French State Research Articles

Function and Form in Territorial Planning: The Case of Lens in the Mining Basin in Nord and Pas-de-Calais – France

This article purposes to engage in a discussion regarding the transformations and restructuring of the city of Lens, located in the department of Pas-de-Calais, in the administrative region of Hauts-de-France, northern France. This discussion pertains to the spatial transformations of the categories of form and function during the evolution of industrial capitalism and, subsequently, globalization. The process of "Territorial Reconversion" implemented in the area, through state planning, from the 1960s to 1990 (the year of the closure of the last coal mine), aimed to alter the region's specialization in response to the serious issues of unemployment and economic recession. Thus, through the establishment of infrastructure and urban remodeling, the French state, in association with policies from the European Union, involving private companies and civil organizations in the region, organized itself to transform the area by changing the economic profile linked to mining and textile production to more dynamic and productive activities. These strategies influenced the transformations of the urban space of the city of Lens, reshaping it towards cultural activities (especially music and cinema workshops) and tourist activities. Among the latter, the installation of a branch of the Louvre Museum stands out. This article aims to reflect on these transformations in Lens, based on the analysis of the introduction of new forms and functions, as well as the re-signification of old forms enveloped by new functions.

The Cultural Construction of the Domestic Space in France: Women’s Lived Experience and the Materialization of Customs

This article explores the intersecting processes of construction of the home, social, and individual identities through domestic practices inside French housing. It examines the design and occupation of French homes as crucial moments for the consolidation of subjectivities, beliefs, and ideologies manifested through daily actions that are influenced by normative cultural systems. In specific, it looks at codified domestic behaviours and their aesthetic dimension, focusing on how the French “art of living” has influenced taste, design, appropriation, and decoration of domestic interiors. Architectural treatises along with etiquette manuals are analysed as they both represent—through the written word and architectural drawings—cultural and gender stereotypes as well as societal norms and expectations that inform housing design and domestic practices. These documents directly assist in the cultural construction of the domestic space, uncovering mechanisms of reproduction and representation that inform the use and design of residential architecture. By focusing on women’s lived experiences, this research looks at the consolidation of feminine domestic cultures and how they fostered small-scale physical transformations of dwellings’ interiors through daily negotiations that define self-identity and interpersonal power relations. These dynamics are referred to as “cultural domesticity.” The latter frames this study along with feminist literature, situating women’s contribution to the aesthetic and spatial development of French apartments. What emerges from this study is that the French state historically exercised a regulatory power that impacted daily life and housing design.

Must Every Golem Die?

Abstract Settler-colonial projects often produce states that eventually turn against the purposes of those who created them. We see this in the American and Boer revolts against the British and the sabotage by British settlers in Ireland and French settlers in Algeria of efforts to integrate the native populations of those territories into the British and French states. We see it also in the relationship between the objectives of European states and Zionists to end antisemitism by exporting the Jewish problem to the Middle East and in Israel’s increasingly pariah status on the world stage and the global increase in antisemitism—both accelerated by Israel’s ferocious response to the Hamas and Islamic Jihad attacks in October 2023. In the Jewish tradition this is the story of the golem—the legendary creature conjured by rabbinic skill and divine power to protect the Jews from their enemies in sixteenth-century Prague. At first successful, the golem became increasingly wild and eventually was put to death by the rabbi who created him out of fear for the welfare of the Jewish community itself. But not all golems must die. The key is to recognize they are not tied to their original purposes and can thus be transformed.

Welfare Elites and State Reconfiguration Evidence from the Transformation of French Social Security

Abstract Studying the transformation of France’s social security system between 1970 and 2020 reveals a recomposition of the power of unelected governmental elites. The institutionalization of a group of “welfare elites” characterized by a new sociological profile (social background and career paths) has led to a reshaping of policy governance (“Iron Triangle”). These High civil servants have carried out a program of “sustainable social welfare,” reinforcing state interventionism in health and social insurance policies. In the context of this program’s implementation, they have developed the role of custodians of state policies. This strengthening of the French state’s capacity sheds new light on the question of its reconfiguration.

Два суверенитета для одного государства: Ш. де Голль и Ф. Петэн

In 1940-1944, the Vichy government existed in France simultaneously with the government of C. de Gaulle. Contemporaries and successors expressed doubts concerning the legitimacy and legality of both governments. However, this historical and legal dispute was finally resolved with the help of justice.

Black Market Logic: Meat Supply in Vichy France

ABSTRACT The extensive black market for meat in Occupied France shows the breadth of popular opposition to Vichy’s system for food allocation and its links to collaboration. The black market gained support from farmers, butchers, consumers, and traffickers improvising to evade state regulation. This article explains the importance of the black market for meat in Vichy France as fostered by two logics for illicit traffic. The first was the obvious opportunity to profit from the shortages and state controls; the second, its influence more widespread, served the needs of family, friends, and communities.

On rafle aussi les enfants : Mémoire d’un délit de séquestre par le gouvernement de Vichy « Les Presque Sœurs » de Cloé Korman

Our purpose is to show how much the contemporary novel can carry war stories in the form of a family investigation, but also a historical one. To do this, and without wanting to upset our readers, we have chosen Cloé Korman’s The Almost Sisters, which behind a backdrop that dates back to the Second World War, revisits the horrors that the Jewish children of France experienced between 1942 and 1944. Evoking the most despicable infamy of the 20th century committed by the Vichy government, the deportation to Auschwitz of 11,400 children, Korman proposes to return to the story of these little ones orphaned by the deportation of their parents. In this sense, it presents the story of six little girls who are tossed from one institution to another, from one camp to another. Three of them survive, and the other three take the road to Auschwitz in convoy 77.

The Ties That Bind: Protection and Projection in France’s Indian Ocean Islands of Mayotte and Réunion

ABSTRACT The article addresses a two-fold question: first, why does the French state invest so much time and resources in its Indian Ocean islands, Mayotte and Réunion? And why do these ultra-marine regions remain wedded to the French Republic? The high degree of insular buy-in both regions involves a two-level game, connecting state and island actors. Such turning to mainland France represents a form of African agency, however dependent on the mainland these islands appear to be. The causal mechanisms of the integration of the French Indian Ocean territories combine historical legacy (choosing France), institutional evolution (departmentalisation), common economic and military security challenges, the cost calculus of mainland France’s readiness to govern ultramarine territories and a widely shared set of beliefs in the value of remaining French. The islands are acting like rational actors, whose insular and isolated status pushes in the direction of seeking protection in an unstable environment.

Lawyers, Archivists, and the Turn to Transparency in the French State

In 2021, the French government commissioned two reports on episodes of extreme violence involving France's past: the Algerian War and the Rwandan genocide. Both reports grapple with how “the past haunts the present and the future,”3 a theme that is central to Karen Knop's scholarly legacy. In both reports, legal, historical, and archival expertise are positioned to redraw and recast relations of France to Africa. We argue that the reports’ focus on the role of a particular class of experts (namely archivist and historians, rather than lawyers) reflects France's current approach to narrating historical injustice, emphasizing public memory of violent pasts, rather than legal responsibility of the French state.

Evolution of the French Language System in Ivory Coast

This article examines the current state of the French language in Ivory Coast. The relevance of the study is related to the lack of research on the state of French in Ivory Coast, represented by the following varieties: Ivorian Popular French, Ivorian French and the Nouchi language code. Nouchi, an integral part of Ivory Coast's linguistic system and a crucial factor of Ivorian identity, remains a poorly researched phenomenon today. The aim of the work is to objectively describe the phonetic, morphological, lexical and syntactic changes that take place in French on the territory of Ivory Coast in a situation of interaction with the autochthonous languages under the influence of extralinguistic factors. The scientific novelty lies in the integrated approach to the study of the French language system in Ivory Coast and the differences between each of the varieties of French and standard French. The research uses general scientific (analysis, synthesis, generalization) and special methods (descriptive and comparative methods). The analysis of the French language system shows the distinctive features of the French varieties from the standard French on the phonetic, morphological, lexical and syntactical levels. Ivorian Popular French is characterised by the greatest influence from the autochthonous languages and numerous features at all levels of the language, caused by the lack of education of its speakers. The continuity and interconnectedness of all the varieties of language examined is highlighted: the oldest variant of Ivorian Popular French became the basis for the formation of modern Ivorian French. Nouchi, on the other hand, combines earlier variants of French with borrowings from the autochthonous and European languages. Ivorian French and Nouchi are now widespread in all social strata and contribute to the issue of Ivorian self-determination.

An Australian Perspective on Occitan and Breton Ethnoregionalism in the Post-war Period to 1981

In France, the student occupations and strikes of May ’68 are well known, but the period was also of immense significance to the country’s ethnoregionalist movements, who sought to increase power and self-determination. From a period of rebuilding following the Second World War, the Breton and Occitan movements, which campaigned against the perceived oppression of their regions by the central French state, were able to find new audiences and grow significantly in the 1960s and 1970s. Through an analysis of primary and secondary sources, this article charts the history of the movements throughout the era, demonstrating how the growth of the movements was linked to the broader societal politicisation of the era. As the period of radicalism waned, so did the Breton and Occitan movements, which saw many of their key demands implemented following the election of François Mitterrand as President, depriving the movements of their key reasons for existence. Nevertheless, the movements left a significant legacy in this period, through both the acceptance of regionalist political demands by the national left, and the ideological refoundation of Breton and Occitan ethnoregionalism. The author reflects on how these movements have some parallels in Australian history.

Connections / disconnections: on Alice Diop’s Nous

ABSTRACT This article considers how Alice Diop’s documentary Nous/We (2021) challenges the myopia of hegemonic colourblind constructions of France and its people. Its title both raises a question (who are we?) and implicitly asserts an inclusive answer. But the film is not a reductively integrationist project. Indeed, it challenges this central policy of the French state and stages an interrogation of contemporary France, where, as Trica Danielle Keaton et al have put it, ‘race does not officially reside, even as racism and discrimination are long-term residents’. The author examines how Nous maps out a discursive space between the poles of forced assimilation and ghettoisation (communautarisme) that acknowledges racialisation and the racial dimensions of exploited labour, urban planning and social housing, but also tracks some points of inter-ethnic connection. The article argues that the film is three things at once: a self-reflexive celebration of filmmaking as an act of creative geography that moves across time and space to forge connectivity as well as tracking disjunctions; a documentation of everyday life and social diversity, particularly among the frequently demonised or simply ignored Parisian banlieues; and an indictment of the failure of the French state to properly recognise and value this diversity.

Entangled migration states: mobility and state-building in France and Algeria

ABSTRACT This article develops the concept of ‘entangled migration states’ as a means of highlighting the centrality of migration governance to state-building processes, the constitution of state sovereignty, and interstate relations. Drawing on the example of France and Algeria, it demonstrates the key role that migration played in three phases of state-building: the colonial period of Algérie française; the Algerian nationalist independence movement; and postcolonial state-building. In the case of France and Algeria, at least three actors constructed and instrumentalised migration and mobility regimes as sources of power and control – the French imperial state; the non-state Algerian independence movement; and the newly sovereign postcolonial Algerian state. A focus on the entangled nature of migration management allows for a deeper historicisation of contemporary migration regimes and draws attention to the central role played by migration diplomacy and transnational governmentality in contemporary migration management regimes, thus calling into question some of the spatial assumptions undergirding the ‘migration state’ concept. The article traces the evolution of mobility patterns and control in the Franco-Algerian case; their relationship to state-building processes; and the implications for rethinking the ‘migration state’.

Troubled waters: Riparian ecosystem services and community opposition to the largest dam removal project in Europe, Vezins Dam, France

The largest Dam removal project in Europe occurred in 2019 with removal of the Vezins Dam on the Sélune River in Normandy, France. The French State ordered removal of the 36-m high Vezins Dam and the 16-m high la Roche-qui-Boit Dam along the Sélune River to restore ecological and longitudinal connectivity to improve riparian water quality, and especially to restore migratory species of Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar) and eel (Anguilla anguilla). We examine community opposition to removal of the Vezins Dam through the lens of riparian ecosystem services and stakeholder values. Primary data sources includes fieldwork, interviews, and an online survey of local stakeholders. Text analysis and interview coding occurred with ATLAS.ti 22, and highlight themes related to federal-local communication and riparian ecosystem services. The French State ineffectively communicated with local communities regarding dam removal benefits and riparian stakeholder values. While the state focused on biophysical ecosystem services, experiential ecosystem services, such as place attachment, were more important to riparian stakeholders. Often portrayed as a positive benefit, here dam removal lacked community support. Failure of government authorities to effectively incorporate stakeholder values along a continuum of ecosystem services substantially compromises future large-scale federal environmental management projects dependent upon local community support. By examining how local actors experienced dam removal, study results increase understanding of environmental governance and the local consequences of national policy decisions, of use in future dam removal projects – including for large dams – in France and internationally.

The Skills of Citizenship

Abstract This article analyzes the history of adult vocational training (AVT) programs for Algerian migrants, funded by the French state, between the end of World War II in 1945 and the aftermath of Algerian independence in 1962. These programs responded to the postwar expansion of citizenship and rights of indigenous Algerians, including rights to migrate and to take jobs in metropolitan France. Across changing governments and diverse ministries, French officials were convinced that vocational training was necessary for indigenous Algerians to find stable employment, to mitigate the supposed risks of migration, and to enable migrants to transform themselves into an idealized version of the French citizen. The widespread adoption of AVT for Algerian migrants calls into question the pervasive image of the unskilled, interchangeable migrant. At the same time, the shortcomings of AVT programs shed light on how migrants frequently contributed to postwar economic expansion and economic modernization while enjoying the fruits of economic growth only meagerly and on an individual basis. More broadly, this study reveals the importance of skill, industry, and labor in French postwar conceptions of (social) citizenship.

Sarah Ann Frank, Hostages of Empire: Colonial Prisoners of War in Vichy France

Sarah Ann Frank, <i>Hostages of Empire: Colonial Prisoners of War in Vichy France</i>

Rupture and reconciliation: the neoliberal logics of Emmanuel Macron’s colonial memory policies

ABSTRACT First as candidate and then as President, Emmanuel Macron has elevated colonial memory policy as a key site for the performance and enactment of the dual values of rupture and reconciliation that underpin his broader programme. While this has led to significant symbolic shifts in the French state’s narrative of its colonial history, this article argues that this memory policy cannot and should not be disaggregated from his wider neoliberal project. Through a detailed contextualisation and analysis of President Macron’s interventions in the field, I contend that colonial memory policy simultaneously reflects, legitimises, and constitutes the ‘neoliberal political rationality’ his administration seeks to perpetuate. Under Macron, a limited recognition of France’s responsibilities for colonial violence has been accompanied by an effort to neutralise the political potency of the past, obscure its enduring legacies, assign authority over it to designated experts and delegitimise those who contest this logic. The article illustrates how memory policy has become a means of sublimating contemporary political demands, arising in part from historic structural injustices, into the manageable and managed process of consensus-making that is the hallmark of neoliberal governmentality.

Royal Companies, Risk Management and Sovereignty in Old Regime France

Abstract Shortly after William of Orange arrived in Devon at the outset of the Glorious Revolution in 1688, Dutch troops stationed in Dartmouth seized the Amitié, a ship laden with marble purchased for the French court at Versailles. This seizure precipitated an extraordinary insurance dispute in Paris between two little-known royal companies: the Royal Insurance Company and the Royal Marble Company. This article analyses the fractious dispute and the companies at its heart. In so doing, it reflects on the dispute as a product of the French state’s broader exploitation of companies as tools of risk management: the state leveraged private capital in order to spread the risks of its virulently anti-Dutch commercial policy. Yet the dispute also exposed the ambiguities of war and peace in seventeenth-century thought and practice. In justifying their refusal to pay out on the insurance policy they had signed on the Amitié, the Royal Insurance Company’s directors suggested that an insurer could decide unilaterally that France was in a state of war, thereby triggering a contractual clause that would shift the onus back onto the policyholder. Although Louis XIV himself stepped in to defuse the dispute at its most contentious moment, the state proved unable to respond to the challenge posed to its sovereignty, with significant consequences for the French insurance industry and maritime commerce up to the end of the Old Regime.

Prediction of cesarean delivery in class III obese nulliparous women: An externally validated model using machine learning.

class III obese women, are at a higher risk of cesarean section during labor, and cesarean section is responsible for increased maternal and neonatal morbidity in this population. the objective of this project was to develop a method with which to quantify cesarean section risk before labor. this is a multicentric retrospective cohort study conducted on 410 nulliparous class III obese pregnant women who attempted vaginal delivery in two French university hospitals. We developed two predictive algorithms (a logistic regression and a random forest models) and assessed performance levels and compared them. the logistic regression model found that only initial weight and labor induction were significant in the prediction of unplanned cesarean section. The probability forest was able to predict cesarean section probability using only two pre-labor characteristics: initial weight and labor induction. Its performances were higher and were calculated for a cut-point of 49.5% risk and the results were (with 95% confidence intervals): area under the curve 0.70 (0.62,0.78), accuracy 0.66 (0.58, 0.73), specificity 0.87 (0.77, 0.93), and sensitivity 0.44 (0.32, 0.55). this is an innovative and effective approach to predicting unplanned CS risk in this population and could play a role in the choice of a trial of labor versus planned cesarean section. Further studies are needed, especially a prospective clinical trial. French state funds "Plan Investissements d'Avenir" and Agence Nationale de la Recherche.

The Gendered Consequences of Abolition and Citizenship on Nineteenth-Century Gorée Island

Abstract: In the spring of 1848, the French Second Republic abolished slavery and made citizens of most adult male residents in its overseas territories. Gorée Island (Senegal) became a French exclave, where free and freed women experienced socioeconomic and political decline. The patriarchal French state that “liberated” enslaved women and “enfranchised” former female slave owners simultaneously limited Goréen women’s avenues to economic prosperity and political authority. French republicanism unsettled a significant sociopolitical distinction, the slave–nonslave divide, making gender a more salient factor mediating Goréens’ access to liberty and the public sphere. Goréen women experienced their formal integration into the Second French Republic—with the regime’s patriarchal republican laws and institutions—as colonialism. Goréens became members of a French Republic that championed universal equality, gendered difference, and patriarchy. French republican tenets excluded Goréen women from civic politics and the public sphere and created female colonial subjects on an island of citizens.