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UC Center Program
Courses - Fall 2005
PCC 116. Debating French Identities: Politics and Society
Lecture
Mon 10:30 - noon
Thu 10:30 - noon |
Prof.
Stéphane Dufoix
Office Hours TBA
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Since the end of the Second World War, France has undergone formidable changes, and French “national identity” along with the political ideal republicanism has been seriously challenged. Much of the 1980s and 1990s, indeed, was spent worrying about the “crisis of French identity”, as intellectuals and the “political classes” attempted to make sense of France’s history and identity in light of the challenges posed by immigration (especially non-European immigration), feminism, economic and cultural globalization (considered an American-directed movement), and France’s peculiar version of “multiculturalism.” The first years of the new millennium see France trying to maintain its distinctiveness in a world of globalization, while the 2002 presidential election has, more than ever, demonstrated the power of “national identity” discourses. To understand these movements and their impact on France, this course considers contemporary debates in French political life surrounding the politics of recognition, national identity, and French “exceptionalism” in a European and global context. [History, Sociology, Political Science, Anthropology, French Studies, European Studies] 5.0 Credits
- Henri Mendras, Social Change in Modern France, Cambridge University Press, 1991
- Articles and book chapters reproduced in the Course Reader (hereby referred to as [CR])
- Recommended readings for each week are either online, in the Reserve Cabinet [RC], or on the Course Reserve Shelf [RS]
- Online materials, including the weekly dossiers that will be discussed in lecture and section. Note that for any set of topics covered by the weekly dossiers, students are urged to search materials using the CDL (in particular, Lexis-Nexis) and www.scholar.google
- There are also separate Web
Resources Pages for this course with links to online
reference sites, as well as other research material. The
best English-language summary of French current events on
the web is The
Tocqueville Connection.
COURSE REQUIREMENTS
Students are required to do all reading before the first weekly session and to attend all guest lectures and sites visits scheduled during the semester. Students are required to complete the weekly readings comprised of secondary sources (in English) found in the assigned books, the Course Reader, and directly on the web (with links from the syllabus). In addition, most weeks require the perusal of a "dossier" of primary sources including speeches, articles in the newspapers by experts, politicians or scholars, government reports.
- Weekly Readings and Class Participation (20% of the final grade)
- Writing Assignments (30% of the final grade)
- Two short papers (5-7 pages each) on two different topics to be chosen in consultation with the instructor.
- Mid-term exam (20% of the final grade)
- Final exam (30%).
COURSE SCHEDULE
Week 1. September 12-16
Introduction.
A. What Does it Mean to be French?
B. What is a Nation?
Reading:
- Fernand Braudel, “Introduction” in The Identity of France, vol. 1 History and Environment, Collins, 1988, pp.15-28 [CR]
- Ernest Renan, “What is a Nation?”, text of a conference delivered at the Sorbonne-University, 11 March 1882 in Ernest Renan, Qu’est-ce qu’une Nation?, Paris, Presses-Pocket, 1992
- Henri Mendras, Intro & Ch. 1 in Social Change in Modern France, pp. 1-30
I. Framing the Debates: The Parties, The Immigration and the Constitution
This section will focus on three sets of phenomena that framed the various debates on French national identity: the existence of a specific party system that shifted from a classical to a more complex one in the mid-80’s; the recent history and composition of immigration in France; the existence of a “constitutional lock” that constraints the possible evolutions towards pluralism (of regional languages, of “peoples” composing France…)
Week 2. September 19-24
Parties and Electoral Politics
A. The French Party System
B. Case Studies: The Decline of the Communist Party and the Rise of the National Front
Reading:
- Pierre Brechon and Subrata Kumar Mitra, “The National Front in France: The Emergence of an Extreme Right Protest Movement” in Comparative Politics, vol.25, n.1., October 1992, pp. 63-82
- George Ross, “Party Decline and Changing Party Systems: France and the French Communist Party” in Comparative Politics, vol.25, n.1, October 1992, pp. 43-61
- Henri Mendras, Chapter 2 in Social Change in Modern France, pp. 31-48
Week 3. September 26-30
Immigration in France
A. The History of Immigration
B. Amnesia and Statistical Inexistence of Origins
Reading:
- Gérard Noiriel, “Immigration: Amnesia and Memory” in French Historical Studies, vol.19, n. 2, Autumn 1995, pp. 367-380
- Dominique Schnapper, “The Debate on Immigration and the Crisis of National Identity” in West European Politics,vol.17, n.2, April 1994, pp. 127-139
- Michèle Tribalat, “How Many People in France are of Foreign Descent?” in Population: An English Selection, vol.4, 1992, pp. 55-73 [CR]
- Henri Mendras, Chapter 3 in Social Change in Modern France, pp. 51-72
Week 4. October 3-7
Territory, Language, and the Constitution
A. Territory and the Constitution
B. “French is the Language of the Republic”
[ASSIGNMENT 1 DUE]
Reading:
- Peter Sahlins, Introduction in Boundaries: The Making of France and Spain in the Pyrenees, University of California Press, 1989, pp.1-24
- Denis Lacorne, “Corsica, 'Multiculturalism', and the Jacobin Republic” in Correspondence (Winter 2001)
- Alain Renaut, “The French Debate on Regional Languages” in Comprendre. Revue de Philosophie et de Sciences Sociales, special issue “Les identités culturelles”, edited by Will Kymlicka and Sylvie Mesure, n.1, 2000, pp. 381-400
- Henri Mendras, Chapter 4 in Social Change in Modern France, pp. 73-90
II. The Politics of Recognition: Race, Gender, Sexual Preferences
France is a Republic, where public law officially forbids the political recognition of any subgrouping (of race, gender, or ethnicity) in the public sphere. In the recent years, this republican model has been frequently challenged by claims for the official recognition of gender and sexual differences; by racism; by the politics of communitarianism and affirmative action; and by the recognition of “zones de non-legalité” within French territory.
Week 5.October 10-14
French Exceptionalism?
A. Neo-Republicanism
B. Family Politics: the Case of the PACS
Reading:
- Claude Nicolet, “More than Two Centuries of French Republican Exception” in Le Monde diplomatique, April 2001, pp. 28-29
- Michael F. Leruth, “The Neorepublican Discourse on French National Identity” in French Politics and Society, vol.16, n.4, Fall 1998, pp. 46-61 [CR]
- Carl F. Stychin, “Civil Solidarities or Fragmented Identities? The Politics of Sexuality and Citizenship in France” in Social and Legal Studies, vol.10, n.3, 2001, pp. 347-375
- Henri Mendras, Chapter 5 in Social Change in Modern France, pp. 91-106
Week 6. October 17-21
Gender Parity
A. Gender and Political Life
B. Guest Lecture: Réjane Senac, “Parity Law and its Effects”
Reading:
- Jill Lovecy, “Citoyennes à Part Entière ?: the Constitutionalization of Gendered Citizenship in France and the Parity Reforms of 1999-2000” in Government and Opposition, vol.35, n.4, Autumn 2000, pp. 439-462
- Marie-Marthe Gervais-le Garff, “Liberté, Egalité, Sororité: A New Linguistic Order in France?” in Women and Language, vol.25, n.2, 2002
- Henri Mendras, Chapter 6 in Social Change in Modern France, pp. 107-121
Week 7. October 24-28
Gender (continued) and Mid-term exam
A. MID-TERM
B. Guest Lecture: Pap Ndiaye, “The Black Community in France”
Reading:
- Henri Mendras, Chapter 7 in Social Change in Modern France, pp. 122-142
SEMESTER BREAK: NO CLASSES
Week 8. November 7-10
Racism and Discrimination
A. Immigration and Racism
B. Case Study: Specific Organizations (SOS Racisme and France Plus)
Reading:
- Georges Mauco, “The Assimilation of Foreigners in France” in Population Studies, vol. 3, “Cultural Assimilation of Immigrants” Supplement, March 1950, pp. 13-22
- Erik Bleich, “Antiracism without Races: Politics and Policy in a 'Color-Blind' State” in French Politics, Culture and Society, vol.18, n.3, Fall 2000, pp. 48-74 [CR]
- Henri Mendras, Chapter 8 in Social Change in Modern France, pp. 145-162
Week 9. November 14-18
Multiculturalism, Communitarianism and Affirmative Action
A. The Contradictions of the Republican Ideal and Multiculturalism
B. Guest Lecture: Marie Poinsot, “A French Ellis Island? The City of National History of Immigration”
Reading:
- Michel Wieviorka, “Identity and Difference: Reflections on the French Non-Debate on Multiculturalism” in Thesis Eleven, n.47, November 1996, pp. 49-71 [CR]
- Driss El Yazami and Rémy Schwartz, “Report to the Prime Minister for the Establishment of a National Center on the History and Cultures of Immigration”, November 2001 (excerpts).
- Daniel Sabbagh, “Affirmative Action at Science Po” in French Politics, Culture and Society, vol.20, n.3, Fall 2002
- Henri Mendras, Chapter 9 in Social Change in Modern France, pp. 163-176
III. National Identity
The ideal and traditional view of “French exceptionalism” has been challenged by both the presence of migrants (and of their children) in France , and the acceleration of globalization in recent years. This final section considers three articulations of the debate over identity: the national (recent changes in nationality law); the European (the opposition to the integration of France into Europe ); and the global (“French exceptionalism” in contemporary economics, politics and culture).
Week 10. November 21-25
Republican Law
A. Citizenship
B. Exclusion in the Suburbs
[ASSIGNMENT 2 DUE]
Reading:
- Maxim Silverman, “Nationality and Citizenship” in Deconstructing the Nation: Immigration, Race and Citizenship in Modern France, Routledge, 1992, pp. 126-152 [CR]
- Patrick Weil, “Introduction”in Mission d’étude des législations sur l’immigration et la nationalité, Report to the Prime Minister, Paris, La Documentation française, 1997
- Nicola Cooper, “'Stop la Violence': Responses to Delinquency and Urban Violence in Contemporary France” in Modern and Contemporary France, vol.8, n. 1, 2000, pp. 91-102
- Henri Mendras, Chapter 10, Social Change in Modern France, pp. 177-196
Week 11. November 28-December 2
Islam in France
A. The Affair of the Headscarf
B. Guest Lecture: Riva Kastoryano, “French Islam and Secularism”
Reading:
- Caitlin Killian, “The Other Side of the Veil. North African Women in France Respond to the Headscarf Affair” in Gender & Society, vol.17, n.4, August 2003, pp. 567-590
- Elaine Sciolino, “France Has a State Religion: Secularism” in The New York Times, February 8, 2004
- Henri Mendras, Chapters 11 & 12, Social Change in Modern France, pp. 199-225
Week 12. December 5-9
The Enlargement of the Framework
A. The Promises and Threats of Europe
B. The United States as the World?
Reading:
- Philip H. Gordon and Sophie Meunier, “Globalization and French Cultural Identity” in French Politics, Culture, and Society, vol.19, n.1, Spring 2001, pp. 22-41
- Michael J. Baun, “The Maastricht Treaty as High Politics: Germany, France, and European Integration” in Political Science Quarterly, vol.110, N.4, Winter 95-96, pp. 605-624 [CR]
- Sophie Meunier, “The French Exception” in Foreign Affairs, vol.79, n.4, July-August 2000, pp. 104-116
- Richard F. Kuisel, “Vive l'Amérique: An Epilogue from 1970 to Euro Disneyland” in Seducing the French: The Dilemma of Americanization, University of California Press, 1993, pp. 212-230 [CR]
- Henri Mendras, Chapter 13 in Social Change in Modern France, pp. 226-246
Week 13. December 12-16
Review and Final Exam
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