Evil from an Anthroposophical Perspective - Part 2: Some Insights on the Nature of Evil

Evil manifests itself in an individual and can manifest itself in groups and institutions. Evil that is manifested in groups is known as collective evil. Examples of Group evil can arise in a social group of friends (say of 5 people), the army, schools and the media.

Typically when evil arises in a group, it ends up becoming its own entity and taking a life of its own. The group manifests something that is not of them but is a result of their working together. One movie that illustrates the nature of group evil can be found in The Corporation, which is a documentary that shows how the majority of corporations running today possess sociopathic tendencies because they only care about pleasing the shareholders and making a profit. They do not care about laying people off and that they are destructive to the environment. Corporations become like narcisstic children who can only think of their own interests when they choose to think of only their only needs.

In these types of situations, no one person is to blame, due to specialization. Specialization has allowed for evil to flourish as it allows people to pass responsibility onto another department.

Evil grows because it seeks an environment that is receptive to it. Group evil flourishes when individuals stop thinking for themselves and submit themselves to the will of the group. The group as a result takes on a mind of its own and it allows people to do things they normally would not do on their own.