit stopping
me in the capriciousness of the exaction that I might have the taste to satiate
(Sade, quoted in Lacan 1990, 58). As mentioned, this caricature of the imperative
is not meant to say anything about the goodness of the will; nor is it (at rst) to
be understood as a critique in the sense that it drives Kants imperative to its own
reductio ad absurdum (i.e., what is said is: look, this maxim accommodates the
demands of the categorical imperative, and yet it leads to hideous acts). Instead
Sades caricature is useful as an explicitation of what is going on when the subject
abides an unconditional demand (such as Kants imperative).
Sades caricature consists of two elements. A rst we have the maxim: Ev-
erybody should search for unlimited enjoyment. This is an expression in the third
person, who is disinterested and universal. On the other hand, the second part is
formulated in the rst person (I have the right . . .), who is particular and bound
to the individual desire. The argument of the Sadist goes, Because the maxim
of unlimited enjoyment is universalized, I have the right . . .; however, being so
universalized the maxim is no longer uttered by the subject who claims to have
the right: The subject who gives the law is not the same subject who enjoys. There
must be some differentiation between the subject of the utterance (here the I)
and the subject of the enunciation (here the superego). Lacan writes: The Sadian
maxim, by pronouncing itself from the mouth of the Other, is more honest than
appealing to the voice within, since it unmasks the splitting, usually conjured
away, of the subject (1990, 59).
Kants ethics refuses the earlier signposts for ethical life: ethics does not
look for happiness, the golden middle, hygiene, the good, and so on any longer.
What is left is only the principle of formal law. This law creates an abyss that
cannot be lled with a concrete given substance. What remains is only the criterion
for moral action, the criterion of universalization. Following this, one version of
the categorical imperative is: Since I have robbed the will of all impulses which
could come to it from obedience to any law, nothing remains to serve as a principle
of the will except universal conformity of its actions to law as such. That is,
I should never act in such a way that I could not also will that my maxim should
be a universal law (Kant 1969, 21). There is, however, a pathological object
that persists: the voice of conscience. Lacan shows that this object is precisely
the object of Sadist desire. Formalism and the pathological, therefore, do not
necessarily exclude each other. Hence Lacans commentary on Kants philosophy:
the Sadist works for the enjoyment of the master in the same way as the moral
subject subjects him- or herself to the conscience.
If a moral act is solely determined by its form, and if this form is given by
an imperative to obey a superego command, then the problem becomes how to
decide whether this duty is enunciated by a good or a bad master (Zupancic 2000,
9293). If the criterion for moral action is the feeling of being addressed by an
JSP 21-3_02.indd 173 5/16/08 12:43:52 PM
174
CARSTEN BAGGE LAUSTSEN AND RASMUS UGILT
externalized voice, it follows that any externalized order can be experienced as
being moral. This brings us back to Eichmann or, rather, to the duty the Fhrer
imposed on Eichmann. It is in this context that Sade is interesting as an example
of a person who, as Eichmann, is evil out of principle: a photographic negative
of a saint (iek 1997, 228).
Sade conceived of himself as a libertine and therefore was not aware that
his search for freedom necessitated a law to be transgressed. Sade formulated his
principle of everybodys right to enjoyment in Kantian terms (Lacan 1971, 125)
but in such a way that the laws castrating impact was not felt. The demand for
unlimited enjoyment, as any other categorical imperative, could be universalized.
Everybody should enjoy the body of everyone without limitations. However, the
problem with the moral law, as with every other law, was that it was necessarily
perceived as a limitation. Sades solution to this problem was to (re)formulate
Kants categorical imperative in such a way that it universalizes transgression.
Sades republicanism gives a law that does not constrain (Sample 1995, 12).
Transgression is its principle.
Kant, however, can also illuminate Sade by stressing that the universal
maxim and the particular tendencies are always conicting. It always takes one
further attempt to realize ones freedom. Thus, it reads in Sades bedroom phi-
losophy: Frenchmen, yet another effort if you want to be republicans . . . (Lacan
1990, 58). For Kant, similarly, it is impossible to obey the law (the categorical
imperative), for the one who acts will never fully be able to bracket his or her
own motivations. The law will thus always be understood as a tension between the
universal and the particular, and what mediates between the two is the experience
of guilt (Copjec 1996, xiiixvi). In Kritik der reinen Vernunft, Kant thus writes
that the real morality of actions, their merit or their guilt, even that of our own
conduct, thus remain[s] entirely hidden from us. Our imputations can refer only
to their empirical character. How much of this character is ascribable to the pure
effect of freedom, how much to mere nature, that is to faults of temperament . . .
can never be determined and upon it therefore no perfectly just judgment can be
passed (1965, 475).
In his theory of religion Kant (2003, 2748, 9495) sharpens this approach
further by claiming that human beings have a tendency toward (radical) evil,
which constitutes the doctrine of original sin previously mentioned. We are not
fully able to avoid acting with evil intentions. But this is not necessarily bad
news. It is precisely the recognition of guilt that, as a human condition, makes
ethical life possible. The moral law makes itself known through the experience
of guilt. Our moral faults demonstrate that we are moral agents and that we are
free (iek 1997, 230).
Whereas refraining from our desires for Kant works as a proof of
the morality of our actions, the victims feeling of pain for Sade works as the
condition for universal enjoyment (Sample 1995, 12). The Sadist remains,
despite the will to total freedom, a slave to desire, an enslavement that most
JSP 21-3_02.indd 174 5/16/08 12:43:52 PM
175
EICHMANNS KANT
clearly shows itself in the importance of having ones enjoyment ratied
through the victims expressions of pain (Sample 1995, 12).
5
For both Kant
and Sade a tension between the universal (morality and enjoyment) and the
particular (guilt and pain) is unavoidable. Both Kant and Lacan thus recognize
that the law must be primary (categorical, castrating). The point of departure
is not the individual desire, which is then limited by the law. The opposite is
the case. The law institutes desire (Lacan), or the moral law enables moral
action (Kant). In both cases an imperative takes precedence. Whereas for Kant
the categorical imperative says, Do your duty! for Sade it says, Enjoy!
(MacCannell 1996, 54). Both paradoxically relate this imperative demand to
human freedom. Both Kants and Sades philosophies are republican: whereas
Sade consolidates the idea that true republicanism always necessitates one
more try, Kant emphasizes that the moral subject never feels moral enough.
Where Sades subject seeks complete enjoyment, Kants subject aims at the
moral perfection. For both the complete and perfect freedom seems to fade
away on the horizon.
4. Duty
For Kant the moral law appears only negatively as the experience of guilt. That
one can never live up to the ethical demand, the a priori guilt, is what Kant (2003,
9495) understands as radical evil (iek 1997, 28). It is a guilt that originates
in the fact that the human being can freely choose evil. Without this radical evil
the moral law would have to phenomenologize itself in positive precepts and
would thus become a codex that one then could follow blindly (iek 1997,
22829; Zupancic 2000, 2960). Eichmann does not accept this radical evil; his
conscience is pure. He does not accept that he has his own will, which is why
he does not feel a need for moral reection. The problem regarding the question
of will is the following: What made it possible for the Nazis to torture and kill
millions of Jews was not simply that they thought they were gods, and could
therefore decide who would live and who would die, but the fact that they saw
themselves as instruments of God (or some other Idea), who had already decided
who could live and who must die. Indeed, what is most dangerous is not an in-
signicant bureaucrat who thinks he is God but, rather, the God who pretends
to be an insignicant bureaucrat. One could even say that, for the subject, the
most difcult thing is to accept that, in a certain sense, she is God, that she has
a choice (Zupancic 2000, 97). And we have the same problem regarding the
question of moral reection:
It is therefore wrong to conceive the Kantian categorical imperative as a kind of
formal mould whose application to a concrete case relieves the moral subject of
the responsibility for a decision: I am not sure if to accomplish the act X is my
duty or not. No problemI test it by submitting it to the double formal criterion
JSP 21-3_02.indd 175 5/16/08 12:43:52 PM
176
CARSTEN BAGGE LAUSTSEN AND RASMUS UGILT
implied by the categorical imperative (Can this act be universalized? Does it treat
other human beings also as ends in themselves, not only as means?), and if the
act X stands the test, I know where my duty lies. . . . The whole point of Kantian
argumentation is the exact opposite of this automatic procedure of verication:
the fact that the categorical imperative is an empty form means precisely that it
can deliver no guarantee against misjudging our duty. (iek 1996, 170)
As claimed by many writers, almost every maxim can be formulated in a uni-
versalizing form so that the principle of noncontradiction is upheld (Allison
1996, 180; Zupancic 2000, 9293). Sade formulated the maxim on everybodys
right to unlimited enjoyment and Frank formulated the duty toward the Fhrer
as categorical imperatives. What is missed here, however, is that Kants moral
philosophy does not deliver a test that may be used to check the morality of acts.
The categorical imperative gives no guarantees and does not free us from the
responsibility of exercising our freedom.
We can now specify exactly the meaning of Kants Du kannst, denn du
sollst!you can because you must (iek 1997, 222). No reference to a duty can
be accepted as an excuse. If one refers to duty in doing ones duty, one sees that
one precisely should act out of duty (aus Picht and not pichtmssig [Zupancic
2000, 1316]). The ethical praxis is always linked to a subjective element, a will,
which must be acknowledged. The difference between acting dutifully and acting
out of duty can be used to clarify in which way Eichmann is mistaken in his use
of Kants categorical imperative. iek insists in this context that Eichmanns
sadism is a clear break from Kantian doctrine: What we encounter here is the
properly perverse attitude of adopting the position of the pure instrument of the
big Others Will: its not my responsibility, its not me who is effectively doing it,
I am merely an instrument of the higher Historical Necessity. . . . The obscene
jouissance of this situation is generated by the fact that I conceive of myself as
exculpated from what I am doing: isnt it nice to be able to inict pain on others
in the full awareness that Im not responsible for it, that I am merely fullling the
Others Will . . . this is what Kantian ethics prohibits (1997, 222). Eichmann does
not want to take responsibility for the enjoyment he gets by subjecting himself to
the Fhrer. He does not want to be held responsible for his own dehumanization.
And he does not want to acknowledge that he had a choice. In this respect it seems
that neither the banal nor the radical evil can describe Eichmanns actions. In his
work on religion, as mentioned before, Kant introduces the notion of diabolical
evil, which is not given as a lack or aw (classical evil) or as an a priori tendency
toward evil (radical evil) but, rather, as an evil that is elevated to the status of an
ethical norm. Sades hero is a perfect example of such a person, and his bonheur
dans le mal, the formula of the diabolical evil.
6
But is this diabolical evil possible? No, at least not if Eichmann is the
test. He did in fact work for a particular good, for the Fhrer and for the Aryan
community. The target of criticism should hence not be Kants formalism. The
problem is rather that the moral law was for Nazism not transcendent enough.
JSP 21-3_02.indd 176 5/16/08 12:43:52 PM
177
EICHMANNS KANT
Eichmann did not act out of duty and only out of duty but for the German
Fatherland, which was given as the ultimate good in the ideological universe of
Nazism (iek 1997, 23135). In this context the strength of Kantian ethics lies
precisely in its undecidabilitythe moral law does not tell me what my duty is, it
only tells me that I must do my duty: The ethical subject bears full responsibility
for the concrete universal norms he followsthat is to say, the only guarantor
of the universality of positive moral norms is the subjects own contingent act
of performatively assuming these norms (iek 1997, 221). Subjectivity and
universality are thus intertwined in a Kantian ethics. Universality is abstract
and formal, but precisely therefore it must necessarily be translated or, rather,
positioned for itself (fr sich). This positioning is the responsibility of the subject.
Ethics for itself can, however, only be positioned on the condition that the
subject negates every/any particularistic grounding for his or her actions so that
the reference to duty is the only motive of the action. It is signicant here to
stress what this does not mean. The point is not that the subject is always bound
to his or her lifeworld and experiencesthat the ethical subject always relates
to subjective factors such as prejudices and interests that he or she carries into
the moral situation. Instead, it is the responsibility of the subject to translate the
ethical precepts to concrete actions; the subject is in fact born in this translation
(Zupancic 2000, 6162).
What does this, then, mean for Kantian ethics itself? What have we learned
from Eichmanns distortion of the categorical imperative? In which sense is sadism,
Eichmanns instrumentalization of himself, the truth of Kants ethics? Or, more
precisely, what does Eichmanns distortion of the categorical imperative consist
of, and what does it tell us?
Sade is not the entire truth of Kantian ethics, but a form of its perverted
realization. In short, far from being more radical than Kant, Sade articulates
what happens when the subject betrays the true stringency of Kantian ethics.
Sade is thus the truth of Kant in so far as we interpret the Kantian ethical
imperative as an objectivized apparatus establishing what our duty is (so that we
can use it as an excuse. What can I do, the categorical imperative tells me this
is my duty!); however, in so far as duty itself cannot serve as an excuse to do
ones duty, Sade (the sadist perversion) is no longer the truth of Kantian ethics.
This difference is crucial in its political consequences: in so far as the libidinal
structure of totalitarian regimes is perverse (the totalitarian subject assumes
the position of the object-instrument of the Others jouissance),that is, as call-
ing on him to assume full responsibility for what he proclaims his Dutythen
Kant is the anti-totalitarian par excellence. (iek 1999, 29697)
If we remind ourselves again of what was said in the beginning, the general project
of a Kantian moral philosophy, understood as a critique of practical reason, is
to allow reason to come to terms with itself as practical. It was then pointed out
that this project is exactly not to be understood as the establishment of a unied
reasonable (reason-giving and reason-abiding at once) subjectivity free of any
JSP 21-3_02.indd 177 5/16/08 12:43:52 PM
178
CARSTEN BAGGE LAUSTSEN AND RASMUS UGILT
aporias. What we have seen through the course of this article is the predicament
that emerges for practical reason (predicaments that have had some very real
historical consequences) as soon as this crucial point is forgotten. A critique
of practical reason can never be a project of establishing a secure foundation
for human beings engaged in practical matters; it can never found an ultimate
guarantee for morality.
Eichmann therefore becomes the (perverted) truth of Kantian ethics, where
the categorical imperative is taken to be the ultimate test of the morality of an
action. It is the very idea of an ultimate tribunal of reason that once and for all
establishes the morality or immorality of various acts that needs to be left out if
Kantian ethics is to be able to come to terms with itself.
Notes
1. In his Radical Evil (2002) Richard Bernstein follows a similar path in the chapter on Kant. One
of Bernsteins crucial points is that, once one delves into his reections on radical evil, it turns out
that Kant struggles a great deal himself with his own negative other. As the title of the chapter claims,
Kant is in fact at war with himself (Bernstein 2002, 11ff.). Bernstein (2002, 33, 43) illuminates the
paradoxes that govern Kants philosophy of evil, but he also claims that it is exactly in considering
these paradoxes that one discovers the true novelty of Kants moral philosophy. As mentioned, it is a
somewhat similar strategy that we are following in this article. However, our approach differs from
Bernsteins in that we include Lacans reading of Kant with Sade. In doing this we bring out some
crucial aspects of Kantian moral psychology that are not easily seen otherwise.
2. Eichmanns distortion of the categorical imperative is multifaceted, and here, by way of
introduction, some of the decisive deviations from a genuine Kantianism can be mentioned. What is
central in this respect is that the distinction between the moral law and the human law (the f hrers
law) collapses in Eichmanns use. This seems to be inconsistent with the categorical imperative Kant
understands to be universal and transhistorical and therefore independent of spatiotemporal factors
and especially of individual interests. The moral law has to be phenomenalized in concrete situations
and thus in practice, but the moral as such must never be reduced to these appearances. In Nazism,
moral practice was to fulll the Fhrers will and serve the Nazi movement. In Kant, moral judgment
is universal. Morality is not bound to heteronymous laws; it is autonomous. However, this way of
separating Eichmann from Kantianism proper is not as straightforward as it might immediately seem.
As Bernstein (2002, 3637) notes, there are plenty of formulations to be found in Kants writings
that would lend support to such a totalitarian interpretation. Kant eagerly argued against the right of
rebellion and noted that it is the peoples duty to endure even the most intolerable abuse of supreme
authority (quoted in Bernstein 2002, 37). Nevertheless, we agree with Bernstein that it would be
unfair to criticize Kant for failing to predict the horrors that followed from the abuse of supreme
authority in the twentieth century. Therefore we shall not make use of remarks such as the one quoted
above in our analysis. Our point is in a sense much more radical. We question whether there is some
(distorted) truth to Eichmanns claimed Kantianism.
Still, it should be noted that there are obvious reasons why Eichmanns distortion of Kant
is a distortion. That becomes apparent once it is realized that in Nazism the Fhrers Law was the
universal law. In Nazism the tension between the universal and the particular was abolished, and thus
the Fhrers will expressed the universal truth, a truth that could be recognized by those with a unique
insight, that is, by Aryans. The idea of ascribing moral capacity to a denite group while denying it to
another has, of course, nothing to do with a Kantian ethics. Further, the Nazi imperative to obey the
Fhrers word and to kill the Jews cannot be universalized. If anything, murder cannot be united with
Kants categorical imperative in its second formulation: you should act in such a way that humanity
JSP 21-3_02.indd 178 5/16/08 12:43:53 PM
179
EICHMANNS KANT
in your own and in any others personality is always treated as an end and not as a means. The human
being has, in other words, an intrinsic value for Kant.
3. Bernstein is again an exception to this rule. In Radical Evil (2002, 218) he even claims that
the banality of evil cannot be understood unless one presupposes the concept of radical evil. And in
his earlier work on Arendt he (1996) explicitly deals with the question of whether Arendt changed
her mind in going from a discussion of radical evil in The Origins of Totalitarianism to the discussion
of the banality of evil in Eichmann in Jerusalem. Here he quite emphatically denies that Arendt in
any way should have distanced herself from the ideas that were central to her analysis of radical evil
as she went on to focus on the banality of evil. The point being that what happened, in Bernsteins
view, was more of a change of focus. Where radical evil was meant to signify that which happens
when human beings are made superuous, the banality of evil describes the thoughtlessness of a
perpetrator such as Eichmann (Bernstein 1996, 152).
4. It should be praised here that Bernstein makes a virtue of stressing the importance of the
post-Kantian philosopher who most forcefully points this out: Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling.
Although Schelling is most often discarded as a more or less irrelevant romanticist philosopher,
who at best provides a step on the way from Kant to Hegel, Bernstein (see, e.g., 2002, 8182,
95100) insists that Schelling introduces a way of questioning the problem of evil that takes us
far beyond both of these philosophers and furthermore that he paved the way for thinkers such as
Nietzsche and Freud.
5. Lacan illustrates this through an example of a sadist who has found a stoic as his victim. The
stoic responds to the humiliations and torture merely by asserting in an indifferent way: you broke
my arm, you cut my nger, you hurt my skin. . . . The sadist is dependent on the victim expressing
displeasure to be able to enjoy it, and nothing is therefore as disturbing to him as the indifference of
the stoic that breaks his fantasy (Lacan 1992, 60; Sample 1995, 12).
6. With Sades maxim it is no longer possible to differentiate between the good and the evil
masters commands, and the absence of this distinction is precisely diabolical evil (iek 1997, 229;
Zupancic 2000, 92). To those who would like to know their duty with certainty Sades philosophy is
the answer. The Sadist is precisely the one who is certain what his or her duty is (iek 1997, 7071;
Zupancic 2000, 5862).
Works Cited
Allison, Henry E. 1996. Idealism and Freedom. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Arendt, Hannah. 1973. The Origins of Totalitarianism. New York: Harcourt Brace and Company.
. 1978a [1971]. The Life of Mind, one-vol. ed. San Diego: Harcourt Brace.
. 1978b. The Jew as Paria. New York: Grove Press.
. 1992 [1964]. Eichmann in Jerusalema Report on the Banality of Evil. London: Penguin.
. 1994. Essays in Understanding, 19301954. New York: Harcourt.
Bernstein, Richard J. 1996. Hannah Arendt and the Jewish Question. Cambridge: Polity.
. 2002. Radical Evil. A Philosophical Interrogation. Cambridge: Polity.
Copjec, Joan. 1996. Introduction: Evil in the Times of the Finite World. In Radical Evil. S2, ed.
Joan Copjec, viixxviii. London: Verso.
Horkheimer, Max, and Theodor W. Adorno. 2001 [1944]. Dialektik der Aufklrung. Frankfurt am
Main: Fischer Verlag.
Kant, Immanuel. 1965 [1781]. Critique of Pure Reason. New York: St. Martins Press.
. 1998 [1781]. Kritik der reinen Vernunft. Hamburg: Felix meiner Verlag.
. 1969 [1785]. Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals. Translated by Lewis White Beck
with Critical Essays Edited by Robert Paul Wolff. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill Educational
Publishing.
. 1974 [1785]. Grundlegung zur Metaphysik zur Sitten. Werkausgabe, Band VII. Frankfurt
am Main: Suhrkamp.
JSP 21-3_02.indd 179 5/16/08 12:43:53 PM
180
CARSTEN BAGGE LAUSTSEN AND RASMUS UGILT
. 1974 [1788]. Kritik der praktischen Vernunft, Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten. Ed.
Wilhelm Weischedel. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp.
. 2003 [1793]. Religion innerhalb der Grenzen der bloen Vernunft. Hamburg: Felix Meiner
Verlag.
Lacan, Jacques. [1966] 1971. crits II. Paris: dition de Seuil.
. 1990. Kant with Sade. October 51:5575.
. 1992 [1986]. The Ethics of Psychoanalysis 19591960. The Seminar of Jacques Lacan.
London: Routledge.
MacCannell, Juliet Flower. 1996. Fascism and the Voice of Conscience. In Radical Evil. S2, ed.
Joan Copjec, 4773. London: Verso.
Sample, Ruth. 1995. Lacan, Kant, and Sade. Journal of the British Society for Phenomenology
26, no. 1: 516.
iek, Slavoj. 1991. For They Know Not What They DoEnjoyment as a Political Factor. London:
Verso.
. 1996. The Indivisible RemainderEssays on Schelling and Related Matters. London:
Verso.
. 1997. The Plague of Fantasies. London: Verso.
. 1999. Kant with (or Against) Sade. In The iek Reader, ed. Elizabeth Wright and Edmond
Wright, 283301. Oxford: Blackwell.
Zupancic, Alenka. 2000. Ethics of the Real. New York: Verso.
JSP 21-3_02.indd 180 5/16/08 12:43:53 PM