Introduction
Albert Camus’s short story “The Guest”, first published in 1957, exposes different aspects of the confrontation between the social roles of the prisoner and the prison guard. The central character of the story, Daru worked as a schoolmaster at a school in the Algerian mountains when the gendarme Balducci brought to him an Arab prisoner, whom Daru was supposed to escort to the police headquarters. The man was arrested because he killed his cousin over some grain in the time of famine in French provinces. The schoolmaster faced an ethical dilemma, whether to pursue the gendarme’s instructions or to free the prisoner. Eventually, he decided to rebel against his role as a prison guard and let the Arab himself make a decision, whether to go to jail. Daru gave him some supplies and thousand francs and took him to the fork of the road from where he could either go to the prison or to go south and hide in the mountains. Nevertheless, no matter how hard Daru tried not to take responsibility for the Arab’s arrest, the man willingly walked towards the prison, and his family was angered against Daru for this.
Thesis
One can rebel against his social role, but cannot influence the obedience of others, in a humanistic perspective, any attempt to make someone free against their will is ironically considered as imposing authority on them.
Outline
- The roots of authoritarianism: what is it like to be a prison guard?
- The kinds of obedience: What is it like to be a prisoner?
- The dilemma of neutrality and choice
The entire society functions on the basis of authority and obedience, law and punishment for breaking it; and to keep it functioning someone has to take on the role of the punisher.
The roots of authoritarianism: what is it like to be a prison guard?
Prisoners in their majority do not choose their social role; it happens against their desire. And for a long time, it was believed that being a prison guard is something that requires certain personality traits, like being authoritative and coldblooded, if not ruthless. We are inclined to think that most people do not have those features, and if put in the situation like they would behave ‘humanely’ like they always believe they do. However, the results of the Standford prison experiment led by the professor of psychology Phillip Zimbardo was most shocking because of the cruelty shown by the participants of the experiment, who took on the roles of prison guards. They abused their arbitrary power, made prisoners do useless work, follow meaningless orders, and engage in the fights just for guards’ entertainment. It was as if they forgot their identities outside the prison and were consumed by their new social role. In some way, that is just another kind of obedience, they begin doing what they were expected to do, obeying the rules of the situation, even though they know it was only an experiment. As Zimbardo describes it:
It was remarkable how readily we all slipped into our roles, temporarily gave up our identities and allowed these assigned roles and the social forces in the situation to guide, shape and eventually to control our freedom of thought and action (6).
In this respect, Daru’s decision not to become a prison guard appears not as a weakness, but as an example of incredible self-awareness and a kind of obedience – but to his principles. As the guards in the experiment started to expect prisoners to be tricky and ‘to try something’ (Zimbardo 4), Daru could not resist having instinctive fear against his prisoner, ‘when the Arab stirred slightly, the schoolmaster was still not asleep. When the prisoner made a second move, he stiffened, on the alert’ (Camus par.22).
However, he managed not to follow that route. Daru avoided the temptation of abusing his power over the Arab; the schoolmaster tried to be humane and to stay equal with his guest. What he did not realize was that the Arab also was affected by the burden of his social role.
The kinds of obedience: What is it like to be a prisoner?
In the Zimbardo experiment, the feelings of actual prisoners ‘typically report feeling powerless, arbitrarily controlled, dependent, frustrated, hopeless, anonymous, dehumanized and emasculated’ (2). At first impression, the Arab seemed to have some elements of this description. For example, when he was awakened by Daru and invited to eat, ‘he started dreadfully staring at Daru with wild eyes as if he had never seen him and such a frightened expression that the schoolmaster stepped back…Calm had returned to his face, but his expression was vacant and listless’ (Camus par.23).
Camus brings the unquestioning obedience of the Arab to the absurd level. It is not only the obedience of the frightened person, who is about to be imprisoned but also the apathy of someone, who appears to be indifferent to what happens to him.
Such general indifference in some ways is extremely dangerous, as Erich Fromm puts it, ‘if the capacity for disobedience constituted the beginning of human history, obedience might very well…cause the end of human history (684).
Obedience that knows no reflection knows no empathy or mercy. It is authoritarian obedience since it follows orders imposed by the outside world and attributes them to the self (Fromm 685). In the case of the Arab it gains absurd form, he was completely disoriented when Daru left him with a decision, whether to turn in himself to prison or to hide among nomads. He was ‘on the edge of the hill his arms hanging now, and he was looking at the schoolmaster’ (Camus par.27). With authoritarian consciousness, he only did what the society and his role assigned him to do. It was only the illusion of his own choice, a decision based on what he was expected to do.
The dilemma of neutrality and choice
While the Arab’s decision to go willingly to prison is something his new ‘role’ prescribes him to do, Daru, as it was already mentioned, refuses to act according to the part assigned to him. At first he, perhaps, tried to convince himself of the malice of the Arab, but as a reflexive and compassionate person he was not able to delude himself: ‘He had to look at this man. He looked at him, therefore, trying to imagine his face bursting with rage. He couldn’t do so’ (Camus par.18).
Then he made his decision; ethically he could not act as a judge, guard, and authority for someone, whom he did not see as evil. He compassioned the grief of his family and his country, yet he could not openly disobey, lose his job and be, perhaps, as well imprisoned. To leave the Arab to decide for himself was his only way to preserve his neutrality between the French colonial government and the Algerian people.
Nevertheless, there was another valid reason for the schoolmaster’s actions. Daru already refused to act like a prison guard, and freeing the man against his would be the same imposition of his power, like taking him to prison. The only humane solution to the dilemma was to put the choice upon the Arab himself, and no matter what the opportunity and power to help Daru had, nobody can be helped against their will.
Conclusion
The societal order is based upon the obedience of the most of its members and punishment for those who disobey. However, in the absurd world, as Camus sees it, obedience is a giving up the choice, as the Arab’s refusal to fight for his freedom. Anyone who is authoritatively obedient is acting in the frame of the social role assigned to him and gives up on the true self. Daru’s protest against being a prison guard is an act of humanistic consciousness. However, the problem with it is that the single act of rebellion against one’s social role not always inspires others to do the same; Daru did not manage and did not want to make the Arab free without his consent. And in a humanistic perspective, the only way to awaken consciousness in others is to let them choose whether to obey or to rebel for themselves.