„Banalita“ dobra a strukturální hřích

Abstract

Following the book Lucifer Effect (2007) written by the American social psychologist Philip Zimbardo, the study explores his central idea that human character can be easily manipulated and corrupted by force of ‘total situations’ and ‘systems’ and that ‘banal’ good and ‘banal’ evil are closely interlinked. Zimbardo’s position is confronted with the Catholic teaching of the ‘social’ and ‘structural sin’ and followed up by a broader philosophical reflection on the phenomenon of structural sin in ‘modern’ and ‘postmodern’ historical contexts. The idea of structural sin is developed into a hermeneutically interpreted category of a destructive ‘existential movement’ on the boundary of personal and institutionally mediated relationships.

Keywords

• Good and evil
• personal responsibility and power of social situations
• personal-structural sin
• social alienation and mediation
• freedom and idolatry of structures
• everyday heroism