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Simone Weil, Beyond Ideology?

  • Book
  • © 2020

Overview

Editors:
  1. Sophie Bourgault

    1. School of Political Studies, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Canada

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  2. Julie Daigle

    1. School of Political Studies, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Canada

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  • Provides readers with a careful and sustained study of Simone Weil’s relationship to key ideologies (Marxism, liberalism, republicanism, anarchism, colonialism, nationalism, Nazism)
  • Proposes an original set of conversations between Weil and influential contemporary authors such as Sara Ahmed, Michael Sandel, Giorgio Agamben, Slavoj Žižek, and John Rawls
  • Sheds light on the relevance of Simone Weil’s oeuvre for thinking about pressing contemporary issues such as socio-economic inequalities/unsatisfied basic needs, populism, social alienation, and contemporary labor practices and precarities

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Table of contents (12 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-x
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  2. Introduction: Weil, Politics and Ideology

    • Sophie Bourgault, Julie Daigle
    Pages 1-21
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Keywords

About this book

In the last decade, interest in the writings of French philosopher Simone Weil (1909-1943) has surged. Weil is admired for her militant syndicalism, her factory experience and participation in the French resistance, but it is above all the eclectic and rich character of her work that has increasingly attracted scholarly attention. Weil reflected on subjects as diverse as quantum physics, Greek tragedy, bankruptcy, colonialism, technology, education, and religious metaphysics, but perhaps most interesting is the way that her work seems to defy any clear ideological labelling: Marxist, anarchist, liberal, conservative and republican all seem to fall short in describing the complexity of Weil’s thinking. Adding to the interpretive difficulty is the fact that Weil often expressed biting criticisms of most things political. What this edited volume argues is that it is precisely Weil’s unclassifiable nature, combined with her sharp and sometimes ambivalent criticismsof politics, that make her work a most timely and fascinating object of study for contemporary political philosophy. It proposes a two-pronged approach to her thought: first, via a series of conversations set up between Weil and key authors in modern and contemporary political theory (e.g. Sandel, Rawls, Ahmed, Agamben, Orwell); and secondly, via a close study of Weil’s reflections on various ideologies. The goal of this book is not to position Simone Weil squarely within a single ideological tradition but rather to propose that her thought might allow us to critically engage with various ideologies in the history of political ideas. 

Editors and Affiliations

  • School of Political Studies, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Canada

    Sophie Bourgault, Julie Daigle

About the editors

Sophie Bourgault is Associate Professor at the School of Political Studies, University of Ottawa, Canada, and current President of the American Weil Society. Her main research interests gravitate toward contemporary feminist theory, care ethics and Simone Weil's political thought. 


Julie Daigle is a political theorist whose research focuses on the history of ideas and work of Simone Weil. She has also taught at the School of Political Studies, University of Ottawa, Canada. 

Bibliographic Information

  • Book Title: Simone Weil, Beyond Ideology?

  • Editors: Sophie Bourgault, Julie Daigle

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-48401-9

  • Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan Cham

  • eBook Packages: Political Science and International Studies, Political Science and International Studies (R0)

  • Copyright Information: The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020

  • Hardcover ISBN: 978-3-030-48400-2Published: 17 December 2020

  • Softcover ISBN: 978-3-030-48403-3Published: 18 December 2021

  • eBook ISBN: 978-3-030-48401-9Published: 16 December 2020

  • Edition Number: 1

  • Number of Pages: X, 252

  • Number of Illustrations: 1 b/w illustrations

  • Topics: Political Theory, Political Philosophy

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