Call It Evil: Susan Neiman in conversation with John McMillian

A Cappella Books and the Georgia Center for the Book welcome Susan Neiman in honor of her important new book, Call It Evil: Understanding the Trump Era, in which the eminent moral philosopher Susan Neiman shows how naming and confronting evil is essential for preserving democracy in an age of demagogues. The author will appear in conversation with Georgia State University Associate Professor of History, John McMillian.


Copies of the book will be available for purchase at the venue. This event is free and open to the public. It will be in the Auditorium of Decatur Library, on the Ground Floor. Due to new security protocols, guests must enter the building through the upper level, rear doors, and then take the elevator to "G." Elevators open at 6:30. Please arrive early to ensure extra time for security.

About the Book

"Possibly the best book title of 2026, I couldn’t agree more with philosopher Susan Neiman’s rehabilitation of the word evil, a very useful and necessary descriptor for the times we are living through. Setting millennia of moral philosophy against the livestreamed degradations of the 21st century, Neiman calls it as she sees it, and in so doing traces the dark path that has led us to this evil moment in history." —Jonny Diamond, Literary Hub

Call It Evil is a bold reckoning with one of the most fraught words in our vocabulary. Far from being a religious or outdated concept, evil is a vital lens, Susan Neiman argues, through which to understand the threats we face today.

Neiman is one of our most important philosophers, and one of the world’s leading thinkers on the nature and question of evil. She opens this sharp, revelatory work with the idea that the reelection of Donald Trump is the outcome not simply of political and economic forces but the erosion of values that have been subject to derision for more than a century. She goes on to show how we have been quietly bombarded from all sides with messages that undermine basic moral principles. Misreadings of Adam Smith and Charles Darwin have led to a view of human nature we now accept as common sense: ideals are for losers, or for politicians who wish to deceive them. Neiman then explores how that ancient view, first formulated by pre-Socratic philosophers, has been steadily promoted by corporate interests and (pseudo) scientists in the modern era. Drawing on history—from European fascism to the moral failures of recent U.S. leaders—she demonstrates how the normalization of evil corrodes trust, destroys justice, and endangers our future.

This is a book for readers who refuse to accept moral confusion as the price of political life, and who believe that confronting evil is the first step toward renewing it.

About the Author
Susan Neiman is an American moral philosopher, cultural commentator, and essayist. She has written extensively on the juncture between Enlightenment moral philosophy, metaphysics, and politics.

About the Conversation Partner
John McMillian specializes in 20th century United States history, with an emphasis on youth culture in the 1960s, and recent American political history. Born and raised in Michigan, he earned his BA from Michigan State University, and his PhD from Columbia University. Previously he has taught in the Committee on Degrees in History and Literature at Harvard University. His most recent book, an edited collection, is American Epidemic: Reporting From the Front Lines of the Opioid Crisis (New Press, 2019). His book Beatles Vs Stones (Simon & Schuster, 2013) was translated into eight foreign language editions. Other books include Smoking Typewriters: The Sixties Underground Press and the Rise of Alternative Media (Oxford, 2011), The Radical Reader (New Press, 2003, co-edited with Timothy Patrick McCarthy), and The New Left Revisited (Temple University Press, 2003, co-edited with Paul Buhle). From 2005-2015, he also a founding co-editor of The Sixties: A Journal of History, Politics, and Culture, which is published bi-annually by Taylor & Francis. Professor McMillian’s writings have appeared in scholarly journals, magazines, and major newspapers. Currently he is writing a book on crime, policing, and the crime debate in New York City from 1963-2001.