Jeremy Jennings undertook to write a history of political thought in France since the end of the XVIIIe century. Of remarkable breadth and erudition, the work nevertheless offers an interpretation which is far from consensual.
Anyone wishing to study political thought in France since the XVIIIe century found itself very quickly hampered by the scale of the task. Indeed, since the Revolution, France has boasted of being the incarnation of the political avant-garde, not only in Europe, but on a global scale. We would readily say that this conviction stems from a particularly Franco-French universalism and egocentrism, but historical reality seems to give reason to the myth. Whether it is the controversy surrounding the Enlightenment, the violence of the Terror, Napoleonic imperialism, or Sartrean philosophy, France can rightly be considered one of the main crucibles of modern political thought.
If it is possible to find symbols and debates born in France almost everywhere in the world, the French themselves have rarely agreed on the meaning of politics and even less on the meaning of certain events such as the Revolution or the Commune. Before even writing a history of French politics, any analytical work must therefore dwell at length on the perception and multiple interpretations of each event. This is where the latest book by British historian and political scientist Jeremy Jennings takes on its full meaning. With erudition and rigor, he guides us through two centuries of heated debates. This book is not really a thesis essay ; rather, it resembles a panorama of key thinkers and ideas structured around several themes.
A liberal perspective
Jennings avoids a purely chronological approach ; each of the ten chapters covers several common concepts. Nevertheless, the author clearly displays his chronological preferences. Even if he discusses the philosophy of the Enlightenment and the philosophers, he places the beginning of his story in the debates around the political community and representation which followed 1789. The fight for or against the Revolution becomes the unsurpassable horizon of each theme present in the pages of the book: sovereignty, universalism, science, insurrection, commitment… Without a doubt, the weight of the revolutionary moment remains overwhelming for all those who live in its shadow.
It would be difficult to prove Jennings wrong on this point, but he goes further in his analysis of the consequences of the Revolution. It is here that we see the influence of a whole generation of historians and political scientists who tried to think about politics in France. The most explicit reference is to Pierre Rosanvallon who appears from the first pages, but we also glimpse the concerns of François Furet and Claude Lefort. By focusing mainly on the impossibility of representation – what Lefort calls “ the empty place » – Jennings is part of the same intellectual heritage. We see without much difficulty that his text is constantly turned towards this same problem: how to appease and close the political void in France.
Given the interest in these questions, it is not surprising that the most important – and longest – chapter is devoted to “ History, Revolution and Terror “. Because it is these three themes that predominate for Jennings. He wants to show how contemporary French politics has strived to think of a political community beyond revolution and violence. He thus takes up the obsessions and fears of liberal thinkers of the XIXe century – Mme by Staël, Guizot, Tocqueville, Constant, Michelet… – who have a special place in his story. Further on, we find this sympathy for liberalism in the chapters devoted to “ Commerce, Usurpation and Democracy » and « Religion, the Enlightenment and the Reaction » in which the author paints a rich and subtle picture of liberal thought and presents a nuanced vision of Catholic thought in XIXe century. Those interested in French liberalism will appreciate this ability to manage different trends within a fragmented political tradition.
However, we are far from a global vision of contemporary political thought. In particular, we can regret that the author focused almost entirely on the XIXe century. The final chapter – titled “ France, Intellectuals and Commitment » – covers the entire period from the Popular Front to the presidency of Jacques Chirac in barely fifty pages. This would have been entirely understandable if the book had been a history of political thought from 1789 to 1918, but the subtitle promises a history of “ since the XVIIIe century “. How then can we justify the marginalization of almost a century of debates, disagreements and political crises? ? Worse: this absence gives the reader the impression that ultimately most of the major political questions were largely settled before the First World War. The Popular Front, Vichy, Gaullism, or the crisis of Marxism in the 1980s appear as so many old, slightly retconned debates, as do certain thinkers of the XXe century – such as Aron or Foucault – do not seem to deserve the detailed treatment reserved for Tocqueville or Constant. Why this questionable choice ? Even respecting Jennings’ thematic choices, it would undoubtedly have been possible to add more recent examples while enriching his argument.
It’s in the chapter titled “ Universalism, the Nation and Defeat » that these gaps are the most apparent. The analysis of the concept of “ defeat » would certainly have been strongly modified by taking into account the military disasters of 1940 in France, 1954 in Indochina and 1962 in Algeria. They all precipitated the fall of the Republic and left traces as deep as Waterloo in 1815 or Sedan in 1870. In 1940 and 1962, they even triggered “ revolutions » and largely contributed to sometimes violent debates around the nation, representation and citizenship. There is therefore little reason to want to leave them aside in a chapter devoted to the consequences of the defeats of the French nation on political thought.
Marxism, Gaullism and imperialism: invisible traditions
Generally speaking, the marginalization of XXe century led to the marginalization of two major political movements: Marxism and Gaullism. Jennings discusses the first in the chapter entitled “ The Insurrection, Utopianism, and Socialism “. Overall, he follows the analyzes of the British historian Tony Judt when he criticizes Marxism of the period 1930-1960 for its hermetic and unhealthy ideology. Whatever one thinks of the Marxist intellectuals of this era, it is a shame to neglect a brilliant and complex political tradition which subsequently had a definite impact on Anglo-American political thought. Likewise for the French Communist Party, which had a profound influence on French society and political thought from XXe century. French Marxism deserved the nuanced treatment that Jennings gives to the liberal Catholics of the second half of the XIXe century: we would then have better understood to what extent it is part of revolutionary and conflictual traditions which are an integral part of French political culture.
As for Gaullism, it barely appears. General de Gaulle would undoubtedly have been surprised to discover that there were more references to Montalembert or Prévost-Paradol than to himself. Even if we consider de Gaulle more as a political actor and less as a thinker, it seems strange to neglect his mix of Bonapartist universalism, national destiny and electoral success. We should have given pride of place to this “ Gaullian myth » which so appealed to the French, and which shows how it was possible in practice to bring the nation together beyond political divisions. That one of the best-known French political figures of the XXe century said almost nothing about the French Revolution would undoubtedly have merited discussion, especially in the context of an analysis by Jennings which takes the revolutionary fact as its starting point.
Along with Marxism and Gaullism, there is a third blind spot in Jennings’ narrative: imperialism. This insufficiency is hardly understandable if we take into account the number of books, articles and polemics which have been published in recent years on this subject. The reader also wonders if it would not have been appropriate to simply add an eleventh chapter on “ Imperialism, Race and Conquest “. This chapter would have been an opportunity to discuss, for example, the reappropriation of the Revolution by Toussaint L’Ouverture, the relationship between republicanism, racism and imperialism at the time of the Third Republic or the critical literature of the negritude. As many historians of contemporary France have pointed out, it was outside France that French political thought was really put to the test. How to bring the Republic to life in Algiers or Dakar ? What citizenship for “ indigenous » of the French empire ? How to manage the contradiction between this deep desire to project “ glory » of France overseas and the liberating principles of the French Revolution ? Failing to address these crucial questions, the conclusion of the book – entitled “ Citizenship, Multiculturalism and Republicanism » – sorely lacking in historical context.
Let’s be clear: this book of more than 500 pages will remain a reference in its field. Through its ambition, its erudition and its seriousness, it will become an essential text for understanding the debates which have crossed the French political space for more than two centuries. Readers should know, however, that the author’s historical, intellectual and political choices significantly modify the scope of the work. These choices may be a conscious decision: it may be that Jennings chose to focus on debates in the XIXe century whose consequences are now well known, instead of entering into more recent and much less clear debates ; it is also possible that he was influenced by the lack of interest of thinkers like Rosanvallon or Furet for the imperial and postcolonial problematic. In any case, we will readily recognize that this partiality is consistent with the characters and the debates which are at the heart of the book. It should not be forgotten that most great men » who set out to write stories « complete » of France failed. Jennings must therefore be congratulated for not only completing his work, but also for presenting a coherent vision. If the differences persist, it is because disagreement has long become an integral part of French political thought.