Terrorism & Evil

Author(s): Perez Zagorin

Source: Daedalus, Vol. 131, No. 2, On Intellectual Property (Spring, 2002), pp. 141-144
Published by: The MIT Press on behalf of American Academy of Arts & Sciences
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20027771
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Letters to the Editor of D dalus

Terrorism & evil "death" became the "fundamental prob

lem" after World War I. Endorsing this
February 24, 2002 view, he discusses the attack on the Unit
ed States as a case of what Arendt called
To the Editor:
"radical evil." Her statement, however,
Iwas dissatisfiedby the "comment" by is incorrigibly abstract and false in its
Ira Katznelson on "Evil & in to the circumstances. Death
politics," application
theWinter 2002 issue of D dalus. The and evil have always been a problem for
essay's importance is underlined by its religion and philosophy, and their con
placement at the beginning of the first remains a profitless exercise
templation
issue of the American Academy's distin unless we accept them as inevitable facts
guished journal in its redesigned format of human existence. After the first great
under a new editor. It is evidently in war of 1914 -1918, the fundamental
tended as an expression of response to for serious intellectual life was
problem
the terrorist attack on the United States not death, but economic depression,
last September 11, and as such, however communist rule in the USSR and its
it seems to me to fail bad
well-meaning, impact, and the rise of Italian Fascism
ly. Its misty abstractness, moral flabbi and German National Socialism with
ness, and ambivalence make it almost ir their thrust toward aggression and war.
relevant as a reaction to the magnitude After the war of 1939 -1945, the problem
of the events of that September day and was not radical evil, but the containment
their consequences. In his discussion of of Soviet communism, the avoidance of
the subject, Katznelson no of nuclear war, and the effort to achieve a
gives sign
even to achieve an historical of how Ger
having attempted understanding
imaginative realization of the suffering, many, amodern civilized state, could
damage, and loss of life caused by the have come under the rule of the criminal
terrorists' attack. He says nothing con Nazi regime and been responsible for the
its as an act of war destruction of the and
cerning import genocidal Jews
against the American nor about the mass murder of other peoples in vio
people,
the proof it provides of our previous fail lation of all the dictates of humanity and
ure to understand the Islamic world and the rules of war.
the forces within it that harbor and culti the theme of evil, Katznelson
Pursuing
vate a deadly envy, hatred, and enmity of of "some intellectual circles"
speaks
free and open pluralistic societies. whose denunciation of the terrorist acts
Katznelson decided to base as evil has been
unhappily accompanied by "a far
his article on the theme of "radical evil" too simple justification of liberalism and
taken from Hannah Arendt, and quotes the Enlightenment" and who see behav
her words that the fundamental ques ior as evil only when it attacks "the val
tion of intellectual life after World War ued goods proffered by Western moder
IIwas "the problem of evil," just as then mentions
nity." He "other intellec

D dalus 2002 141

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Letters to tuai circles" who focus on the evils of work, a campaign undertaken despite
theEditor
and global capitalism's the dire warnings from some "intellectu
postcolonialism
of the world and according al circles" in America and Europe that a
exploitation
ly consider the events of September n direct military response to terrorism
"in a cooler, sometimes
icy, register."
would lead to disaster and that we

Why does he not tell

us who these first should deal with the root causes of ter
intellectual circles are to which he so rorism through substantial foreign aid to
refers, where they
are to be poor countries and a sweeping change in
vaguely
found, and what are their one our Nor has he
precisely foreign policy. anything
sided opinions in justification of liberal to say of the future of the antiterrorist
ism ?And why does he not for once struggle and what the United States
come down to Earth and say plainly that should do to ward off the very real dan
the second of these intellectual circles ger of nuclear, chemical, and biological
consists to a considerable extent of left warfare waged against it by rogue states
academics in America and like Iraq or by terrorist groups that they
leaning
not their
Europe who have demonstrated sponsor.
coolness and iciness but their moral and Katznelson wonders whether "the
and callousness Western liberal tradition can effectively
political stupidity by
the United States
for deservedly contest radical evil without sacrificing
blaming
the attack of September n upon its own best features." He thinks it can,
bringing
itself by its wicked policies
over the but only if it finds a way to engage with
years in the Middle East and other parts "nonliberal beliefs and cultures without
of the world? dismissing them too hastily as irremedi
Itwould be easy to pick apart other ably antiliberal." He also holds out the

pretentious and empty formulations in prospect of ultimately converting these

Katznelson's article that reveal his re cultures to the universal liberal values
moteness from the reality he professes to that, while Western in origin, have now
be discussing. He worries, for instance, become global. With his usual lack of
that a "rote defense of liberalism" could concreteness, however, he neglects to
authorize a new brand of colonialism point out that the most important pres
ent challenge to this country comes from
that would again make many non-West
ern for the "core the danger of terrorism itself and the
peoples "ineligible"
values of rights, toleration, it imposes on us. In the conclu
participa priorities
tion, and consent." I can make nothing sion of his article he suggests that it
of this statement. What is this "rote won't be the war on terrorism that de
defense of liberalism" and who are its fines the early twenty-first
century, but
promulgators? Katznelson addresses his rather the series of battles
for the soul of
readers in the name of liberalism, but liberalism. This is certainly a partial and
one suppose from some of his self-centered way of analyzing our situa
might
remarks that the world is in nearly as tion in the new century. Liberalism is a
much danger from the sins of liberalism hardy growth that has strong roots in
as it is from Islamic terrorism. It is sur contemporary Western Its
civilization.

prising that he omits any mention of the soul is not in question. What is in ques
remarkable success of the tion at the present juncture is its intelli
military
United States and its allies in their few gence and whether those who claim, like
months' in Afghanistan Katznelson, to on behalf of liberal
campaign speak
against the Taliban and terrorist net ism will possess the political clarity and

142 D dalus 2002

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 resolution to give consistent support to Professor Zagorin badly misreads (or Terrorism &
evil
the struggle terrorism as the has not read) The Origins of Totalitarian
against
greatest danger that now faces us and to ism. He writes as if the attempt in that
the effort necessary to its organi book to turn a
destroy traditionally theological
zation, leadership, and sponsors. concept into a tool for the systematic
analysis of twentieth-century desolation
Perez Zagorin were intended its author to be an
by
Charlottesville, VA alternative to historical accounts of the
terribleregimes and barbaric practices
Perez Zagorin isJoseph C. Wilson Professor of in theWest in the twentieth century.
could be further from an accu
History, Emeritus, at theUniversity of Rochester Nothing
and a Fellow of the Shannon Center for Advanced rate characterization. After all, Arendt
Studies at the University of Virginia. He has been placed radical
evil, the practices and
a Fellow of theAmerican ideas that made human beings superflu
Academy since 1976.
ous
by erasing their moral and juridical
status, at the core of her assessment of
the camps and the terror in Hitler's
March 12, 2002
Reich and Stalin's Soviet Union. For
Ira Katznelson : Arendt, the developments enumerated
replies
by Professor Zagorin constituted a rup
As it turns out, Iwas reading Hannah ture in human affairs so
profound that
Arendt's 1953 reply to Eric Voegelin's "all traditional elements of our
political
sharp objections to The Origins of Totali and spiritual world were dissolved." For
tarianism when Perez Zagorin's tough just this reason, she rejected Voegelin's
came to my attention.
faultfinding trans-historical assessment of the dark
as I am to in kind -1
Tempted respond side of human nature, just the sort Pro
take no pleasure in being upbraided by a fessor Zagorin advances when he writes
distinguished intellectual historian of about death and evil as "inevitable facts
"
early modern Europe for flabby and of human existence. At this level of
misty abstractness, empty and preten abstraction, who could differ? But how
even a lack of empa
tious formulations, death and evil are caused - by whom, for
thy for "suffering, damage, and loss of what purposes, and by what means -
life" -1 will try to follow the example set were Arendt's issues. As she predicted,
by Arendt by addressing the substance,
they sadly remain ours.
not the shrill and tone, of
hectoring Regarding the current scholarly cli
Zagorin's critique. mate, Professor Zagorin would like me
I also will leave aside Professor Za to side with him. I cannot, for I resist the
observations current I reject, as does
gorin's concerning simple terms he submits.
events about which neither he nor I has
he, appraisals of modernity that discard
any special expertise or original contri liberalism and the tradition of the En
bution to offer. I comment, instead, on and discredit the values of
lightenment
the partially overlapping principal sub
toleration, reason, freedom, rights, and
jects in his critique : the salience and consent as hallmarks
sig of hypocrisy and
nificance of Arendt's considerations on
masks for domination. I nevertheless
radical evil, the state of debate in Ameri refuse to join him in his
surprisingly
can intellectual life, and the qualities of ahistorical justification for liberalism
modern political liberalism. and the Enlightenment as innocent, un

D dalus 2002 143

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Letters to tainted enemies of darkness, an exces sion ?How would he seek to array its in
theEditor
sively self-satisfied stance that Professor stitutions? Which liberties might he sac

Zagorin's letter exemplifies. These, I rifice to battle terror? Why, finally, does
insist, are not, and must not be, the the history of the last brutal century
only
two positions on offer. make him so about liberal
complacent
Let there be no mistake. I am a liberal. ism's invincibility?
Nowhere do I imply, as he suggests, that
"the world is in nearly as much danger
from the sins of liberalism as... from
Regarding the word "race"
Islamic terrorism." But I understand the
liberal tradition not to be a closed or March 1, 2002
fixed location, but a bounded site for
contests about its content and capaci To the Editor:

ties. Such controversies include debates In their essays in the Winter 2002 issue
about its range of membership and its of D dalus, both James F. Crow and
scope for pluralism. In stating my out Ernst Mayr dwell on the concept of race.
look, I identified these, among others, as Both recognize that it is a geographic
- -
basic puzzles Western indeed, global a that embraces "inter
concept, concept
liberalism still must address. I stand by That Eskimos and Australian
breeding."
these views, which were reinforced for example, may resemble
aborigines,
when I read Professor Zagorin's prose one another in some manner does not
about "the Islamic world and the forces same race :
place them in the they do not
within it that harbor and cultivate a are
normally interbreed; they geographi
deadly envy, hatred, and enmity of free cally isolated. Geneticists have another
and open pluralistic societies," as if term that covers such similarities :
phe
these traits were especially or
necessarily notype.
more robust within these countries than
Mayr, more than Crow, stresses the
in, say, Cambodia, China, Germany, Rus term "geographic an
race," ostensibly
sia, or South Africa in his and my life as
unambiguous concept. Indeed, Mayr,
times.
does Joseph L. Graves, Jr., in his book,
When Professor Zagorin does not, or The Emperor's New Clothes (2001), equates
cannot, disagree, he changes the subject. race" with "subspecies."
"geographical
Rather than deal with the pressing pres seems to accept that the hu
Thus, Mayr
ent conundrum of how liberals might man at one time consisted of
species
best engage with nonliberal cultures and Graves argues that
subspecies, whereas
beliefs, he reminds us that terrorists are time has been too brief for human sub
a real threat we must defeat. Surely this to occur. Crow recognizes that
- speciation
is so. Yet wars on terrorism hot or cold, the major geographic races - African,
overt or covert, narrowly or -
targeted European,
and Asiatic are now "mixed,"
- cannot
broadly circumscribed define this does not negate
but, in his opinion,
the kind of liberalism we should wish to the usefulness of the word "race" ;as he
have. Professor us not to
Zagorin tells says : "I believe that the word 'race' can
worry, that "liberalism is a hardy growth to groups
be meaningfully applied that
that has strong roots in contemporary are partially mixed."
Western civilization." But exactly which I also believe that the word "race" can
liberalism does he have inmind? Where be useful ; if it did not exist, another
would he situate its boundaries of exclu word would soon be invented in its

144 D dalus Spring 2002