From Caligula to The Plague. Freedom and Solidarity in Camus

As a philosopher and writer, Albert Camus left behind a rich body of work relevant to political theory. While one can derive a theory of Democracy as rebellion (see Pausch 2019) from his explicitly political essays, some of his literary works negotiate central questions of power and society. In his play Caligula, he describes the consequences of absolute freedom, and in his novel The Plague he focuses on the ambivalence of the individual between the pursuit of happiness and solidarity. Based on the two works, the paper presented here develops a model of cosmopolitan solidarity among strangers that dispenses with communitarian moments of identity. Pausch, M. (2019). Democracy Needs Rebellion, Theoria, 66(161), 91-107. Retrieved Feb 16, 2022, from https://www.berghahnjournals.com/view/journals/theoria/66/161/th6616105.xml