Simone Weil: Critique of Rights & Impersonal Justice — A Political Philosophy of Obligation
University of Colorado, MA
Political Philosophy
Simone Weil, a politics of the good for our age
Simone Weil (1909-1943) – philosopher, teacher in high schools and for factory workers, social activist, anarchistic-ranks soldier in Spain, manual worker in factories and farms, Résistence member, mystic – never wrote academic articles: the 16 volumes of her writings are an intellectual but personal expression of her social, political and spiritual deliberations and engagement, constituting a corpus of original, sober and subversive thought. Her influence is intensifying along the years, from Albert Camus who first published her posthumously and described her as “the only great spirit of our time”, up to her increasing presence in the words of contemporary politicians. A first Hebrew translation of a collection from her social and political writings is forthcoming in 2018, and in 30-31.10.2018 an international conference will be held at the Open University of Israel campus in Raanana on her thought and its relevance for the society and politics of our age from theoretical, comparative and historical perspectives. The conference will be tri-lingual, in Hebrew, French and English, with simultaneous translation between Hebrew and French.
Participants: Barbara Wolfer, Aviad Heifetz, Frederic Worms, Alexandra Feret, Jean Davienne, E. Jane Doering, Daniel Rosenberg, Pascal David, Denis Charbit, Robert Chenavier, Rita Fulco, and Christine Evans
Open University of Israel campus (Raanana) (2018)
Simone Weil Critique of Rights and Impersonal Justice a Political Philosophy of Obligation
Full text of MA dissertation, University of Colorado, 2018.
The Developmental Stages of Simone Weil’s Political Philosophy: From Pacifism to a Justification of Force
Maynooth University (Ireland), MA
Overlapping Consensus Thin and Thick: John Rawls and Simone Weil
John Rawls and Simone Weil presented two distinct conceptions of political justice, aimed at articulating a common ethos in an inherently heterogeneous society. The terms of the former, chiefly concerned with the distribution of primary goods, underwrite much of today’s Western democracy’s political liberalism. The terms of the latter, chiefly concerned with the way interaction is organized in social activities in view of the body and soul’s balancing pairs of needs, are less well known. We explain the sense in which the overlapping consensus in Weil’s notion of political justice is “thicker”, and may thus deserve more attention – alongside that of Rawls – for substantiating a democratic ethos within political liberalism.
Philosophical Investigations 39:4 October 2016, pp. 362-384
Untimely Meditations on the Need for Roots: Imagining a Culture of Human Need in Nietzsche and Simone Weil
Baylor University, Honors Thesis
The Political Thought of Simone Weil and British Modernism
Radford University, MA.
At the Threshold with Simone Weil: A Political Theory of Migration and Refuge
Duke University, PhD
Beyond Power: Simone Weil and the Notion of Authority
Beyond Power draws on the writings of Simone Weil (b. Paris, France, 1909, d. Ashford, UK, 1943) to construct a theory of authority that challenges conventional assumptions. Avery argues that neither science nor religion nor a political mandate can provide an adequate rationale for authority. Simone Weil’s electrifying insights, derived from her experience as a social activist, factory worker, and philosophy teacher, provide ways in which to think about the essential element of authority and take it into account more fully than usually seems possible. By focusing unflinchingly on what was sacred to herself and others in religion, politics, science, work, justice, and education, she achieved a kind of authority of her own. Avery devotes a chapter to each of these six subjects, as well as to an overview of the question of authority and a short account of Simone Weil’s life.
Beyond Power will be ideal for students and teachers of philosophy, politics, religion, and history, and the humanities. Those who admire the philosophy of Simone Weil will find a compelling overview of her work, while those interested in religious questions will find a fresh approach to thinking and talking about what makes human life meaningful. Avery offers new ways to examine the burning political, religious, and scientific issues of our time.
Lexington Books, 2008
Finding Freedom: Simone Weil, Hannah Arendt, and Herbert Marcuse on Post-Totalitarian Politics
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, MA
