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FDU PRESS
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| Scholarly Review |
 | The Development of Albert Camus's Concern for Social and Political Justice
ISBN# 9780838641101
Reviewed by: Peter Dunwoodie Goldsmiths, University of London
Oxford Journals, French Studies, Vol. 65:3 |
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Scholarly and informative, this book reassesses the somewhat cliched portrait of 'Camus le juste' by close investigation of his non-fictional texts, unpicking the tensions, ambiguities, and hesitations generated by the gradual slippage from the political to the ethical. Firmly anchored in concrete assessment of the available biographical data, it resituates key episodes - Algerian, French, and international - within the 'evolution of Camus's lifelong preoccupation with justice,' seeking to expose 'the fragile relationship between politics and morality' operative in three interconnected phases: the formative years in Algeria: Occupation, purge, and Cold War; and, after L'Homme revolte, the Algerian War. The Introduction provides working definitions of socioeconomic, political, institutional, and constitutional justice, and reveals at the onset Mark Orme's acceptance of the figure of Camus not only as 'a man en situation who ... opposes perceived injustice in all its various guises in primarily a personal and practical capacity, but as an intellectual whose 'underlying consistency' is 'modified by the pressures of changing (historical and personal) circumstances.' The strength of this book lies in Orme's sensitivity to the inevitable contradictions and inconsistencies arising from this.
This book will interest both students and researchers, whatever their attitude to Mark Orme's closing claim that Camus remains a 'beacon of moral optimism.'
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