Arne Johan Vetlesen is Professor of Philosophy at the Department of Philosophy, University of Oslo, Norway. He is the author of over thirteen books including Perception, Empathy, and Judgement: An Inquiry into the Preconditions of Moral Performance (1994) and Closeness: An Ethics (with De Maleissye-Melun, 1997).

'This book is an excellent and brave contribution to a complex topic - balanced, well-argued, informative. I recommend it to all philosophers, sociologists, and psychologists who have research interests in understanding large-scale atrocities.' Claudia Card, Philosophy Review

• 1. The ordinariness of modern evildoers: a critique of Zygmunt Bauman's The Modernity and the Holocaust; 2. Hannah Arendt on conscience and the banality of evil; 3. The psycho-logic of wanting to hurt others; 4. The logic and practice of collective evil: ethnic cleansing in Bosnia; 5. Responses to collective evil; 6. A political postscript: globalization and the discontents of the self.