Social Movements and Symbolic Power: Radicalism, Reform, and the Trial of Democracy in France

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Social Movements and Symbolic Power Radicalism, Reform and the Trial of Democracy in France

John Girling

Social Movements and Symbolic Power

Also by John Girling AMERICA AND THE THIRD WORLD CAPITAL AND POWER CORRUPTION, CAPITALISM AND DEMOCRACY FRANCE: Political and Social Change

Social Movements and Symbolic Power Radicalism, Reform and the Trial of Democracy in France John Girling

© John Girling 2004 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London W1T 4LP. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. The author has asserted his right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. First published 2004 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS and 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010 Companies and representatives throughout the world PALGRAVE MACMILLAN is the global academic imprint of the Palgrave Macmillan division of St. Martin’s Press, LLC and of Palgrave Macmillan Ltd. Macmillan© is a registered trademark in the United States, United Kingdom and other countries. Palgrave is a registered trademark in the European Union and other countries. ISBN 1–4039–3379–0 hardback This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Girling, J. L. S. Social movements & symbolic power : radicalism, reform and the trial of democracy in France / by John Girling. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 1-4039-3379-0 (cloth) 1. Social movements – France. 2. Social structure – France. 3. Democracy – France. 4. Elite (Social sciences) – France. 5. Polarization (Social sciences) 6. Social action – France. 7. Social classes – France. 8. Minorities – France – Social conditions. 9. Bourdieu, Pierre. 10. Touraine, Alain. 11. Sociology – Philosophy. I. Title: Social movements and symbolic power. II. Title. HN430.G57 2004 303.48¢4¢0944 – dc22 10 9 8 7 13 12 11 10

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Contents Acknowledgements

vii

Introduction Formative factors of modern France A summary of events since 1981

1 6 11

1. Social Critique: Discrimination and Inequality Rich and poor The place of women Education Work and inequality Insecurity Social fracture

13 18 20 21 23 25 27

2. Touraine and Bourdieu: Two Perspectives Touraine and the crisis of modernity Bourdieu: structural domination, symbolic power

31 32 38

3. Social Change: Radicalism or Reform Coping with capitalism Radicalism or reform Welfare confrontation Critique of social movements and symbolic power Environment: the political will Education: elite or mass Permissive society: individual freedom or social evasion The autonomy project

53 54 55 58 60 63 71 76 80

4. The Rights of Women: a Case Study 1. Theoretical perspectives 2. Against discrimination: social movements 3. Identity and symbolic power

83 83 94 112

5. Conclusion 1. Economics, politics and civil society 2. Democratic deficit

135 135 140

v

vi

Contents

Appendix: Structure/Action Theories of Bourdieu, Touraine, Giddens and Archer: a Comparison

149

Bibliography

157

Index

163

Acknowledgements I am grateful to the late Pierre Bourdieu for reading my critical assessment of his work (in Chapter 2) and approving it as ‘juste et précis’; and to Alain Touraine for a lengthy interview on the ‘crisis of modernity’ and subsequent correspondence. My thanks, too, to Christine Delphy for endorsing my discussion of her major themes; to two anonymous readers of an earlier version of my text: one for an effective overall critique, the other for good advice on feminism; to William Outhwaite for evaluating the entire text and suggesting certain improvements; and to Briar Towers and Jennifer Nelson of Palgrave for bringing it to completion.

vii

Introduction

Crucially, the theories of Alain Touraine and Pierre Bourdieu – emphasising ‘social movements’ and ‘symbolic power’, respectively – provide explanations and offer solutions of the ‘crisis of democracy’, revealed throughout the developed world and in particular in France. Consider the unusually high abstention from voting in the first round of the 2002 presidential elections, supposedly the most important event in the political calendar; then the astonishing rise to prominence of an extreme rightwing demagogue, denouncing immigrants and their ‘criminal’ tendencies as well as establishment (‘rotten’) politicians, and proclaiming a strident, inward-looking nationalism; and finally the evidence of popular disillusionment – going far beyond the ranks of Le Pen’s suppporters – with political institutions and representatives, seen as corrupt, elitist and out of touch. Certainly, Le Pen was heavily defeated by Chirac in the second round of presidential elections. But Le Pen is a symptom, not the problem. The problem is the democratic malaise that produces extremists like Le Pen – a malaise that reflects the very uneven development of economy and society. (That Chirac – a tainted figure – should be the one to uphold democratic values against Le Pen is a commentary on this state of affairs.) The political sociologist Yves Mény, president of the European University Institute, sums up the situation well: [European] populism . . . is a degeneration of our democratic systems . . . It arises when the gap between political supply and popular demand becomes too great, when the elites reveal themselves to be incapable of tackling the problems expressed by society, when democratic frustrations become too strong. The transmission 1

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belt of political representation either no longer functions or functions badly. (Le Monde, 19–20 May 2002) And Mény asks, specifically in relation to France: where are the working and lower middle-class deputies? Where are the Arab, Black or Asian deputies? The women? The youth? What place do they have in our institutions? (Of 557 deputies elected in 2002, only 68 are women, while a handful of working-class deputies ‘represent’ some five and a half million workers. There are no deputies whose parents are North African – the major immigrant community.) Structural inequality – in social and economic as in political spheres – and the resulting feeling of discrimination are at the heart of the democratic malaise. (These are analysed in my first chapter.) Note that much of the support for the extreme right – and the extreme left – comes from the ‘victims’ of modernisation: those left behind by social change and who feel abandoned by established politicians. More generally, widespread inequality at work, in educational opportunities and in access to social goods makes a mockery of the democratic ideals of liberty, equality and fraternity. It is in seeking to understand the reasons for this ‘social fracture’ that the work of Bourdieu and Touraine is so valuable. For the fragmented and polarised state of society underlines the relevance not only of Bourdieu’s radical critique of France’s dominant elites but also of Touraine’s reformist persuasion, advocating cooperation as well as contestation in the relations of social movements with political institutions. But Touraine is no less critical of modern society, which he sees as no longer held together by a unifying principle, but reflecting instead the divergent forces of economy, politics and culture. Social critique, (contrasting) theoretical perspectives and responsiveness to social change are key features of the work of Bourdieu and Touraine. They are analysed at length in my second chapter. The major themes can be summarised as follows. Social critique: Pierre Bourdieu and Alain Touraine, both eminent sociologists, theorise structures of domination – in economy, politics and society – resulting in discrimination and social inequality. Education is one example: for Bourdieu it is the transformation of ‘inherited capital’ (superior social origins) into educational capital, whereby scholarly degrees legitimise subsequent elitist careers. The ‘Republican model’ is another: for Touraine the Republican tradition imposes unity (in the service of state power and the demands of the economy) on a diverse society, constraining people’s freedom and creativity.

Introduction 3

Theoretical perspectives: Bourdieu’s key concept is the correspondence between objective structures of power and the way in which people perceive them (a fusion of structural and phenomenological approaches). The result is the dominance of ‘symbolic’ as well as institutional power, which is contested, to a certain extent, by movements at the margins of society. Touraine’s key concept is the autonomous ‘subject’, defined as ‘the will of the individual to act and be recognised as an actor’, changing society by way of ‘free and creative’ social movements. Evaluation: Bourdieu’s emphasis on symbolic power (whereby the dominated, who are conditioned to see the world from the point of view of the dominant, take part in their own subjection) allows small scope for structural change, apart from marginal efforts (by the unemployed, the excluded). Touraine’s emphasis on social movements (such as trade unions in the ‘industrial era’ of the recent past and, at present, some of the more dynamic forms of civil society) is theoretically more favourable to change. But in practice such movements, with the significant exception of environmentalists and the women’s movement, are often marginal (less than 10 per cent of the French workforce, for example, are unionised). Some, like the immigrants seeking legal status (known as sans-papiers), are spontaneous, but spasmodic; others, such as the homeless, are more likely to seek the protection of the state than to contest its power. Nor is the quantitively more important ‘youth culture’ or ‘mass culture’ more helpful: it is largely apolitical on the one hand, consumer-oriented on the other. Social change: despite the dominance of existing power structures, substantial changes have taken place throughout the developed world in recent decades: near-universal social security (welfare state), fragmented families and couples living together, ‘mass’ education, environmental awareness and women’s rights, are examples. But have such changes, however socially important, substantially altered the political and economic (including international) power structures, and have they seriously reduced social inequality? This is Bourdieu’s argument. But is his prescription – a ‘symbolic’ as well as political and economic ‘revolution’, freeing ourselves from unconscious dispositions – the most appropriate one? Finally, to what extent (considering Touraine’s work) have social movements contributed to each of these changes (welfare, permissive society, environmentalism, mass education and women’s rights)? And are they the most effective means to counter abuses of economic and political power? Given the shortcomings of the way democracy functions (criticised by both scholars) what other institutional or ‘symbolic’ forms are possible?

4


A major trial of the capability of the democratic system to bring about desired social change is provided by the situation of women, comprising half or more of the population. On the debit side: (i) There is a persistent and substantial gap – despite years of legislative injunctions or reforms – between the salaries of men and women doing similar work with similar qualifications. (ii) There are far fewer women than men in higher managerial, professional or administrative positions (the ‘glass ceiling’). (iii) Substantial inequality between men and women persists in household tasks; despite certain improvements, women work (and are expected to work: symbolic power) many more hours than men. As for assets, what appeared to be a remarkable achievement is the recent French law on ‘parity’: the equal access of men and women to elected positions. The motivation and talents of the women’s movement did much to bring it about. Yet, in practice, this too has proved deceptive. Despite the law on parity, the general elections in 2002 resulted in an increase from nearly 11 per cent to less than 12 per cent of women in the national assembly, the so-called ‘heart of democracy’. Moreover, the feminist movement is divided, among other things, on ‘reformist’ and ‘differentialist’ grounds, the first claiming that women will achieve their ‘rights’ once there is practical equality between men and women, while the second asserts that women are culturally and socially, as well as biologically, different from men. The first is a social movement, as defined by Touraine, in that a specific group asserts universal goals; but from Bourdieu’s perspective, women’s struggle for equality with men is a much more arduous, and even problematic, struggle against structural domination. As for the second component, affirming a different identity for women, it can surely be seen (if not by Bourdieu) as the expression, above all, of symbolic power. The debate in theory and practice: Touraine’s focus on action (social movements) is in marked contrast to Bourdieu’s tendency to determinism, most obviously in regard to women, who in his view are habituated to submission. But this contrast has its advantages, by opening up the social field of investigation to different interpretations. A further advantage is the complementarity of their perspectives, each making up for the deficiencies of the other. Thus, while Touraine’s conception of individual and collective action is persuasive it lacks a rigorous theoretical structure. Bourdieu’s position is the reverse: the dominant structures of society (institutions reinforced by symbolic power) are so strong and enduring as to be virtually impervious to substantial social change – by the dominated, at least. Each perspective (action or struc-

Introduction 5

ture) is insufficient; but a synthesis is possible, and desirable, as I seek to show. Moreover, the debate – even the antagonism – between Bourdieu and Touraine is instructive, by drawing attention to issues of great importance and their interpretation: the global economy, the role of the state, the educational system, the place of women, the degradation of the environment, and problems of unemployment, immigration and ‘exclusion’; these are assessed in the third chapter followed by the case study of the ‘rights of women’ in the fourth chapter. Finally, these issues form part of a wider debate between the ‘politics of change’ and the ‘politics of order’. The former encompasses, in my view, both the Bourdieu-defined state of crisis and the Touraine-defined potential for reform. Both contest the establishment insistence on order: basically, support for political authority and business interests (more police, less social welfare). To remedy the malaise of democracy it is essential for both critical and reformist arguments to be heard. Consider the alternative: the concentration, for example, by both left and rightwing parties on security. Such a policy may well assure immediate satisfaction, but it offers no long-term solution of the social fracture that is largely responsible for ‘insecurity’ – and alienation – in the first place. Brief biographical note Pierre Bourdieu, philosopher, anthropologist and sociologist, retired from the Collège de France in 2001 and died the following year. He has written on the Kabyles of Algeria, on poverty in France, the rules of art, on education and the elitist grandes écoles, on sociological problems and ‘language and symbolic power’. He is internationally known for his concepts of ‘capitals’, ‘fields’ and ‘habitus’ and his theory of dominant and dominated classes. Alain Touraine, sociologist, was for many years director of the Laboratory of Industrial Sociology; he was the founder (in 1981) of the Centre for Sociological Analysis and Intervention (CADIS) of the Ecole des hautes études en sciences sociales. Apart from his early studies of the trade union movement, he has written on the ‘fragmentation’ of modernity, on pluralist democracy, multiculturalism and the ‘neoliberal’ economy. His major concern is the theory and practice of the free and creative subject, active in ‘social movements’. While both sociologists are critical of social inequality, I consider Bourdieu’s approach to be ‘radical’, Touraine’s ‘reformist’. (I do not use these terms in a pejorative sense.) Touraine views existing society posi-

6


tively, based on the creative potential of the free subject to bring about change. Bourdieu, to the contrary, rejects reformism as an illusion, because of the continuing resistance by the dominant classes to challenges from below. Note that both theories, although derived from and concerned with French conditions, are universal: they provide important explanations of social behaviour throughout the world. There is, therefore, much to be said for a study comparing France with other Western countries, but this is beyond the scope of this work: to deal effectively with such issues would require another book. On the other hand, focusing on the particular (French) context adds greatly to an appreciation of ‘social movements’ and ‘symbolic power’ in action. Accordingly, I provide a brief analysis of the ‘formative factors of modern France’, setting out the historical and contemporary context – the ‘real world’ which Bourdieu and Touraine seek, in their different ways, to understand and to change.

Formative factors of modern France Four themes are important in understanding the evolution of modern France: the character of different regimes, from the Third to the Fifth Republic; the remarkable economic development; the political system and its problems; and changes in society. 1. Regime change The Third Republic (1870 to 1940) ended dismally with the crushing defeat of France by Nazi Germany and the formation of a collaborating regime (Vichy) contested by the courageous figure of General de Gaulle. This Third Republic, which had started with such enthusiasm for ‘modern’ ideas ended under the stigma of ‘backwardness’ – provincial inertia holding back the advanced sector – aggravated by the corruption of the political elite in a divided society. The Fourth Republic, inaugurated with the liberation of France, also proved deceptive. Enmeshed in the Cold War, centrist governments confronted the hostility of a powerful Communist Party on the Left and of alienated Gaullists (the General had quit the parliamentary scene in disgust) on the Right. It was involved in a debilitating colonial war in Indochina, ending with the humiliating defeat of Dien Bien Phu in 1954, followed almost immediately after by the outbreak of an even more terrible war in Algeria. France was saved from disaster by the

Introduction 7

‘second coming’ of de Gaulle in 1958, ending the war, re-establishing authority, and inaugurating the Fifth Republic. Contrary to the practice of the Third and Fourth Republics, the Gaullist Republic actively encouraged the fusion of political and administrative power in a highly centralised state. Nearly one-third of government ministers by the late 1960s originated from the higher civil service, while more than half were graduates of the prestigious ‘grandes écoles’, such as the Ecole normale supérieure for teachers and academics and the Ecole nationale d’administration – founded under de Gaulle’s leadership after liberation – for administrators. More than half the government ministers, after retiring from active politics, went on to join the boards of directors of public or private enterprise. Such has been the tightly interlocking leadership – or classe dirigeante – of politicians, higher officials and economic chiefs characteristic of the Fifth Republic. De Gaulle insisted – and this was established under the new Constitution – that the President of the Republic should be directly elected, elevating the presidential mandate (in his eyes) above the ‘factious’ parliamentary level of the prime minister. Above all, de Gaulle viewed the presidential role, at the head of a strong state, as projecting the power and prestige of France. 2. Economic dynamism – and after What is known as the ‘trente glorieuses’ – or ‘thirty glorious’ years, from the mid-1940s (after liberation) to the mid-1970s (the ‘oil shocks’ of massive price increases) established France as a major economic power. It was during these years that French production soared, more than doubling the standard of living of ordinary people and transforming France’s occupational structure. Thus, the rural population (formerly so important politically and socially) was reduced almost to insignificance, the working class was fragmented and ‘bourgeoisified’ (as participants in the new consumer society), the middle class greatly expanded to become the largest single formation and the role of the ‘classe dirigeante’ was reinforced. This extraordinary period of economic growth came to an abrupt end with the quadrupling of imported oil prices and American reactive policies in the early and mid-1970s. In France the centre-Right government under President Giscard d’Estaing (following de Gaulle’s successor, President Pompidou) responded by ‘neo-liberal’ policies of budget austerity, priority to the struggle against inflation, reduction of welfare expenditure, deregulation of financial controls and diminution of the ‘all-

8


powerful’ state. Industrial output fell sharply while unemployment – below 3 per cent in the mid-1970s – doubled by the end of the decade and nearly doubled again (to 10 per cent) by the mid-1980s. ‘Competitive disinflation’ became the gloomy economic watchword even of the Socialists (see below) for the next ten years: only recently has there been a substantial upturn in the economy.

3. Political compromise Contrary to the divisive politics of the early postwar years, Gaullist stability and economic prosperity, followed by turbulence and uncertainty, have resulted in something of a consensus between Left and Right on economic policy – an agreement on essentials derided as ‘one-way thinking’ (‘pensée unique’) by its critics. The turning point can be noted with precision: the early 1980s, when the Socialist President Mitterrand, in an atmosphere of triumph, announced the end of the reign of money in politics, the changeover from austerity measures to Keynesian stimulation of consumer demand (improved wages, increased public expenditure), wholesale re-nationalisations intended to be the ‘motor of the economy’ and, in sum, ‘rupture with capitalism’. The experiment proved disastrous: the consumer boom drew in imports, while domestic production fell; the trade deficit was the worst in 14 years and the budget deficit nearly doubled. Within the next two years, the Socialist government was forced to reverse its programme and return to a policy of wage-freeze and austerity. Since then, economic ‘orthodoxy’, whether by the Left or Right, has prevailed. Ideological antagonism has diminished. The once-powerful Communist Party, fervent opponent of capitalism and the bourgeoisie, has been marginalised by its alliance with the Socialists and has adopted reformist policies. The pro-Communist trade union movement (CGT) has similarly declined: in numbers from more than two million in 1978 to less than one million a decade later; while the trade union movement as a whole is weakened by rivalry with the centrist CFDT (Confédération française démocratique du travail). Gaullism, too, lost its aura. The Right has largely abandoned its founder’s world ambitions – and much of his ‘social’ concern. Although for years deeply divided on personal as well as on tactical issues, the Right was spectacularly unified (in the Union for a Presidential Majority, UMP) and won decisively the 2002 presidential and legislative elections.

Introduction 9

On the extreme Right, Le Pen’s National Front mobilised 17 per cent of the electorate on a populist and ultra-nationalist, anti-immigrant platform, eliminating the Socialist leader Jospin from the 2002 presidential race. Despite the apparent stability brought about by Chirac’s electoral triumph, two outstanding defects of the political system, whether under governments of the Left or the Right, remain to be solved: first, the association with technocratic ‘elitism’ – notably the pervasive influence of graduates from the Ecole nationale d’administration, known as ‘énarques’; and second, the problem of ‘affair-ism’, that is, relations between politicians and business, ranging from collusion to corruption. Not only is there a high proportion of énarques among ministers (and advisory staff) – one-third of ministers, for example, in the 1997–2002 Jospin government, including the prime minister himself – but such technocrats continue to dominate much of the economic sector, public or private. (Two researchers have recently shown that almost half the 200 biggest enterprises are headed by officials drawn from the state apparatus: Le Monde Campus, March 2001.) Indeed, the machinery of state itself is subject to criticism, as one expert points out, for its ‘ineffectiveness in relation to national objectives’ and for being ‘opaque, hierarchical and blind’; it ‘produces regulations the way Ford produced cars’ with the same self-satisfaction and sense of impunity (Roger Fauroux, 2000: 20, 21). The technocrats are blamed for being incapable when they get things wrong, and for being arrogant when they are right. As for ‘affair-ism’, collusion between politicians and business is evident well before the (notorious) Third Republic: ‘enrichissez-vous’ (enrich yourselves) was the slogan of a chief minister of the midnineteenth century ‘bourgeois monarchy’. Such a relationship stems, then as now, from the necessity for politicians to balance between the interests of their constituents, on the one hand, and economic imperatives – without which the political system could not survive – on the other. Corruption scandals, when ‘collusion’ goes too far, have emerged especially in recent years because of the increasingly heavy costs of electoral campaigns. It was a customary practice of both Left and Right to finance their campaigns – before the introduction of legislation in the mid-1990s – through hidden commissions from business firms awarded public contracts. One major reason for increased public awareness of political corruption is the success of investigative journalism; another

10 Social Movements and Symbolic Power

is the emancipation of the judiciary from its former subservience to its political ‘masters’. Corruption, as a result of both factors, is on the decline; but it remains an important issue, because in terms of public opinion the continuing evidence of corruption discredits the image of politicians. 4. Social change The most dramatic change was in May 1968 when radical students defied the authorities, by insisting on freedom from stifling regulations, and were joined by millions of striking workers, virtually paralysing the country. Even though this revolutionary movement came to a disillusioning end (a conservative political backlash) it continued to inspire struggles for emancipation, such as the ‘women’s liberation movement’ (see Chapter 1 and especially Chapter 4). At the same time, a very different social behaviour took the form of ‘consumerism’, derived from the postwar economic boom, which spread widely among the middle and ‘popular’ classes, encouraging a variety of leisure activities: holiday tours, sports, pop festivals, discos, fashions, television entertainment, and so on. Underpinning the general improvement in living standards was the establishment of the ‘welfare state’ – a major postwar reform – which provided an unprecedented safety net in case of accidents, sickness, unemployment and in providing for retirement. Mass education, too, opened up the possibility of technical and professional employment to previously excluded youth (but education for the elite remained largely a closed preserve). Personal lifestyles also flourished, with freer choice in marriage (or living together) and divorce, contraception and abortion. Social values as a result changed considerably. In 1981, according to one specialist, people from the working class and the lower middle class still valued highly the morality of the family and order, while the professional middle class was more sensitive to new feminist attitudes and the elite favoured quality of personal relationships. By 1999 these class differences had considerably diminished. The popular classes were more open to different views of the family and sexuality, while permissive behaviour and women’s insistence on financial independence were shared widely throughout society (J.-F. Tchernia writing in Le Monde, 16 November 2000). But there is a downside. The distribution of wealth remains very unequal. Moreover, the high rate of unemployment, especially in the 1980s and 1990s, disproportionately affects young people (about twice the national average) and young immigrant workers in particular; more-

Introduction 11

over, those with jobs – and women especially – increasingly have to turn to part-time or short-term employment or other forms of ‘precarious’ work. Above all, the poorly educated have much less chance of getting a job in the more specialised and competitive manufacturing and service enterprises of the global economy. The result for those who are ‘excluded’ is too often a downward spiral into anti-social forms of behaviour, such as petty delinquency, street violence, drugs or more serious crime. Indeed, the problem of ‘insecurity’ became the central issue of the 2002 presidential and legislative elections. (See also the following chapter.)

A summary of events since 1981 Mitterrand was elected president in 1981, appointing as prime ministers, first Maurois, then Fabius. After the victory of the Left in legislative elections, a ‘socialist’ economic policy was announced, involving wage increases and a spate of re-nationalisations. The economic crisis of 1981–82, characterised by high inflation and unemployment, however, forced a return to austerity. Among positive social reforms, the death penalty was abolished and important decentralisation measures were enacted. In 1986 the Right and Centre-Right won the legislative elections. As a result, the Gaullist leader, Chirac, became prime minister, ‘cohabiting’ with Socialist President Mitterrand. The following year Mitterrand was re-elected president for another seven-year term, appointing as successive prime ministers Rocard, Cresson and Bérégovoy. But corruption scandals dogged the Socialist administration, despite a hastily-enacted amnesty law in 1989. Unemployment climaxed at three million. In 1993 the Right and Centre-Right decisively won the legislative elections, the Gaullist Balladur becoming prime minister. Chirac was elected president in 1995, but the Gaullist Prime Minister Juppé’s reform plan provoked widespread strikes and had to be abandoned. In 1997 the ‘pluralist Left’ of Socialists, Communists, Greens and others won the legislative elections. Prime Minister Jospin’s ministers notably included Strauss-Kahn (economy), Aubry (employment), Guigou (justice) and Voynet (Greens, environment). Jospin proclaimed the independence of the judiciary, boosted employment (by measures such as the 35-hour week) but also continued previous governments’ promotion of privatisation. The ‘parity’ law stipulating equal access of men and women to elected positions was adopted. As a result of economic revival unemployment was reduced to two million. Mid-


term ministerial changes saw Fabius taking over the economy, Guigou employment and Lang replacing the controversial Allègre at education. The 2001 municipal elections were significant for the Left’s victory in Paris (Chirac’s former stronghold) and in Lyon, but these were offset by reverses elsewhere. Abstention from voting was particularly high among young people. Chirac was re-elected president in 2002. Jospin had been humiliatingly outvoted in the first round of the 2002 elections by Le Pen, himself massively repudiated in the second round. The dominant majority of the Right in parliament was led by the provincial notable Raffarin, astutely appointed by Chirac. The president, seeking to go down in history as a great reformer, insisted in his New Year message for 2003 on ‘indispensable’ reforms, notably effective retirement pensions, decentralisation, educational renewal, safeguarding the health system, modernisation of the state, environmental protection and redynamising the economy – so far with mixed results. Major problems persist: the record number of abstentions (nearly 40 per cent for the 2002 legislative elections) demonstrates alienation or indifference among citizens, especially the young; economic growth, which is essential to achieve structural reforms without social conflict, is subject to global uncertainties and European budgetary constraints; finally, the electoral victory of the Right was won essentially on the negative issue of insecurity (and of disaffection with the Left, suffering from the wear and tear of office): now, the positive challenge for the Right is to bring about fundamental reforms, which are essential for a modern society, without yielding (as is usually the case) to vested interests.

1 Social Critique: Discrimination and Inequality

This chapter, broadly, is the expression of civil society. It describes the social context from which the theories of Bourdieu and Touraine are derived and which gives meaning to those theories. They are examined in detail in the following chapter. As noted above, economic growth, elitism and the Republican model were the threefold sources of strength of postwar France – the ‘trente glorieuses’ from the mid-1940s to the mid-1970s. The standard of living of French people, the historian Jean-Jacques Becker records, increased four times (between 1949 and 1981) and household equipment was totally transformed. In 1963, 9 per cent of families had a telephone; in 1988, 92 per cent. Those with a refrigerator, in those same years, increased from 43 to 98 per cent, those owning a washing machine from 32 to 87 per cent, and families with a television set rose from 28 to 94 per cent. By 1988 almost every family owned a car. ‘The immense majority of French people lived in conditions of comfort unknown to their grandparents or even their parents’ (Becker, 1998: 731–2). And yet the confidence of ordinary people in such benefits, following the economic upheavals of the 1970s, was increasingly replaced by hesitation and doubt. As Becker states, unemployment in the 1990s became the ‘number one pre-occupation’ of the French (it had increased from 4 per cent in 1975 to more than 12 per cent, involving three million people, in 1994); another seven million, who wanted to work full-time, were in temporary jobs or worked part-time. ‘It is not excessive’, in Becker’s view, ‘to consider unemployment, on such a scale and over such a period of time, as a really destabilising force in society’ (735–6). It was then that the word ‘exclus’, referring to the poor, the unemployed and the ill-lodged or homeless, came to symbolise the return of poverty. It was expressed in a material as well as ‘spiritual’ 13


sense: that is, exclusion from the benefits that society is supposed to provide its citizens, resulting in a feeling of abandonment, of no longer belonging to the community, of demoralisation. Now, the ‘neo-liberal’ economy, elitist leadership and Republican traditions are increasingly perceived in negative, and no longer as before, in positive terms. The transnational economy is seen by ordinary people more as a threat to their jobs and their standard of living than as a challenge or opportunity (which it is to the technocrats, executives and elites). The elites are no longer believed to be instrumental to economic, social and political improvement, but on the contrary to be incapable of bringing it about; and in their aloof behaviour and arrogance they appear indifferent to the problems of ordinary people. As for the ‘Republican model’ (the more it is in crisis the more its virtues are invoked) it seems to fail on all three counts: ‘liberty’ means the freedom of market forces, imposing economic constraints on society; ‘equality’ of electoral choice is a mockery confronted with the evidence of social inequality, notably the division between elites and ‘masses’; and ‘fraternity’ or solidarity is lacking in an increasingly fragmented society. This lack of social cohesion was underlined by the prominent contemporary historian René Rémond, head of the Fondation nationale des sciences politiques, in an inaugural lecture on the ‘state of France’ on 8 January 2001. Public opinion, he noted, no longer tolerates the ‘social fracture’ (once regarded as part of the natural order of things). Social inequality is seen as unjust. Remedies are needed and should not be stalled by politicians arguing – either because of lack of courage or clarity – that people are ‘refractory’ to change. This critical attitude is reflected in the comments of numerous intellectuals, certain politicians and the quality media as to the state of France, and its political institutions in particular. For ‘the French social model seems to have seized up’, as François Fillon, Minister of Social Affairs in the Raffarin government, pointed out on 9 July 2002. ‘The Republican pact is less and less effective because of the weakening of civic spirit and the blocking of social mobility.’ Hence the notion of ‘social fracture’ (see below) and ‘democratic deficit’. ‘Democratic deficit’ describes the situation where political parties, whether of the Left or the Right, are seen to be less and less reflecting the needs and aspirations of society. As Jérôme Jaffré, director of the centre for the study of public opinion (Cecop), points out, the parties have three main defects: the under-representation of women; the small space open to youth; and the disregard for ordinary people, especially workers and white-collar employees. Workers form only 6 per cent of

Social Critique: Discrimination and Inequality 15

members of the Socialist Party, for example, while people under forty – amounting to one-third of members in 1985 – are now only 14 per cent ( Jaffré, Le Monde, 15 January 2000). ‘We have a generational gap’, admitted François Hollande, first secretary of the Socialist Party, in March 2000, emphasising the ‘great difficulty’ he had in finding people aged thirty who wished to take part in politics. For them, there are no ‘defining moments’, such as the Resistance, the Algerian war and the ‘events’ of 1968, as in the past, observe Ariane Chemin and Nicolas Weill (Le Monde, 5–6 March 2000). Moreover, the cynicism and corruption evident in Mitterrand’s last term are hardly an inspiring example. Even the Jospin government of the ‘pluralist Left’ is seen to have ‘rather failed’ to solve outstanding social problems for a majority of those polled by the opinion survey organisation Ipsos (France Soir, 31 May 2000): 74 per cent felt this way in regard to educational reform (and see below), 67 per cent on the question of insecurity, 60 per cent on ‘reduction of social inequalities’ and 58 per cent on environmental problems. It is this perceived ‘incapacity’ of government to deal with major problems of everyday life that gives rise to a feeling of apathy or indifference, rather than outright opposition, especially among the youth. According to a recent Ipsos survey (Le Monde, 4–5 March 2001), half the teenagers surveyed showed total lack of interest in politics, while another 30 per cent were ‘rather uninterested’. Significantly, on the other hand, the great majority were ‘preoccupied’ by the problems of Aids, poverty and world hunger, violence and insecurity. The extent of popular indifference towards, or alienation from, politics was brutally revealed by the record abstention from voting – nearly 40 per cent, especially among workers and employees – in the 2002 legislative elections. Moreover, the Socialist leader Jospin was disgracefully beaten for second place by the extreme rightist Le Pen in the first round of presidential elections. Chirac himself obtained only 20 per cent at this time – the lowest score of any president seeking re-election. ‘Social fracture’ was most evident among the reasons given for abstention: more than half the workers who abstained and the same proportion of supporters of the extreme Right and extreme Left – and 59 per cent of the unemployed – considered the elections to have little or no importance. Indifference (too much trouble to vote) and ‘lack of confidence in politicians in general’ were explicitly mentioned by half the workers and white-collar employees (the survey study organisation, Sofres, poll for Le Monde, 15 June 2002).


Although workers and employees accounted for more than half the Socialist vote in 1978, they represented only one-third in 1995 and just over one-quarter in 2002. More of them voted for Le Pen than for Jospin (Eric Dupin, Le Monde, 2–3 June 2002). Even more dramatically the Communist Party, like the Socialists no longer offering an ideological inspiration, lost more than half its supporters between 1995 and 2002. Moreover, the pressures of a global economy, demanding technocratic skills in a competitive environment, on the one hand, and important social changes on the other – precarious work, more women in the labour force, the problem of immigration, the rise of individualism – ‘all this has made more fragile the traditional representative structures established by social democracy’, as the communications specialist of the Socialist Party, Alain Bergounioux, acknowledges (Le Monde, 26–27 May 2002). The Socialist Party, concludes Pierre Rosanvallon of the prestigious Collège de France, is now a party of politicians, managers, teachers and officials, with a social base too narrow to give rise to effective reforms (debate in Le Monde, 16 May 2003). Given this situation, ‘What is a Left Policy?’, asks Nicolas Tenzer, president of the research centre for reflection on political action (Cerap). He refers, supporting the previous Ipsos findings, to the ‘long-standing ineffectiveness of numerous policies, the increase in inequalities, the persistence of a substantial degree of poverty, and the ritual (official) incantations of limited room for manoeuvre’ leading to despair as to the ability of the Left – in government from 1997 to 2002 – to struggle for a better world. He blames for these social ‘blockages’ the ‘hidden mechanisms’ that reproduce the existing order, supported by an educational system that works against the most disfavoured, reinforced by the power of ‘closed corporate bodies’ and an elite that acts with impunity (Tenzer, Le Monde, 11 July 2000). The well-known sociologist Pierre Bourdieu takes an even more critical stance. Writing in Le Monde, ‘Pour une gauche de gauche’ (8 April 1998), Bourdieu denounced the ‘instrumental and cynical’ conception of politics held by political parties of Left and Right, who have no other solution than ‘manipulating the electoral and media-inspired rules of the game’. The ‘imploding’ Right returns to its troubled origins when ‘conservatives do not know what to conserve’. As for the apparent ‘pluralism’ of the Left, according to Bourdieu, it fails to serve its own electors, it demobilises its activists and relegates the most disaffected to the extreme Left – the sans-papiers, the unemployed, the teachers. Bourdieu concludes: ‘The Left profits provisionally from the mediocrity of its opponents without proposing anything but a day-to-day policy


which changes nothing essential in the daily life of the great majority of the citizens.’ The influential left-of-centre sociologist, Alain Touraine, also expresses his disillusionment with enfeebled political institutions, shaken by the pressures of economic globalisation. Politics appears unable to express or organise popular demands. The political system is isolated from society where, in rich countries, youth culture, media images and consumerism provide a non-political expression to social demands. Indeed, the popular disaffection with the ‘political class’ removes all content from democracy (Touraine, 1994: 157–8). In response to the cumulative effect of such criticism, the social commission of the (Catholic) Bishops of France urged the ‘Rehabilitation of Politics’ in its declaration of 23 March 1999, which records the widespread public feeling that governments are unable to solve such major problems as unemployment, delinquency and social inequality. The bishops are alarmed by the widening gap between citizens and politicians, contrary to the aims of public action: that is, to ‘live together’ effectively and to pursue the ‘common good’. The declaration, in conclusion, upholds the dignity of human beings, the need to care for the poor, the conception of politics as a service, a more equitable sharing of wealth and openness to universal values. Similar social values are expressed by the researcher Michel Wieviorka, director of the centre of sociological analysis and intervention (Cadis, founded by Alain Touraine), in Une société fragmentée? (1997: 14). ‘It seems that we are experiencing a return to poverty, today known as exclusion, and to the precariousness of existence, called social fracture [Chirac’s expression]. But behind the return of poverty (la misère) we must learn to uncover the imprint of social relations combining scorn, discrimination and segregation.’ The economist Nicolas Baverez, previously chef de cabinet (chief of staff) of the conservative prime minister Balladur in the mid-1990s, is no less critical of the current failure of French institutions to solve the problem of mass unemployment and social inequality. ‘Such are the elements of a major democratic crisis . . . The loss of confidence in the elites, especially the politicians, contributing to the institutional paralysis; the strength and the duration of an extreme-Right nationalistic and xenophobic movement . . . ; the proliferation of scandals, including the growth of corruption . . . all serve to indicate the decomposition of public life . . . in the context of an indisputable immobilism, replacing the accelerated movement of the Trente Glorieuses’ (Baverez, 1998: 14–17).


Such critical insights, whether from Left or Right, can be appropriately considered both in subjective and objective terms: thus, discrimination is the perception of social relations from ‘above’ and from ‘below’ (the subjective representation of esteem and dis-esteem) while social inequality is the ‘objective’ production of hierarchical structures of power. For even with a return to economic growth – although fluctuating considerably from negative growth to nearly 4 per cent over the past decade – and a substantial decline in unemployment – but still around 9 per cent, or one-and-a-half times that of Britain or the United States – the ‘social fracture’ remains in force. Thus, even after five years of economic improvement, as the national statistical institute (Insee) reported in its annual survey of income and wealth (Le Monde, 22 March and 19 October 2001), the number of households living in poverty – affecting more than four million people – remains virtually unchanged. Indeed, unemployment and ‘precarious’ work, on the one hand, and the highly unequal division of wealth, on the other, are characteristic of this ‘fracture’, both product and cause of social inequality. Discrimination and social inequality in France are revealed thematically in the following sections: rich and poor, the place of women, education, work, ‘insecurity’ and ‘social fracture’. Note that inequality and discrimination are the problem of a minority – with the notable exception of women – but it is a substantial minority. Moreover, far more are affected by what is related, directly or indirectly, to unequal treatment: that is, unemployment, precarious work and anxiety about the future, on the one hand, and fear of violence and ‘insecurity’, on the other. What follows, then, is not an overall survey of French society, with its generalised consumer norms, but of a particularly important aspect: the ‘social fracture’ of divergent elements of society that underlies the ‘democratic deficit’.

Rich and poor The French statistical institute (Insee), in its 1999 survey, Données sociales, la société française, reported that the richest 10 per cent of French households possessed half the nation’s wealth (Laurent Mauduit, Le Monde, 19 March 1999). The richest 1 per cent, with one-fifth of the national wealth, also owned nearly 40 per cent of stocks and shares (Insee: reported in Le Monde, 25 September 1997). In September 1996, Insee reported that the poorest 25 per cent of households, by contrast,


owned only 1 per cent of the total wealth; and even half the households owned only 8 per cent (Girling, 1998: 162). During the period 1984 to 1994, according to the economist Alain Trannoy, the share of the poorest 20 per cent of households was actually reduced from 4.7 to 3.4 per cent of disposable income, while that of the richest 20 per cent increased from 42.1 to 44.7 per cent (reported by Martine Laronche, Le Monde Economie, 23 December 1997). A later study by Insee reveals 30 per cent of the population with ‘modest’ incomes, averaging 1130 euros a month per household. A much broader category of ‘middle’ incomes (nearly 59 per cent) possess on average twice the incomes of the ‘modest’, but they include a large number (twofifths of this category), especially among workers, with only one-and-ahalf times. Meanwhile the richest 1 per cent earn nearly 8900 euros a month per household – eight times those of the ‘modest’ 30 per cent (Camille Boulongne, Le Monde, 9 August 2003). The then Labour and Employment Minister, Martine Aubry, defending the ‘law against exclusion’ in the National Assembly on 5 May 1998, pointed out that half a million unemployed households were povertystricken, as were 300,000 households with jobs. Also among the excluded were the 50,000 young people who left school every year without qualifications, some 200,000 homeless, 600,000 who were heavily in debt and two million who were badly housed. According to Insee on 6 March 2002, the rate of poverty during the years 1996 to 2000 amounted to nearly 11 per cent of the French population. Of the total active population of over 26 million in 1999, according to Insee, white-collar workers formed the largest proportion with nearly 8 million, ahead of manual workers (7.1 million), ‘intermediate professions’ (nearly 6 million), ‘cadres’ (managers) and higher professions (3.2 million), artisans, shopkeepers and small businesspeople (1.7 million) and farmers and tenant-farmers (0.6 million). The sociologist Howard Davis notes (1999: table, 22) that the average net wealth by occupational category (in 1982) varied from 2297 million francs possessed by large businesspeople, to 1545 million owned by liberal professions, down to the 283 million of white-collar workers and only 221 million belonging to manual workers. (In terms of net salaries in 2000, according to Insee, higher professionals and business executives earned nearly 40,000 euros a year on average – more than two-and-a-half times the wages of workers and employees: Le Monde on the ‘France of the Forgotten’, 2–3 June 2002.) Davis concludes that ‘the class structure and the inequalities which persist in employment, education, housing, consumption, health and


mobility chances have endured throughout the twentieth century’. But, while class positions may not have changed, ‘work and employment are now experienced as more arbitrary and uncertain’ as a result of economic changes and global competition. Social institutions which once provided some protection – the family, neighbourhood, trade unions and local associations – have become more inward-looking and ‘private’. Individual identity, which is closely linked with social recognition and status, is less firmly rooted in shared social conditions. Indeed, ‘unemployment, debt, surviving on a pension, or becoming a social security claimant are experiences of inequality which are increasingly likely to be lived in isolation’ from traditional sources of support. The ‘evidence points to a growing problem of social cohesion which is exacerbated by a lack of direction in the political system’ (Davis 1999: tables, 18, 22; 31). And see ‘Work and Inequality’, below.

The place of women Unlike the many poor people in France – who are still a minority – women make up the majority. In a democratic country, therefore, it is all the more scandalous for women to experience discrimination and inequality. Discrimination refers to the negative or condescending way in which women are perceived by men according to male values; inequality refers to the different – inferior – treatment of women who are as well qualified as men. Historically, women have been subordinated to men. The ‘Salic law’ of male succession is one example. Even the French Revolution – the very symbol of the ‘Rights of Man’ – is retrograde in terms of the social and political rights of women. It was not until 1944 that women could vote in elections. Only in 1965 were married women entitled to work and to open a bank account without needing authorisation by their husbands. Paternal authority over children was replaced by ‘parental’ authority in 1972. In 1967 contraception was legalised (publicity had been banned in 1920 and abortion was made a crime); abortion was legalised in 1975 (Gaspard, 1997: 163; Rodgers, 1998: 58–61). Women have long experienced the social imposition of male conceptions of the place of women (relegated to household tasks or subordinate jobs). Even more significantly, male domination has been so deeply entrenched in society that women have come to accept male valuations (of women and of males themselves) as ‘natural’, as part of the ‘order of things’. Women, in other words, have their rightful place in the private sphere, while men control the public life


of politics, the administration and the commanding heights of the economy. As a result, despite the principle of equality between men and women, the latter are, in practice, still disadvantaged, especially at work. Women now make up 45 per cent of the workforce (more than three-quarters of women aged between 25 and 49 work outside the household). They do so because an extra salary is important and because it gives them autonomy. Yet women are mainly concentrated in the service sector, in low-status, low-paid, less secure jobs (Holland, 1997: 139–40). According to Insee (Le Monde, 9 March 2002), the average salary of women is 20 per cent less than that of men. Eighty per cent of the over 3 million workers earning less than the minimum wage are women. After ten years of work experience, for example, the holder of the general baccalauréat had a 17 per cent chance of becoming an executive if he was a man, compared to 8 per cent for a woman. For those with a higher university degree, the chances were 76 per cent for a man and 57 per cent for a woman (‘Discrimination’, Le Monde Economie, 9 March 1999). In the private sector, women accounted for 24 per cent of executive positions in 2002, up from 19 per cent ten years before. In the public sector, women (especially teachers) are in the majority; but only 14 per cent are ranked as directors or inspectors (Le Monde, 9 March 2002). Significantly, as Pierre Bourdieu puts it, ‘access to power, of whatever kind, generally places women in a double bind: if they act like men they are likely to lose the obligatory attributes of “femininity” and they call into question the natural rights of men to positions of power; but if they act like (the stereotypes of) women, then they appear incapable and unable to adapt to the situation’ (Bourdieu, 1998b: 74). This is one of the ways in which male attribution of femininity – the exercise of ‘symbolic power’ – contributes, often unknowingly, and sometimes against their will, to women’s acceptance of their own domination by men (44). (The importance of the feminist struggle for equal rights with men – or, for some women, insistence on a separate identity – is considered at length in Chapter 4.)

Education The grand aim of education, since the foundation of the Third Republic, has been to produce informed citizens, imbued with Republican values. Despite this universalist aim, education and formation have largely served the particular interests of the ‘classe dirigeante’ and later of the


expanding middle class. Even in recent decades when ‘mass education’ has been introduced, incorporating ever larger numbers into underfunded collèges, lycées and universities, the educational system has failed to prepare a substantial proportion of children from ‘marginal’ areas to participate in the world of citizenship or employment. The contradiction between Republican theory and current practice, aggravated by economic constraints, is evident in the rhetoric of political leaders, on the one hand, and the critical assessments of education specialists, on the other. Thus, Prime Minister Jospin in his inaugural declaration of 19 June 1997: ‘to return to the Republic is first to have faith in the school. The school is the cradle of the Republic. Besides its mission to instruct, it should ensure the apprenticeship of civic virtues.’ A few weeks later, Roger Fauroux, author of an important report on education, asserted to the contrary that there was a degree of ignorance among pupils and students, from primary school to university entrance, who are ‘disoriented and badly motivated’ and therefore ill-prepared to take on the ‘role of active citizens in the world of adults’ (writing in Le Monde, 1 August 1997). The Fauroux report, published a year earlier, emphasised in particular the growing gap between, on the one hand, the successful education of elites, including the favoured treatment of the highly select grandes écoles, such as the Ecole nationale d’administration, as well as the advantages bestowed by social position and wealth on gaining entry into the best schools; and, on the other, the difficult situation of young people from the banlieues (suburbs of major cities), deprived and destined to fail (Pour l’Ecole: 16, quoted by Neather, 1999: 173). Undoubtedly, there has been an increase in social mobility as a result of mass education; but the gap between rich and poor is still large. In 1977, for example, the chance of being a cadre rather than a worker was 100 times higher for the children of cadres than for children of workers; in 1985 it was 70 times and in 1993 about 40 times (Louis-André Vallet, sociologist, Le Monde des Débats, January 2000). (See also the findings of Dominique Goux and Eric Maurin, for Insee, on the correlation between family wealth and scholarly success; reported by Sandrine Blanchard, Le Monde, 21 October 2000.) In this regard, Pierre Bourdieu’s major study, La Noblesse d’Etat: grandes écoles et esprit de corps (1989), incisively sets out the transformation from superior social origins to educational ‘capital’, providing a career ‘investment’ for top graduates at the highest levels of the administration, government and major industries. It is a ‘strange cognitive machine’, Bourdieu asserts, whose ‘operations of knowledge and evaluation’ tend


to correlate classification (by social origin) at entry to the grandes écoles and classification (by scholarly result) at exit – without the criteria of social classification ever being made known officially (Bourdieu, 1989: 13, 51–2, 56–7, 537; also see Girling, 1998: 41–4). As Fauroux himself puts it, writing in Le Monde de l’Education (October 1997), ‘a subtle network of information and social complicity allows the socially privileged to place their children in the good classes of the good lycées, serving them as a springboard for the good preparatory classes (of the grandes écoles) and so on’. Bourdieu concludes that students from elite families are well placed in ‘good educational streams and good establishments’ preparing them for positions of economic and political power, while those who come from the most deprived families, and especially children of immigrants, are often left to themselves, ‘excluded as always . . . and relegated to the more or less devalued educational streams’ (Bourdieu, 1993: 920–1). Thus, education, which should be a major force for integration in society, has not succeeded in creating a social link nor even a minimal equality of opportunity. Indeed, as many as 60 per cent of those polled in 2002 by Credoc – centre for the study of conditions of life – considered that schools were not capable of achieving their mission of educating and training children. The critical proportion rose to 68 per cent of those leaving school without diplomas and 63 per cent of low-income earners (Nathalie Guibert, Le Monde, 28 June 2002). ‘Is not the crisis of education’, asks Alain Touraine (1992: 133), above all ‘a recognition of the cultural contradictions and the decomposition of the system of values and norms which the school, the family and all the agencies of socialisation are supposed to transmit to new members of society?’ (The problem of educational inequality is further considered, particularly in relation to the theories of Bourdieu and Touraine, in Chapter 3.)

Work and inequality In an ever more global economy there are limits to the ‘autonomous’ power of national governments to solve social and economic problems. Yet the ‘traditional’ French policy of protectionism, state controls and elaborate welfare provisions was as unsuccessful as is the present policy of adapting to market forces in limiting the surge of unemployment and precarious forms of work. (Economic growth in the years 1999–2001 has, as noted above, considerably reduced unemployment, but it is still at an unacceptably high level.)


Yet it is an illusion to attribute unemployment and poverty simply to globalisation and the growth of the service sector, states the economist Daniel Cohen (Le Nouvel Observateur, 23 May–3 June 1998). ‘The truth is that inequality is inherent in today’s industrial society. One cannot have one without the other. For the third industrial revolution – the information revolution – generates inequality.’ At present 20 per cent of people entering the labour market are unskilled, while 80 per cent have educational qualifications. It is the latter, Cohen states, who set the pace in a freer and less hierarchical economy; but it is also one that is much more competitive and individualistic. It inexorably abandons the 20 per cent of non-qualified, who would previously have found work. Indeed, the statistical institute Insee reports that from 1990 to 1996 unemployment among senior executives increased from 2.6 to 4.6 per cent, while among workers and employees it increased from around 12 per cent to 15 per cent. For those leaving school without qualifications it rose from 13 per cent to 17 per cent (Saglietti, 1997: table, 460). The economic situation is ‘scandalously unbalanced’, according to the economist Roger Godino, associated with the former Socialist prime minister Rocard, because there are 3 million (now down to 2 million) unemployed and another 5 million working precariously, usually parttime or on short-term contracts. Moreover only just over half those seeking work receive an unemployment allowance. One million of those who do get less than 3000 francs a month, compared to the national average of over 10,000 francs (Godino, 1997: 77–8, 96). The rate of unemployment among young men – nearly 24 per cent in 1995 – is actually twice the national average; for young women the figure is still higher, nearly 31 per cent (Hantrais, 1999: table, 121). As a result, the very system of social security is at stake, according to the 1999 report of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). Many important changes taking place over the past fifty years were not foreseen, such as the ageing of the population, the break-up of family structures, the massive recruitment of women to the labour market and the increase in ‘precarious’ forms of work, especially among the poorly qualified. Social policies of OECD governments, including that of France, have not well adapted to these changes, resulting in increasing numbers of poor and excluded (Laurence Caramel, Le Monde, 9 March 1999). For the poorly paid are doubly penalised, according to a report drawn up for the Minister of Social Affairs in January 2003. They are more likely to be laid off as a result of economic restructuring (40 per cent of those affected are workers and 20 per cent are


employees) and these two categories have the most difficulty in finding another job (Le Monde, 23 January 2003).

Insecurity Unemployment and precarious work breed insecurity, especially among poorly qualified young people, who fear for the future. This is even more the case among immigrant families, who feel they no longer benefit from the integrating capacity of the French Republic. To the contrary, troubled French youth and those from alienated ethnic communities (largely Arab) tend to reject Republican values, as no longer applicable, and turn inward on themselves. They may make a virtue out of necessity and take up the values of ‘the street’ – petty delinquency, drug addiction (or dealing), and violence at an ever younger age. Violence in schools is symptomatic: indeed, the Jospin government organised an international conference in March 2001 on the very subject. Schools in ‘sensitive’ areas, founded to educate children as future citizens, have turned out to be centres of bullying and aggression, even against teachers. The sociologist Christian Bachman, interviewed by Le Monde (24 May 1997), argues that the problem is not just a matter of individuals, but of a whole ‘street culture’ that has taken over as a result of the disappearance during the last twenty years of ‘socially integrating’ factors. Nearly half the lycées and collèges, according to school inspectors (Le Figaro, 15 September 1997), are affected by violence, and as many as 81 per cent in the suburbs of Paris (Girling, 1998: 163–4). Thus, insecurity in relation to work creates feelings among the ‘abandoned’ of neglect, low self-esteem, aimlessness and alienation, often turning into ‘anti-social’ behaviour (delinquency and violence) as an aggressive form of compensation, which in turn creates insecurity among those who live in the neighbourhood. Polls by research centres have shown major French preoccupations to be unemployment, serious illness, poverty and drugs. But other studies have also emphasised the growing importance of feelings of ‘insecurity’, especially among the inhabitants of working-class suburbs of major cities. Protests against insecurity are strongly represented in the demagogic appeal of the extreme-Right National Front, obliging both Socialists and conservatives to take the issue seriously. Delinquency, from violence at school to burning cars in the street, as François Dubet explains, is one of the consequences of life in poor households, suffering from unemployment and living in poor suburbs


of large cities. In his fascinating and disturbing study, La Galère (1987), he argues in effect that the hardship of these suburban youths is an extreme case of a general tendency: towards more and more individualistic behaviour, on the one hand, and increasingly precarious employment – or no jobs at all, especially for the poorly qualified – on the other. This argument is taken further by Michel Wieviorka: street violence, he writes, is both the product of ineffective ‘Republican’ institutions and their cause. New forms of violence, he suggests, mark the end of the industrial era when the ‘popular classes’ were integrated into society through work. Now those who are without work are seen as ‘useless’ – lacking social relationships – and even dangerous: the ‘barbarians’ at the gates (review of Wieviorka, Violence en France, by M.-P. Subtil, Le Monde, 2 April 1999). Pierre Bourdieu, too, describes the environment of failure and degradation that lies at the heart of delinquency and violence. Suburban youths, leading a precarious existence, have the feeling of being tied by lack of money and means of transport to ‘rotten’ areas – a feeling that weighs on them like a curse or a stigmata, forbidding access to work, leisure and consumer goods. Above all, they repeatedly experience failure, first at school and then at the labour market, which discourages any reasonable expectation of the future. This sense of abandonment to their fate is aggravated by the disappearance or weakening of organisations, such as trade unions or political parties, that formerly ‘mobilised’ urban or suburban populations into social activities or protest demonstrations. The break-up of family structures, too, contributes to a feeling of fragmentation and loss of bearings that easily degenerates into petty crime and violence, seen as a challenge to authority or even society (Bourdieu, 1993: 344–8). A similar perspective is shown by the sociologist Laurent Mucchielli, interviewed by Le Monde (13 November 2001). While it may be difficult to understand the ‘gratuitous’ forms of violence in the suburbs, he states, they have a meaning: they are expressions of revolt against public institutions. ‘The key is the feeling among youth of exclusion, abandonment and injustice.’ But instead of tackling the social causes – pervasive racism, unemployment and educational inequality – politicians indulge in exaggerated ‘security’ concerns. Indeed ‘insecurity’ became the major theme of the 2002 presidential and legislative elections. President Chirac (successfully re-elected) insisted that ‘violence changes the face of the Republic’ creating fear; it puts at risk the very foundations of life in society (Le Monde, 20


February 2002). ‘For us, security is an absolute priority’ confirmed the rightwing Minister of the Interior, Nicolas Sarkozy, in the incoming Raffarin government (interview with Le Monde, 31 May 2002). Sarkozy inaugurated the official programme to increase the number of police and enact more repressive legislation, especially against young delinquents. Thus, insecurity has replaced unemployment as the main preoccupation of French people, confirmed Robert Rochefort, director of Credoc, centre for the study of conditions of life.

Social fracture ‘A double divorce’, writes the critic Jacques Julliard, ‘is taking place before our eyes: between the people and the elites, on the one hand; and between the people and progress (the alliance of science and social justice) on the other’. Julliard emphasises popular disillusionment with the role of the state: thus, ‘irresponsibility of officials, who have chosen to serve, and to advise, the state; corruption, where previously a puritanical austerity reigned; corporatist interests instead of the general interest: all these combine to give the French the impression of the bankruptcy of a fine and noble institution’ ( Julliard, 1997: 9, 31). The state fails, moreover, to protect its citizens from insecurity. As noted above, the ‘insults and fighting, armed aggression, (stolen) car rodeos, stone-throwing, hurling bottles from windows . . . are increasing all the time’. Yet the contrast is striking between the poorer classes, who massively denounce the aggravation of violence, and the better-off who tend to regard the former as suffering from a kind of ‘insecurity’ syndrome. But the popular classes are not more conservative or repressive than bourgeois liberals; they are just more exposed to the situation (99, 101). It is not surprising, Julliard concludes (204, 211–13), that ordinary people, only too aware of unemployment and worried about the future, have lost their confidence in a common destiny; and that they especially blame the institutions of the Republic for failing to live up to their promise. The result is a ‘profound crisis’ in representative democracy, particularly affecting the political parties. ‘The parties no longer help to express sovereignty; they no longer provide an education in democracy; they are no more than agencies to select political personnel, according to criteria that are more and more doubtful and opaque. They no longer inspire respect among the citizens.’ The political crisis, in other words, reflects the social crisis – that of large numbers of ordinary people. They feel excluded from the rela-


tionship that society is supposed to provide: ‘any idea of the lawinspired state, of the relationship between work and income, and of social linkages has disappeared’, according to the ‘social Gaullist’ Baverez (1998: 56–7). The contrast, Baverez goes on, between the increase in social inequalities and the development of exclusion, on the one hand, and technological progress in information and transportation, on the other, makes the radical differences in status all the more unacceptable, especially in a democratic society emphasising egalitarian values. For the feeling of ‘loss of identity’ especially affects the poor, the precarious and the excluded in a society which seems to have lost its bearings. This is all the more the case as a result of upheavals in family structure in addition to the failure of ‘mass education’ to fulfil its expectations: of imparting knowledge, providing qualifications for work, and expressing common values. Changes in family life have been turbulent, including decrease in marriage, increase in divorces, numerous couples living together without marrying, and children born out of wedlock. Fewer people are getting married and marriage is less stable. Whereas in 1963 only 15 per cent of couples had lived together before marrying, this rose to 58 per cent in 1978 and 84 per cent today. Currently a third of French couples break up after ten years. More than 37 per cent of births take place out of wedlock, compared to less than 7 per cent in 1970. Divorce by mutual consent (85 per cent of cases) allows for quick settlements, but ‘the system of justice is relatively powerless to enforce alimony payments and many divorced women experience conditions of great poverty’, especially when unemployment plays a part (indirectly) in a quarter of the cases. Single parent families have become more frequent, in more than 85 per cent of cases headed by women. They rarely re-marry and suffer marginalisation similar to others dependent on income support (Harismendy, 1999: 79–81). In such a fragmented society, neither of the two ‘great frames of reference’ of the past – religion and communism – are plausible sources of legitimacy, according to Philip Dine. Quoting Pascal Ory, he explains that the cultural implications of this political and social ‘void’ are predictable: a tendency to individualism and nihilism, coupled with a highly vocal rejection of political ideologies and the professed belief in the impossibility of anything other than individual salvation. In postmodern terms, the collapse of traditional value systems results in a generalised quality of ‘depthlessness’ (Ory, 1989: 217; Dine 1999: 239–40). As a result, even the democratic system of political representation is


at stake, as Pierre Rosanvallon asserted in a dialogue with Alain Duhamel (Le Monde, 15–16 January 1995). For Rosanvallon, ‘the political system no longer produces social identification; society has become less “readable”, more opaque; it is more and more difficult to be represented’. The reason is not simply the distance between political parties and ordinary people, but ‘the fact that the political system no longer understands society; it no longer speaks a language that enables it to understand itself or to perceive its bearings or define its perspectives’. For Bourdieu, on the other hand, the ‘misunderstanding’ of politicians reflects the more fundamental withdrawal of the state, subjected to the neo-liberal economic ‘invasion’, from areas of common concern: that is, low-cost accommodation, public broadcasting, state schools, hospitals and so on. ‘What is described as a crisis of politics, of antiparliamentarism, is in reality despair about the state, which should be responsible for the public interest’ and, in particular, the welfare of the most disfavoured – but, on the contrary, is revealed to use public means in the service of private ends: nepotism, favouritism, clientalism . . . (Bourdieu, 1998a: 10–11). In this society of flux and dissolution of traditional bonds – teenage turmoil, women’s emancipation, unmarried couples, discrediting of political parties, decline of institutionalised religion (but enthusiasm for ‘charismatic’ performances), loss of rural roots, identification with image and ‘spectacle’ – the authority of intellectuals, once the symbol of French cultural superiority, is also in decline. Does not the virtual disappearance of intellectuals from public life – in striking contrast with the ‘age of Sartre’ – does not this reveal, according to Alain Touraine, the fragmentation of society and its values? (Touraine, 1992: 461–5; see also Hewlett, 1998: 181–92. Such ‘fragmentation’ is no less evident in ‘How goes France?’: variations on a theme by noted intellectuals in Le Monde, during September–October 2003).

2 Touraine and Bourdieu: Two Perspectives

Pierre Bourdieu and Alain Touraine share a common diagnosis of the state of France: the ascendancy over the last twenty-five years of ‘neoliberal’ economics, facilitated by governments of Left and Right, which increases social inequality and discriminates against the poor, marginalised and ‘excluded’. But they differ in their theoretical perspectives. Touraine focuses on the role of ‘social movements’, inspired by the free and creative action of ‘subjects’ (individual and collective), while Bourdieu emphasises to the contrary the structural condition of elitist domination, reproduced by social origins and scholarly attainment and ‘legitimised’ by the belief among dominant and dominated alike that the system is ‘natural’ and therefore right. For Bourdieu, this is symbolic power. Such different perspectives produce divergent conclusions. Bourdieu argues that economic liberalism must be challenged by augmenting the power of the state and by renewing the appeal of ‘public service’ to aid the poor and the powerless. Further, he supports the ‘revolutionary’ aim of the dispossessed against the dominant elite. Touraine, on the other hand, claims that the previous failure of the ‘administered economy’ (state protection, regulation and control) precisely paved the way for the advance of neo-liberalism (market forces). For Touraine, the power of the state as well as the power of capitalism must be resisted – by free and active social movements in a pluralist society. Touraine is reformist: the system is capable of change under the pressure of individuals and organisations. Bourdieu is revolutionary: the system of hierarchical power and conditioned behaviour is incapable of reform and must be overcome by practice (strikes, demonstrations, disruption) and above all by a change in mentality, rejecting the ‘categories’ of perception and action imposed from above. 31


Each author challenges the weak points of the other: there have certainly been reforms (Touraine); but they have had only a minor impact on the structural condition of domination, which remains intact (Bourdieu). The only salvation is through the uprising of those who have nothing to lose, the ‘marginals’ of society (Bourdieu); it is not the marginals and excluded, but those who already have a stake in society, who are most likely to produce change. Indeed, to rely on the marginals is a counsel of despair (Touraine). Each professes – in the French tradition – to have ‘reason’ on his side. But each perspective has its weakness. In regard to social movements, do they really have the creative capacity attributed to them? If they do not, where is the force and the inspiration for reform? As for structural domination and symbolic power, is it so rigid and all-pervasive as to be incapable of change, either from within or without? If important changes have undeniably occurred, as for example in the field of women’s rights, where does this leave the theory of (male) domination? Nevertheless, both perspectives are valuable. There may even be complementarity, as well as contestation, between them. Touraine’s remarkable synthesis of political philosophy, historical development and concrete analysis in four recent works suggests the modern equivalent of Alexis de Tocqueville (De la démocratie en Amérique; l’Ancien Régime et la Révolution): like his illustrious forbear, for Touraine, democracy and civil society, stages of modernisation, and the authoritarian tendencies of successful revolutions are very much a preoccupation. Bourdieu is more a combination of Rousseau and Sartre: man is born free but is enslaved by institutions, on the one hand, but citizens can be redeemed by the virtue and power of the general will, on the other hand; as for Sartre, Bourdieu shares his radical critique of the social order and his justification of rebellion. I shall start with an exposition of Touraine’s ideas and then follow with Bourdieu.

Touraine and the crisis of modernity Modernity and its ‘decomposition’ are central features of Touraine’s work. He sees modernity as the union of man and nature, or in current terms as the correspondence between system and actors, between the rational functioning of economy and politics on the one hand, and cultural values and attachment to the community on the other. Modernisation in the age of capitalism cannot develop, however, without the principle of order and integration being added to the fissiparous tendencies of bourgeois individualism. In the modern secular world, the

Touraine and Bourdieu: Two Perspectives 33

‘general interest’ provides this integrating principle, which cannot be separated from the free realisation by each member of society of his or her interests. ‘Law, on the one side, and education, on the other, assure the correspondence between individual and society’ (Touraine, 1997, 1999: 43). This unifying model reached its highest stage of development in industrial society, with the achievement of democracy and social welfare. ‘Personal wellbeing and market economy are combined thanks to the intervention of the democratic state, which assures the integration of economic requirements and social demands’ (45). There are thus three stages in the development of modernity, marked by the predominance of the political (in the age of Enlightenment), the economic in the industrial era, and at present the cultural (production of symbolic goods, the information revolution). But, unlike the past, the present period is characterised by the ‘decomposition’ of modernity. The result is a ‘fragmented society’ because of the separation of economic system and cultural values. ‘To this concrete image of a world torn between economy and politics, the market and the state, commercial exchange and identity, there is superposed another more abstract image of the separation of instrumental reason, and thus strategic action, from the symbolic universe of cultures. Reason is no longer a matter of ends and means’, for the attainment of values, but is only an instrument to satisfy needs, which are determined by those who hold economic and political power. How in this fragmented world, Touraine asks, can we ‘recompose’ modernity? ‘What is the (new) principle combining rationalisation of the world and personal freedom, science and conscience, that can replace the former principles of social order and economic development, both of which have lost their integrating force?’ (217–18). For the ‘crisis’ of modernity, Touraine argues in his impressive Critique de la modernité, occurs in two stages: the first is the exhaustion of the initial movement of emancipation (from the conditions of the old regime) followed by the loss of meaning of culture, which is enclosed in a world of techniques and instrumental rationality, while an overpowerful state imposes uniformity on social life. Such a debased form of modernity appears as an instrument of control, integration and repression (Touraine, 1992, 1995: 125–6). Breaking through such a system of control, contemporary society has become an ‘ensemble of decomposed fragments of modernity’ taking four major forms: sexual permissiveness or ‘desire’; mass consumption; ‘strategic’ economic organisation (along with globalisation and predominance of finance-capital); and finally, social conflicts and national


rivalry, which are symbols of collective identity separated from reason (127–9). In such a fragmented world, personality, culture, economy and politics all seem to fly off in different directions. It is a period of incessant change in production and consumption which increases the distance between economic development and social recognition of the individual personality, considered in terms of sexuality as well as collective cultural identity. ‘Yet there seems to be no principle capable of reunifying these diverse forces, which occupy the shattered world of (rationalist) modernity.’ For the personal and the collective are also separated: on the one hand, sexuality and consumption; on the other, enterprise and nation. ‘It is the dissociation of fact and meaning, economy and culture, which best defines the crisis of modernity’ (130–2). Nevertheless, each of these separated elements contains a modernising potential: and it is this, in Touraine’s view, which favours the ‘recomposition’ of modernity. National independence, for example, is a precondition of economic development. Sexuality in turn challenges outmoded norms of social behaviour. Consumerism allows the satisfaction of varied demands and provides an incentive for increased production. Such modernising functions imply an alliance with instrumental rationality, which holds together the social world – but without effectively integrating it, because it remains a rationality of means divorced from ends. Only the ‘return of the subject’ with the use of reason, in Touraine’s view, can reunify the fragmented world (136, 187–9, 275). Return of the subject For modernity itself separates, but also relates, reason and the subject. Thus, ‘modernity produces the Subject, which is neither the individual nor the self created by the social organisation, but is rather the work by which the individual transforms himself or herself into an actor, that is to say, an agent capable of transforming the social situation instead of reproducing it’ (476). The subject is the agent of change, opposing the logic of freedom to the logic of power that maintains the existing system. The subject is the reflection of the individual on his or her identity, but is also attachment to the traditions or values of a community: the individual unites particular interests with universal goals. The subject is constituted by democracy and human rights, freedom and tolerance, and the transformation of emotional impulses into recognition of the other (299–300, 339, 346, 359).


Touraine emphasises the ‘double disengagement’ of the subject, that is, freedom from imperialism or the rule of market forces, on the one hand, and from the closed world of nationalistic or sectarian communities, on the other. Such disengagement is the condition for communication between subjects – but also the condition by which principles of justice, solidarity and co-responsibility permit communication and argument to be transformed into action. The subject is therefore not a simple form of reason, but exists by mobilising memory and solidarity, by inscribing personal freedom in social struggles and cultural liberation (Touraine, 1997, 1999: 103–4). The ‘social debate’, Touraine goes on, is not just a matter of communication. Rather, it is by confronting power and external constraints that the demand for freedom and identity is affirmed. Thus, the search for justice is not only a cognitive activity, but it is best defined as the search for the collective conditions of personal freedom, namely, the capacity to combine in personal experience both instrumental rationality and personal and cultural identity (120). To gain an idea of the just society therefore requires the successive attainment of three levels of thought and action. First, the open conflict between the personal desire for freedom and the power of (economic and political) systems. Second, the debate defining the institutional conditions for encouragement and respect of freedom for everybody. Third, the general formulation of ‘equity’ but also, and above all, establishing the concrete conditions for social integration and sustainable change (121). Subject and social movement Thus, for Touraine, there is no ‘subject’ without ‘social movements’. For the social movement – such as trade unions in the industrial era, and the women’s movement today – is the indispensable collective actor needed to defend the subject against the abusive power of the market, the enterprise and the state. ‘There is no subject without social engagement; there is no social movement without a direct appeal to the freedom and the responsibility of the subject’ (367). Cultural orientation, pluralism and contestation therefore define the social movement. Culture in the broad sense – a way of life, ideas about society and our place in it – informs what Touraine calls the modern ‘programmed society’, where mass production and diffusion of ‘cultural goods’ occupy the central place previously occupied by material goods. In this cultural era, the power of management consists in foreseeing and modifying opinions, attitudes and behaviour, thus entering directly into


the world of values instead of limiting itself to utility. These new forms of control, new mechanisms of government, can be resisted only by defence of the subject and his or her freedom (313–14). Only a pluralist society, and not a uniform model imposed by central authority or inspired by a powerful ideology, can ensure the freedom of the social movement to change its environment. That is why trade unions, in Touraine’s view, are no longer true social movements. They have become degraded either into ‘corporatist’ pressure groups, defending their gains, or into appendages of political parties (315). For social movements are not in the service of any ‘perfect’ model of society, nor of any political party, ideology or political strategy. Instead, they defend their right to autonomy and moral choice; ‘the moral discourse of the societal movement speaks of liberty, life project, and respect for fundamental rights, which cannot be reduced to material or political gains’. Here, the women’s movement, contrary to the trade unions, is exemplary: it has not become a political force, and as a result has penetrated ‘more and more deeply into personal behaviour, family relations, legal conceptions and education’ (Touraine, 1997, 1999: 162–5, 168, 170). But, as Touraine wryly confesses in his ‘Critique’: Today, my confidence in history has deteriorated, and I no longer accept the identification of man as worker or citizen [that is, defined by class or by a uniform conception of society]. I am more afraid of the totalitarian state and all its power apparatuses than of a capitalism which two generations of the Welfare State have made less brutal. I prefer democracy, even when it does not remove injustice, to revolution, which always ends up as absolute power. (Touraine, 1992, 1995: 470). How, then, does Touraine conceive the relationship between social movements and an imperfect democracy? Democracy Politics, for Touraine (and I agree with him) is a system of mediations, and not a mechanism of social integration. Accordingly, democracy is the defence of pluralism, and cannot exist without it. Among the diverse forces of society, social movements uniting particular identities with cultural values are of supreme importance. But, in contemporary society, economic interests have become preponderant, endangering the autonomy of social movements and the democratic process alike.


Social movements alone, however, cannot withstand either the power of capitalism or the abusive tendencies of the state; nor can they check the often irrational search for a collective identity, whether national or communitarian, on the one hand, or the ‘mindless’ drift into consumerism, on the other. Only the complementary (and contesting) relationship between social movements and political institutions can bring about the ‘re-composition’ of fragmented modernity. Social movements, inspired by personal freedom and solidarity with others, are the key to Touraine’s conception of democracy. Pluralist diversity, and not a central organising system – such as the uniform imposition of ‘Republican’ values – is essential for the freedom of the ‘subject’. In turn, the free subject’s sense of responsibility towards others makes it possible to work together for a more just and equal society. For the political equality assured by democracy is more than the equal rights of citizens, Touraine asserts: it also means compensation for social inequalities in the name of moral rights, giving the least-favoured citizens the right to act, within the law, against an unequal order (Touraine, 1994: 38, 106–7, 212). Indeed, the change from passive consumer to active subject, transforming the social environment, is only possible through democracy and open debate. But the danger in ‘developed’ countries, as Touraine recognises, is that parliament tends to be absorbed by the state while the means of information and communication, required for debate, are taken over by the market. Hence the enfeeblement of political institutions. Politics appears unable either to express or to organise demands. The political system is isolated from society: instead, youth culture, media messages and consumer attraction give non-political expression to social demands (157–8, 213, 232–3, 237). The weakness of political conceptions (in an intellectual void) is reflected in the parties’ attachment to solutions that are no longer relevant. Under such conditions, Touraine declares, it is necessary to reorganise political life by the formation of new social movements (154–5). But do not these movements also show the signs of weakness? Clearly the model of a successful social movement is that of Solidarnosc in Poland, formed socially, culturally and historically, uniting workers and intellectuals in a national, popular (and religious) crusade against an unjust and oppressive regime. But in present-day Poland, Touraine admits, economic change (and not ‘Solidarity’) is the dominant feature (248–9). Nor do the exhilarating ‘events’ of 1968 in France, also uniting students and workers, provide a more favourable example,


for they were soon to be superseded by the electoral ‘revenge’ of the silent majority. Nor, to conclude, are prospective social movements more promising. As such, they are intended to be constructive (and not negative) and to express specific demands but also to reflect common cultural values. But it is not clear that Touraine’s choice of candidates fulfils these exacting criteria: that is, his preference for the unemployed, the excluded, gays and sans-papiers (Touraine, 1999: 75–93). Even their names, for the most part, betray their dispersal or marginality: ‘un-’, ‘ex-’ and ‘sans-’. On the other hand, despite fragmentation, the women’s movement, trade unions and ecologists do stand for universal principles: a majority of humankind, work, and the environment. Indeed, the social policies that Touraine proposes (95–6, 132–43) reflect that perspective: parité (equal access to elected positions) for women; priority to work – including enterprise flexibility, reduction of labour costs, wage increases and a ‘social accord’; and ‘sustainable development’ to safeguard an increasingly fragile environment. The next chapter seeks to explain the degree to which important changes in French society – existing or prospective – can be attributed either to the action of social movements, or to other factors, and why some social movements have been effective and not others. A similar evaluation is made of Bourdieu’s notion of symbolic power, which he sees as an obstacle to, rather than inspiration for, social change. The differing critiques of Touraine and Bourdieu are all the more important given the context of ‘social fracture’ – massive abstention of citizens, on the one hand, technocratic and elitist domination of the political system, on the other – evident in the 2002 presidential and legislative elections.

Bourdieu: structural domination, symbolic power The structure of any given society, according to Bourdieu, can be analysed in terms of hierarchical divisions, patterned behaviour of individuals and groups, and production of knowledge. Regularised forms of behaviour correspond to the basic divisions in society between the dominant classes (owners and managers in large-scale commerce, industry and finance, senior administrators, the ‘political class’, liberal professions and so on) and the dominated, chiefly workers, pettybourgeoisie and small farmers. But the ‘typical’ (or even ‘stereotyped’) behaviour of the dominated classes Bourdieu attributes to the way in which they have internalised the dominant views of the roles they do


and should play in society – in the interest of the dominant classes, of course. Such ‘social mythology’, in Bourdieu’s words, owes its ideological strength to the fact that it recalls, more or less discreetly, the most fundamental oppositions of the social order: that which is inscribed in the established division of labour between dominant and dominated; and that which occurs within the dominant class, opposing two principles of domination, material and intellectual, or economic and ‘cultural’. In this way, as Bourdieu puts it in his remarkable and challenging work, La distinction, ‘the social order is progressively inscribed in the mind: social divisions become principles of division that organise the vision of the social world’. Thus, those who are dominated incorporate schemes of perception and assessment that are established by the dominant social order as ‘objective laws’, measuring their hopes according to opportunities that are ‘defined as the established order defines them’. Real limits to social advance are set between the classes. The way these limits – or rather, the system of classification of (appropriate) class behaviour – is fixed owes less to scientific ‘knowledge’ than to ‘symbolic’ power, which is accepted as ‘natural’ by the dominated, but in reality serves the interests of the dominant (Bourdieu, 1979: 546–7, 549–50, 556). This conceptual approach to the fundamental divisions in society, and the corresponding relationships of individuals and groups, is what Bourdieu calls ‘objectivism’: an intellectual orientation to the social world seeking to construct objective relations that structure practices and representations (mental processes). But the way in which individuals perceive society is ‘subjectivism’: an intellectual orientation to the social world, which seeks to grasp the way the world appears to the individuals situated within it. Now, as Bourdieu states, objectivism creates a break with the immediate experience of individuals in society, their everyday life, and the words and concepts they use. This ‘break’ is a prerequisite for social-scientific inquiry, by elucidating the underlying structures and principles upon which primary experience depends but which it cannot directly grasp. Nevertheless, in Bourdieu’s view, objectivism provides an inadequate explanation because it does not link its theoretical structures with the practical activities of individuals who make up the social world (Bourdieu, 2001: Preface by John B. Thompson). Bourdieu transcends the objectivist/subjectivist problematic by conceptualising an ensemble of ‘unified economy of practices’ and especially ‘symbolic power’, fusing the phenomenological (or subjectivist,


as above) and structural approaches in integrated research. Thus, for Bourdieu, there is an ‘objectivity of the first order’ given by the distribution of material resources and the means of appropriation of socially rare goods and values (considered as economic, cultural, social and other forms of ‘capital’) in a class-divided society. Correspondingly, there is an ‘objectivity of the second order’ in the form of mental and physical schemes, functioning as a symbolic matrix of practical activities, behaviour, thoughts, feelings and judgements by social actors. Bourdieu emphasises the immediate experience of agents in order to make explicit the categories of perception and appreciation (‘dispositions’) which structure their actions and representations. For Bourdieu there is a correspondence between the (objective) social structure and the (subjective) mental structure. In this way ‘symbolic systems’ – perceptions of the social world and ‘dispositions’ to think and act in a certain way – are not just instruments of knowledge but also instruments of domination. As operators of cognitive integration they promote by the same logic the social integration of the established order. For they orchestrate categories of perception so that they appear to be ‘objective necessity’, instead of historically contingent products of a given relation of forces (Bourdieu, 1992: introduction by Wacquant). Capital and ‘habitus’ Bourdieu uses the concept of ‘habitus’ to explain this ‘disposition’ by the dominated to accept the ‘inferior’ role assigned to them by the dominating classes (as also the dominant belief in their own superiority). The social and historical construction of the ‘habitus’ is a ‘generating formula’, which makes intelligible the relationship between economic and social conditions (the volume and structure of what Bourdieu calls ‘capital’, whether economic, social or cultural) and the disposition of individuals and classes to think and act in a largely unconscious but socially pre-determined way. Habitus thus structures people’s behaviour; but it is also structured by the economic and social conditions of a class-divided society. As Bourdieu puts it: ‘the principle of division in logical classes which organises the perception of the social world is itself the product of the incorporation of this division in social classes’. The entire structure of social conditions is inscribed in the habitus: thus, ‘the most fundamental oppositions of the social structure (dividing “high” and “low”, “rich” and “poor”, etc.) tend to impose themselves as principles of the basic structuring of practices and the perception of practices’, which tend to be perceived as ‘natural’. As a result: ‘The dialectic of conditions


and habitus is at the basis of the alchemy that transforms the distribution of capital, according to the relationship of forces, into a system of perceived differences and distinctive qualities [“objectively” belonging to individuals and groups], that is, distribution of symbolic capital, misunderstood as legitimate capital’ (Bourdieu, 1979: 190–2). Now it is surprising that ‘the established order, with its dominant relationships, its rights, privileges and injustices, should perpetuate itself so easily . . . and that the most intolerable conditions of existence should so often appear as acceptable and even natural’. Yet we have the example, par excellence, of such ‘paradoxical submission’, which Bourdieu attributes to ‘symbolic violence’, that is, exercised essentially by way of communication and knowledge, or more precisely, ‘misunderstanding’ (méconnaître). This is women’s subjection to male domination: The social order functions like an immense symbolic machine tending to ratify the masculine domination on which it is founded: it is the sexual division of labour, the very strict distribution of activities imparted to both sexes . . . it is the structure of the space, with its opposition between place of assembly or market, reserved to men, and house, reserved to women . . . This social programme of incorporated perception [habitus] applies to everything in the world . . . it constructs the difference between the sexes, biologically, in conformity with the principles of a mythic vision of the world rooted in the arbitrary relation of men’s domination over women, itself inscribed, with the division of labour, in the reality of the social order. (Bourdieu, 1998b: 7, 15–16) So far from claiming that male domination is ‘eternal’, Bourdieu insists that structures of domination are the product of an incessant and therefore historical work of reproduction of the social order. This is the work of particular agents: men, with such weapons as physical and symbolic violence; and institutions, including families, church, school and the state (40–1). It is because of symbolic power that ‘the dominated contribute, often unconsciously, sometimes against their will, to their own domination by tacitly accepting the limits’ imposed by men (44). Thus, ‘men are able to carry out discriminatory acts, without even questioning them, excluding women from positions of authority . . . as indicated by the very feeble representation of women in positions of power, notably economic and political’ (66). (And see ‘Feminist Struggle’, below.)


It is precisely the issue of political and economic power that Bourdieu addresses in his notable study, La noblesse d’Etat, on the formation of the dominant classes. Economic capital and cultural capital produce social space: indeed, educational institutions (like the grandes écoles) play a determining role in the reproduction of cultural capital and then of the structure of social space, in which the struggle to monopolise dominant positions is decisive. Educational institutions are therefore both the foundation of domination and – because of the importance attached to scholarly achievement – the means of its legitimation (Bourdieu, 1989: 13). Now, according to Bourdieu, the recruitment and training of members of the dominant classes are processes of transformation of inherited capital (superior social origins) to educational capital. It is a ‘strange cognitive machine’, he argues, that carries out a ‘whole series of operations of knowledge and evaluation’ tending to establish a strict correlation between classification (by social origin) at entry to the grandes écoles and classification (by scholarly result) at exit – without the principles or criteria of social classification being ever known or exercised officially (56–7). Yet it is by such scholarly results that future members of the classe dirigeante – in administration, politics and much of the economy – are selected. In Bourdieu’s study, 60 per cent of pupils at the grandes écoles are from the dominant class. It is their ‘cultural capital’ – socially superior families, cultural environment, inculcation of general ideas and capacity for synthesis – enhanced by education in highly selective institutions that marks them out (‘distinguishes’ them) for rapid promotion after graduation to dominant positions and authoritative functions (199, 209, 279). Indeed, Marie-Françoise Bechtel, newly-appointed director of the Ecole nationale d’administration (ENA), admitted the ‘excessive monopoly of wealthy classes and Parisians’ among those who graduate from ENA (interviewed by Le Monde, 24 October 2000). Inversely, as a respected public figure (Roger Fauroux) records, children from poor families have practically no chance to go to the grandes écoles. ‘At the same time, a subtle network of information and social complicity allows the socially privileged to place their children in the good classes of schools’, serving as a springboard for higher careers (Le Monde de l’Education, October 1997). Fields of power and politics Society, divided between dominant and dominated, is not static. To explain the ‘incessant change’ that takes place, both externally (espe-


cially economic) and internally (between and within classes) Bourdieu uses the notion of ‘field’ as in field of force. This is because ‘capitals’, which are socially indispensable resources for the appropriation of scarce goods and values, effectively operate only in a particular field of relationships, such as the field of modern art or the field of politics. Such capitals (political, economic, social or cultural and so on) are instruments for the conservation or improvement of ‘superior’ positions in a particular field – but also, and inevitably, objects of struggle for those with little capital or without any. Capital of whatever kind, Bourdieu argues, is a ‘social relationship’ (it only operates in relation to others); it is a ‘social energy’ which exists and produces effects only in the ‘field’ – or structure of relationships anchored in certain forms of power – where it produces and reproduces itself. It is the logic of a particular field (cultural, scientific, religious and so on) which determines what kind of capital operates effectively and produces the appropriate type of behaviour. ‘This signifies, concretely, that the social rank and the specific power that agents are assigned in a particular field depend first of all on the specific capital that they can mobilise’ (Bourdieu, 1979: 127). Now, each field prescribes its own values and has its own regulatory principles, defining the limits of socially-structured space in which agents struggle as a function of the position they occupy in the space – either to change it or to conserve it. Modifying the distribution and relative weight of the forms of capital modifies the structure of the field (Bourdieu, 1992: introduction by Wacquant). This struggle to change the relationship of forces, and thus to dominate the field is part of the fundamental struggle to control the ‘meaning of the social world’ (production of knowledge) through the ‘classifying schemes’ and systems of class-determination operated by those who dominate society. ‘This classifying power fixes, in the fashion of a law, the state of the relationship of forces which it aims to perpetuate by the fact of making that relationship explicit and codifying it.’ But the principle of logical and political division into classes can only be effective because it reproduces, in a properly symbolic logic, the differences and discontinuities (in society) which make up the structure of the established order (Bourdieu, 1979: 559). Such symbolic power, producing and justifying the ‘naturalness’ of class divisions among both the dominant and the dominated, ‘misrecognises’ the reality of the appropriation of scarce goods and values by the dominant classes. Only when the dominated classes recognise the deception imposed on them (which they have come to believe in


by internalising the values dominant in society) can these classes ‘mobilise’ their capitals to struggle effectively in the various fields to change society (see 273–4, 278, 281). Unmasking social deception is the task of ‘professionals of the work of explanation’ (intellectuals) who, under certain historical circumstances, can become spokesmen for the dominated. Together, they may operate a ‘transfer of cultural capital’ permitting collective mobilisation, thus subverting the established symbolic order (Bourdieu, 1997: 224, also 218). Political struggles therefore take place, for Bourdieu, in the field of ‘ideological production’, a relatively autonomous universe, where competitive and contesting ideas about the social world are elaborated and which, at the same time, define the ‘field of what can be thought politically’ or the problematic of legitimacy. It is in this context that social agents, who occupy different positions in the field of class relations, are defined by their more or less substantial ‘specific political competence’, meaning their capacity to ‘recognise political questions as political’ (Bourdieu, 1979: 465–6) – and not to ‘misrecognise’ them (under the influence of the habitus). Despite the subversive potential of certain intellectuals, the factor of political competence, closely associated with ‘scholarly capital’ (seen as a legitimate title to exercise ‘authority’), normally works to the advantage of the privileged classes in society, and to the detriment of those who are not. Thus, the ‘political division of labour’ comprises, on the one hand, technocratic representation, which makes purely technical competence define the condition of access to ‘political responsibility’ and, on the other, the representation of the most economically and culturally deprived, founded on a feeling of incompetence and lack of power, which makes them rely, not on themselves, but on superior ‘experts’. The result is that those who admit that politics is ‘not their affair’ are actually abdicating their formal rights and even legitimising by their silence the ‘unequal participation in electoral democracy’. In this way they are reproducing the objective division of political powers between classes and sexes (478, 484–5). But note Bourdieu’s ambiguous attitude in the section below and under ‘Democracy?’; and in Chapter 3, ‘The Autonomy Project’. Structural change? As if to compensate for the rigidities of the habitus, which structures behaviour in predetermined ways, Bourdieu emphasises the ‘relatively autonomous’ and even indeterminate character of the field. For the powerful and largely unconscious dispositions generated by the habitus


make it exceedingly difficult even to envisage, let alone carry out, substantial changes in class relations – as can be seen in the political ‘abdication’ of the poor and uneducated noted above. (Nevertheless, the French Communist Party in the immediate postwar years was the largest single party, indicating that its working class and petty-bourgeois voters were not taken in by the symbolic power of the habitus.) As against the structured – and structuring – character of the habitus, Bourdieu maintains that the ‘question of the limits of a field is always posed in the field itself and thus allows no a priori response’ (Bourdieu, 1992: 75). Indeed, he warns against any ‘provisional objectivism’ that treats social facts as if they were things (reification) so that social positions appear in a static order, when in reality they are ‘strategic emplacements’ to be defended and conquered in a field of struggles (Bourdieu, 1979: 272). It is the relation of force of the ‘players’ (agents) that defines the structure of the field (Bourdieu, 1992: 74). Indeed, Bourdieu argues that ‘mid positions’ in the social field, such as that of the ‘new’ petty-bourgeoisie, are characterised by their ‘relative indetermination’ in relation to the hierarchy of classes, vertically, and in the economic or cultural fields, horizontally, as well as by the historical ‘trajectory’ of the occupants of these positions (Bourdieu, 1979: 396). Yet Bourdieu is even more ‘indeterminate’ in regard to the crucial question, posed by Wacquant, as to the overall relationship of fields required by the project of a general theory of fields. What is the relationship, in other words, between a variety of particular fields, each with its own ‘logic’, and a universe of fields with ‘invariant properties’? How are the different fields, Wacquant asks, articulated with one another? (This major problem is also raised in a good critical study by Jeremy Lane, 2000: 199.) ‘In good logic’ Bourdieu states that he cannot reply, because it is too difficult. He admits his dilemma, being on the one side close to ‘grand theorists’ (especially structuralists) while on the other side he is close to empirical researchers observing the interactions and practices of particular individuals and groups (Bourdieu, 1992: 87–8). The immense amount of empirical research undertaken by Bourdieu, in such notable works as La distinction and La noblesse d’Etat, indicates (vindicates?) the fluid, open-ended and indeterminate character of fields that are crucial for the operation of capitals and also (1992: 102) ‘structure the habitus’. But the empirical emphasis on individual or collective agents positioning themselves in various fields only serves to underpin a deterministic theoretical framework of class or gender divisions made impervious to change by the symbolic power of the habitus.


There is an additional problem: where is the important middle class ‘positioned’ in the hierarchical division between dominant and dominated? If it is neither one nor the other, or if it is both, what does this imply for the theory of domination? The problem of privileging agents or structure, change or order – Bourdieu does not see it as a contradiction, according to Wacquant’s introduction – is especially evident in Bourdieu’s treatise on male domination. Nevertheless, in other ‘fields’ (discussed subsequently) Bourdieu does allow for the possibility of change. Note especially, in this regard, Bourdieu’s Méditations pascaliennes (1997), which is an extended reflection on the relationship of capitals, fields and habitus. The book sums up Bourdieu’s conception of the social world and how it operates to reproduce the established order. Indeed, it is the point (as with Pascal) from which the whole of his work can be seized with one regard (Bourdieu: 1997: 17). Feminist struggle Symbolic power, as Bourdieu repeats in La domination masculine, operates as if by magic outside all physical constraints (which also exist); but this magic can only operate by relying on deposited dispositions (the habitus). It is in this way that the dominated know, and accept, the reality of a class- and gender-divided society and thus contribute to their own domination. For women assimilate the traits that men ascribe to them (‘feminine’ characteristics) and as victims of symbolic power willingly accomplish those subordinate tasks that conform to their imposed ‘virtues’ of submission, gentleness, docility, devotion and self-denial (Bourdieu, 1998b: 44, 64). Such female dispositions to accept an inferior role in the social division of labour – ‘a social law converted into an incorporated (internalised) law’ – cannot be overcome by a simple effort of will based on consciousness of emancipation, Bourdieu insists. Even when external constraints have been abolished and ‘formal liberties’ have taken their place – right to vote, right to education, and access to all professions, including politics – ‘self-exclusion’ by women as well as belief in their separate ‘vocation’ continue to operate effectively in the service of male domination (45, 47). Symbolic actions alone, Bourdieu insists (1997: 215), cannot eradicate these submissive attitudes, without the ‘transformation of the conditions of production’ of such ‘dispositions’. To those who object that a number of women have in fact broken with the ‘norms and traditional forms’ of feminine restraint, Bourdieu has two answers. First, he argues that the ‘effect of symbolic domina-


tion (whether ethnic, gender, culture, language, etc.) is not exercised in the pure logic of knowing consciousness, but through schemes of perception, appreciation and action, which constitute the habitus and which engender, beyond decisions of consciousness or will, a relationship of consciousness that is profoundly obscure to itself’ (1998b: 32, 45). In other words, the ‘unconscious’ dispositions of the habitus still operate – despite the ‘conscious’ realisation of freedom. In the second place Bourdieu asserts, correctly, that despite all the gains achieved by the women’s movement, inequality persists – in certain fields of education, in professional life, and in politics. ‘Even the changes in the female condition always obey the logic of the traditional model of division between men and women. Men continue to dominate the public space and the field of power (especially economic, production) while women are predominantly attached to the private space (domestic, site of reproduction)’ or to its extension in social services, education or ‘symbolic production’, that is, literary, artistic or journalistic work (97–8, 101). Like the ‘middle class’, which fits uneasily in Bourdieu’s hierarchical vision (or division) of dominant and dominated, there is no ‘space’ for women except at either end of the social spectrum. There is no midway: they are either submissive to the unconscious dictates of the habitus, or else emancipated through the ‘radical transformation of the social conditions (i.e. class domination) of the production of the dispositions’ of the habitus. For the latter engenders ‘schemes of thought that are the product of the incorporation of relations of power’ but which are expressed in a symbolic form (40, 48). The implication is that emancipation of the dominated can only be achieved by putting an end to the power of the dominant classes. When class power is ended, thus drastically transforming the structure of the habitus, so symbolic power over the minds and bodies of its victims must also come to an end. This requires revolutionary action, not reformist ‘complicity’ with the system. (But see especially Chapter 4, ‘Rights of Women’, on the implications of radicalism or reformism among feminists.) Democracy? The existence of dominant structures, imposing a vision of the social world that conditions the behaviour of dominant and dominated alike, and yet the possibility of ‘subversive’ mobilisation to realise an alternative vision of society express Bourdieu’s ambiguous attitude towards democracy.


In his determinist mode, Bourdieu insists that elitist domination is not only reproduced by the physical power of institutions – family, school, work, political parties and the state – but also by the symbolic ‘schemes of classification’ that serve to legitimise the unequal division of labour in society, which is accepted as part of the natural order of things. How is it possible, Bourdieu asks, for subordinate classes to repudiate not only their habitual practice but also the way in which they have internalised that practice? (Bourdieu, 2001; orig. texts 1982, 1991: 202, 206, 210). Above all, it is the political field, inculcating and legitimising the dominant vision of the world, that plays a key role in reinforcing the ‘complicity’ of the dominated classes in their own subordination, according to Bourdieu. In this process, the ‘professionalisation’ of politics, that is, production of the special competence required for success in a particular field, is indispensable. For it distinguishes the dominant, who are trained and initiated into the ‘practical mastery’ of politics, from the dominated, who lack both the necessary skills and the requisite ‘capitals’ (social, cultural, economic) either to understand or to resist the power of the established order. Sustaining the very unequal division of labour in the political field is the work of ‘large political bureaucracies’ of full-time professionals. The latter are themselves the product of institutions, such as the Ecole nationale d’administration (ENA), designed to recruit and train ‘professional producers’ of dominant ways of thinking and action: politicians, political analysts, journalists, high officials and so on, whose task is to codify the rules of functioning of the political system (217–18). In this ‘game’ of politics an absolutely fundamental adhesion to knowledge and mastery of the ‘rules’ is essential. ‘The sense of the political game that allows politicians to foresee the policy-stances of other politicians also makes their own positions predictable to others’: in this way, ‘responsible’ politicians are ready to play the role assigned to them by the structure of the game. The professional capacity of the ‘players’ is developed to such an extent that politicians on opposite sides have more in common with each other than they have with their own electorate. The result is a growing feeling among ordinary citizens of isolation from and abandonment by those who are supposed to ‘represent’ them (218–21). The nature of the game of political ‘competition’ is revealed in the televised debates of professional politicians, who are chosen not only for their specific competence but also for their political respectability. Such debates take place in the presence of a public that is reduced to


the status of spectator. The effect is to create a sort of ‘class struggle’ – between Left and Right – in the form of a theatrical and ritualised confrontation between two champions, symbolising the process of ‘autonomisation’ of the properly political game. Thus, the latter becomes ever more enclosed in its own techniques, hierarchical structures and internal rules (220, n. 9). The process of bureaucratisation of political parties and the opportunism of politicians combine to isolate the political field from the voting public. The more such ‘political capital’ is institutionalised, the more the appeal to the minds of the electorate takes second place to the conquest of official positions. In revulsion, those political activists who are devoted to a cause withdraw from the field, leaving it open to party apparatchiks, attracted by the opportunity for profit and other material or symbolic benefits. Indeed, the concern of political parties to stay in power, or simply to exist, often requires them to ‘sacrifice’ the very programme on which they were originally voted into power (249–50). This is the fundamental ambiguity of politics, since the struggle for ideas and ideals cannot be separated, according to Bourdieu, from the struggle for power and privilege. Such a contradiction haunts every political enterprise, even those that aim to ‘subvert’ the established order (257–8). For this reason, Bourdieu explicitly rejects the ‘revolution from above’ proposed by Communist Party apparatuses, which he insists can only be achieved at the expense of the properly political functions of expression and representation. What, then, is the potential for ‘subversion from below’? The possibility of a ‘break’ in the structure of domination, Bourdieu argues in his subversive mode, presupposes cognitive change, that is, a ‘conversion of the vision of the world’ that rejects the tacit contract of adhesion by the dominated to the established order (188). But such a rupture in habitual ways of thinking cannot occur without an ‘objective crisis’, in effect revealing the incongruity between dominant representations of the social world and the contradictory reality. This subversive possibility of changing the social world – by changing the imposed representations of the world – must, however, go beyond a purely negative critique: it must advance an ‘alternative vision, utopia, project, programme’. By doing so, it offers a prediction that aims to bring about what it announces, making itself conceivable and above all credible. In this way the ‘extra-ordinary’ situation of crisis, Bourdieu claims, evokes an equally ‘extra-ordinary’ discourse, which generates the practical principles of collective action needed to achieve the alternative vision of society (188–9, 190, 198).


For it is by struggle, Bourdieu goes on, that the categories of the social world are created – and the groups that are constructed according to such categories. Every group is an arena of ‘properly political struggle’ to impose the legitimate principle of its construction. This is all the more evident in the case of a crisis of the established order, when the dominant classes resist the subversive threat to their power and their legitimacy (191, 193, 195). Accordingly, the ‘capital question’ for every revolutionary strategy is to know, at a particular moment, whether the dominated classes constitute a genuinely ‘antagonistic power’, capable of defining their own objectives, and thus able to mobilise support, or, to the contrary, whether the subordinate classes form merely ‘strata’ at the lowest point of hierarchical space, defined not in a positive sense, but only by its distance from dominant values. In other words, and this is crucial, whether the struggle between classes is a revolutionary struggle, aiming to overthrow the established order, or a ‘competitive struggle’ in which the dominated seek to appropriate the properties of the dominant (197–8). To put it another way, the crucial question is whether the objective is (radical) change of the system or (reformist) change in the system. Bourdieu in his determinist mode categorically rejects the reformist strategy of ‘competitive’ struggle aiming to improve the bargaining position of subordinate classes within the existing system in favour of a revolutionary ‘break’ with the old order. Nevertheless, he emphasises, the utopian goal that is capable of mobilising support must clearly relate to the social reality. This goes without saying; but the real problem for Bourdieu is that nowhere does he define the state of ‘crisis’ nor theorise the revolutionary process. As with Gramsci in his ‘prison writings’, often cited by Bourdieu, he rejects so-called laws of development. Instead of a determined outcome that is scientifically predictable, Gramsci (and Bourdieu) observe a relation of forces in continual movement. Social experience cannot be schematised: ‘it is history in all its infinite variety and multiplicity’ (Gramsci, 1971: 428, 438). Such a perspective would not be denied by Touraine himself. Indeed, Touraine’s model of a social movement, inspired by Polish Solidarity, corresponds to Bourdieu’s criteria of a utopian goal, mobilising popular support (workers and intellectuals alike) and resulting in a revolutionary break with the established (in this case, communist) order. Solidarity’s achievement suggests a possible synthesis of Bourdieu’s and Touraine’s perspectives, but in the much more intractable context of capitalism. For social movements, such as trade unions, environmentalists and feminists along with other elements of civil society, are


no less inspired by ‘utopian’ goals (a form of symbolic power), even if these fall short of a revolutionary break. Something of the sort is acknowledged by Bourdieu in his large-scale investigation of the ‘malaise’ in French society, which reflects the poverty and exclusion of subordinate classes. It is because of the lack of legitimate expression in politics, he argues in La misère du monde, that the sense of malaise is expressed at times in ultra-nationalism or racism. But contrary to his ‘revolutionary’ stance above, he claims that only a ‘really democratic politics’ can avoid the alternatives of technocratic arrogance or irresponsible demagogy (Bourdieu, 1993: 1450). Nevertheless, it is the task of social science to discern the structural causes of this malaise, which appears in the form of gratuitous violence, racist crimes and populist exploiters of people’s sufferings as well as in the ‘inert violence’ of economic and social structures. It is necessary to go back to the true social and economic determinants in order to bring to people’s consciousness the ‘mechanisms that render this life so painful and so unliveable’. Admittedly, ‘to bring to light these contradictions is not to solve them’. But there is no need to despair: ‘what the social world has done, the social world can, armed with knowledge, undo’. It is through science that ‘partial and provisional truths’ can be established, contrary to intellectual orthodoxy, and so ‘procure the only rational means to use fully the margins of manoeuvre left to freedom, that is to say, political action’ (1452–4). Bourdieu also suggests (1997: 276–9) a ‘margin of liberty for political action’, with a liberating effect on the dominated, but only under conditions of crisis of (repressive) structures. Is it Bourdieu who speaks or Touraine? Or is it the Bourdieu of the (indeterminate) struggle of agents versus the Bourdieu of structural constraints? The contrast between these perspectives, and yet the potential for synthesis, are explored in the following chapters.

3 Social Change: Radicalism or Reform

Substantial improvements in the lives of ordinary people have undoubtedly been made during the last half-century in France, as elsewhere in the Western world, despite the operation of symbolic power (whereby the dominated, who have internalised the dominant values in society, contribute to their own subjection), on the one hand, and despite the weakness of social movements, considered as the motive force for change, on the other. (Less than 10 per cent of the French workforce are unionised, for example, while the environmentalists and the women’s movement are fragmented.) Neither the determinist assumptions of Pierre Bourdieu, nor the activist expectations of Alain Touraine, would seem then to provide adequate explanations of the remarkable changes that have taken place, such as near-universal social security (welfare state), the erosion of conventional family life-styles (‘permissive society’), the spread of ‘mass’ education, the progress of women and environmental awareness. Now, to recall Bourdieu’s argument in the previous chapter: have such changes, however socially important, substantially altered dominant political and economic power structures, and have they seriously reduced social inequality? Yet even if we accept Bourdieu’s diagnosis, is his prescription – a physical and ‘symbolic’ revolution, freeing ourselves from unconscious dispositions – the most appropriate one? (But note the potential for synthesis with Touraine in the concluding section of this chapter: ‘The Autonomy Project’.) As for Touraine’s diagnosis, to what extent have social movements contributed to each of these changes: welfare, permissive society, mass education, environmentalism and women’s rights? And are social movements the most effective means to counter abuses of political and economic power? And yet a further question: given the shortcomings of 53


democracy (the way it functions is criticised by both Bourdieu and Touraine) what other institutional or symbolic (re)forms are possible? To answer these questions, one cannot consider only the most striking formulations of the two authors – symbolic power and social movements – it is also necessary to take into account their theoretical foundation. For Alain Touraine, as noted in the previous chapter, it is the ‘break-up’ of modernity, when its components – individuality, living conditions, economic forces and the search for national or ‘communitarian’ identity – move in different directions. Only the free and active subject, working within a social movement (as Touraine defines it), can ‘re-compose’ the shattered unity of society by restoring the rational unity of ends and means, of personal freedom and social integration. For Touraine, the present fragmented society is evidently ‘dysfunctional’. For Pierre Bourdieu, to the contrary, society functions only too well. For it is a society structured by the division between the dominant classes (technocratic elites, business owners and managers, leading professionals) and the dominated (notably workers, peasants and pettybourgeoisie) who, by internalising dominant values, perpetuate an unjust system. The ‘inferiority’ of women, relegated to the ‘private’ sphere of the household, while men control the public sphere of political and economic life, is very much to the point. The result, for Bourdieu, is structural domination, maintained and reproduced both by physical and symbolic means. Fragmentation of modernity versus structures of domination. Despite such contrary perceptions, which pervade the two authors’ approach to social problems, they nevertheless agree on one major threat to society: namely, the ascendency of capitalism, taking the form of ‘neoliberalism’, both national and global. (For Touraine, however, the authoritarian state is at least as menacing to individual and collective freedom as is an economic system expanding beyond political control.)

Coping with capitalism ‘Neo-liberalism’ – the highest stage of capitalism? – encapsulates economic rationalism, excessive reliance on market forces and material values, privatisation, deregulation, reduction of the public sector and untramelled free trade – with adverse social consequences: notably, ‘rationalised’ dismissals of the labour force resulting in a hard-core of unemployed and, for those at work, ‘precarious’ or short-term jobs, creating anxiety and stress among those at risk, often disrupting personal or family life. All these contribute to the discrediting of political insti-

Social Change: Radicalism or Reform 55

tutions and the democratic system itself, because of the unwillingness or inability of elected politicians to remedy the ‘social fracture’. From Touraine’s perspective, neo-liberalism represents one of the major ‘fragmenting’ forces: a global economy largely escaping political or social control. The economy becomes all the more powerful precisely because the other fissiparous forces in the break-up of modernity – consumerism, the diversion of ‘personalism’ and the resort to nationalism or ‘communitarian’ forms of identity – either reinforce the global economy or, in a reversion to private concerns, fail to confront the problem. For Bourdieu, on the other hand, neo-liberalism is part of the (changing) structure of domination, as a result of which economic ‘capital’ increases at the expense of other capitals, political, social or cultural, in the various ‘fields’ of forces that structure, through the ‘habitus’, people’s ideas and actions. Neo-liberalism can be seen as a major consequence of the incessant struggle for power within the dominant classes: between the new ‘expert’, educationally qualified and professionally dynamic groups seeking to oust the backward, old-established leadership. (As a striking example of such change, the majority of graduates from the elitist Ecole nationale d’administration intended for the financial inspectorate, instead of serving in the public sector, now prefer to move to the private sector, especially to firms dealing in the ‘new technologies’ (Le Monde, 5–6 March 2000; see also Schmid, 2000: 52–9). The ENA was severely criticised in an official report by a former European commissioner, on 22 April 2003, notably for its exit-classification, allowing a handful of ‘conformist’ graduates to gain entry to the highest state positions.) The form of domination has changed, but not the system. Indeed, the new, more efficient, form of domination enables the system to accommodate social changes – in lifestyle, in the search for identity – that otherwise could serve as the source of revolt.

Radicalism or reform These divergent assessments by Bourdieu and Touraine of neoliberalism, located in very different conceptual frameworks, promote contrary solutions. For Bourdieu, the reinforcement of the power and authority of the state (assailed both by neo-liberals and democratic pluralists) is an urgent necessity if the advance of neo-liberalism is to be halted. Yet, because the state apparatus is evidently one of the major institutions of social domination (along with the family and the educational system) its reinforcement, if successful, would simply substitute one form of domination – the political – for another, the economic.


(For the state, as Bourdieu puts it, is the ‘central bank’ of symbolic capital: 1997: 283.) To bypass this problem, Bourdieu has an ingenious solution: the state itself is divided into its ‘Left hand’ and its ‘Right hand’ (Bourdieu, 1998a: 9–10, 39, 46). The latter is the elitist state of the ‘énarchie’ and the technocrats, an essential part of the dominant class; the ‘Left’ hand, on the contrary, represents the ‘caring’ state of the welfare system, of economic protection and social regulation. (It is also the state of lesser functionaries, who may either represent the ‘dominated fraction’ of the dominant class or may be among the mass of the dominated.) To reinforce an already over-powerful state is anathema to Touraine. Indeed, it is the inefficiency and the excessive centralisation of the ‘administered state’ (not to speak of the repressive uniformity of the Republican concept as such: ‘une et indivisible’) that is the problem – and not the solution. For Touraine, this type of state is no impediment to the global economy, but the reverse, since the evident economic failure of the protectionist state only clears the way for the more efficient neoliberalism. Touraine argues that instead of relying on the state it is rather at the opposite end of the social spectrum, through the action of individuals in social movements, contesting but also cooperating with political institutions, that the adverse social consequences of neoliberalism can best be countered. Contrary to the uncompromising radicalism of Bourdieu, appealing for the mobilisation of the ‘dominated’ against the dominant system, Touraine advocates a reformist stance. In his book, Comment sortir du libéralisme?, he rejects the idea that ‘revolt is the only possible action against economic domination’ and insists that an ‘opening to the market’ also presents opportunities as well as dangers: ‘it requires the renewal of social policies and the search for participation’ in the political process. ‘Just as we have passed from a form of socialism to a form of capitalism, so the market has replaced the state as the principal regulating force in our society.’ But this does not mean the exclusion of political – or social – action to counter the ‘irrational’ forces of globalism, notably speculative capital flows (Touraine, 1999: 8–9, 12–13, 19, 25, 32). Touraine’s ‘complementarity’ of social action and political intervention (14) is well illustrated by the economic policy of the Jospin government (for Bourdieu, the latter is another instance of the betrayal of socialist principles). According to the then Minister of the Economy, Laurent Fabius, the ‘new dynamism’ of the French economy is stimulated both by a favourable international environment and by domestic


policies of low interest rates and monetary stability. To maintain economic growth, however, requires: (i) controlling public expenditure – including social expenses – and reducing the public deficit; (ii) handling carefully the reduction of work to 35 hours in small and medium-sized enterprises; and (iii) equitably distributing wealth but avoiding a wage/price spiral that could undermine economic growth. Fabius insists that the rate of taxation must be lowered, and points out that the fiscal burdens on industry are still a ‘major structural handicap’ for the economy. Given the necessary reforms, however, ‘our citizens’ can expect ‘new chances through economic growth’ resulting in ‘more jobs and less taxes, less inequality and more creativity’ (Laurent Fabius, ‘The Necessity of Stable Growth’, Le Monde, 25 August 2000). Despite the apparent incompatibility of radical and reformist conceptions of the (changing) role of the state in a global economy, a potential synthesis can be seen in the work of Roger Fauroux, a former minister of industry (and previously head of an important state enterprise) and his fellow critical reformers. Fauroux, like Bourdieu, emphasises the positive functions of the French state: maintaining social cohesion by protecting the disadvantaged, increasing expenditure on health and education – ‘socialised expenses par excellence’ – and pursuing innovative ways of providing employment, especially among the young. But he also, with Touraine, criticises an over-powerful, tradition-ridden state, replete with bureaucratic rivalries, obstructing much-needed reforms, notably ‘corporatist’ insistence by public service unions on retaining the status quo, in a word, ‘the balkanisation of state activity’ (Fauroux, 2000: 17–28). The fundamental issue, Fauroux argues, is not the dispute (as between Touraine and Bourdieu) over the state being too much or too little, but the need for the state to be more effective. What is ‘scandalous’ is not so much the sheer financial weight of the state apparatus, which should certainly be reduced, as ‘its ineffectiveness in relation to the objectives that the nation decides’ through elections. Evidently, Fauroux concludes, this is not a matter of persons but of (lack of ) organisation. ‘The state apparatus has integrated none of the achievements of modern systems, such as the deconcentration of those in positions of responsibility, the functioning of networks, transparency, internal emulation, priority for innovation and rapid communication of information’ (20–1). To deal with the ‘fracture’ between a revived private sector and civil society, on the one hand, and on the other a public service living badly and beyond its means, ‘excelling at maintaining inertia and discourag-


ing all attempts at reform’, Fauroux and his fellow editor Bernard Spitz (a member of the Conseil d’Etat) recommend a series of reforms. For, as they point out, only an effective state is capable of meeting the challenges of globalisation. Education and training at all stages of life form an essential strategic role for the state: decentralisation, autonomy and openness are also keys to reform. Transparency, as well, is needed to overcome the secrecy and suspiciousness of officials in regard to the outside world. ‘The state is only too ready to see the dangers of any countervailing power, whereas this is the very essence of democracy.’ Only an effective state, on the other hand, can cope with the problem of globalisation and play a more decisive role in Europe. Moreover, political economy reforms, such as reducing the charges on industry, capping social welfare expenses and dealing with the urgent problem of retirement are no less important (Fauroux and Spitz, 2000: 766–9, 773–80, 786–7). It is precisely these contentious reforms that the Chirac-Raffarin administration sought to undertake in 2003: so far with mixed results (see the concluding chapter). Touraine evidently shares this point of view. In the course of the 2002 election campaign, he insisted that the state was the essential issue: he was neither for old-style over-intervention nor for neo-liberal dismissal of the state, but for new forms of public intervention, notably to diminish inequality. As for Bourdieu’s perspective: the public figure who supported the ‘caring’ state (even if opposed to the repressive state) would surely welcome – precisely because of the growing threat of neoliberalism – the reformed state that more effectively protects the poor and vulnerable in society. Nevertheless, the contradiction posited by Bourdieu between the ‘Left’ and ‘Right’ hand of the state also reflects the contradiction within Bourdieu between the doctrinaire and the practising democrat.

Welfare confrontation Official policy, whether under the Right (such as the previous Juppé government) or the Left, is clearly pragmatic, opportunist (attuned to changing circumstances, especially international) and reformist. Fortunately for Fabius, he was able to apply orthodox policies in a period of economic growth. Prime Minister Juppé was not so lucky. It was his plan to control the spiralling costs of the social security administration in November–December 1995, while the economy was still depressed, that sparked off a major social confrontation, not only on the ground


(strikes, demonstrations, protests), but also between the two major theoretical protagonists, Touraine and Bourdieu. Evidently the economic situation – and how it is perceived – is crucial to social change. For Bourdieu, neo-liberalism is such a menace that it must be countered by all possible means, including resort to such strange allies as the traditional state, on the one hand, and ‘marginal’ groups – the unemployed, homeless, excluded – on the other. For Touraine, however, the economy is not monolithic, but offers both opportunities and dangers. Economic growth, for example, subsidises the welfare system, reduces unemployment and helps the consumer (the ordinary citizen). Where the economic system produces adverse social effects – new forms of inequality, the ‘exclusion’ of the uneducated or ill-trained, the undermining of cultural standards, as emphasised both by Touraine and by Bourdieu – the appropriate reaction is not to stimulate an illusory revolt (in Touraine’s view) but to inspire political reforms through responsive social movements. Maintenance of the welfare state is a crucial test of these opposing views, both objectively – the degree to which it provides a safety net, and where it falls short – and subjectively, how it is perceived to ‘function’ in relation to the social system as a whole. Is ‘welfare’ part of the structure of dominant institutions, providing a semblance of ‘security’ to the dominated in return for their allegiance to the system (the operation of symbolic power)? Or does the welfare state derive from the action of social movements – or perhaps the wider notion of ‘civil society’ – as part of a reformist climate of opinion, envisaging a better (but not a perfect) life for ordinary people: not a utopia, but what can ‘reasonably’ be expected under prevailing (economic) conditions? These opposing views were crystallised in two petitions responding on the one hand to Juppé’s plan for administrative reform, and on the other to the cumulative effect of student demonstrations (for more teachers and better facilities) and strikes by railway unions, seeking to preserve, among other things, a favourable retirement scheme. The petition supporting ‘a basic reform of social security’, signed by a considerable number of influential ‘intellectuals, activists . . . and experts’, including Touraine, approved the ‘courage and spirit of independence’ of Juppé, prepared to grapple at last with an ‘archaic’ system resulting in increasing contributions for less services. They welcomed especially the prime minister’s efforts to control medical costs and his proposal that the French parliament should itself set limits, in a democratic debate, to the social security budget.


The ‘appeal of intellectuals in support of the strikers’, on the other hand, followed the militant Bourdieu line of defence of the ‘Left hand’ of the state and of the justified demand of citizens to public housing, education and welfare. While Bourdieu’s themes of structural domination and symbolic power were unstated in the appeal, they nevertheless underpin the radical policy. For it was Bourdieu himself, in a meeting with railway strikers, who denounced the technocrats and elitists – the ‘Right hand’ of the state – for manipulating state policy in favour of market forces, in order to weaken the unions and to reduce welfare services. The struggle against the technocrats (that is, in the dominant classes), as he put it, is the struggle for democracy (by the dominated) (Bourdieu, 1998a: 30–3). The ‘strike’ petition, signed by numerous activists, including Bourdieu and the philosopher Jacques Derrida, applauded those who, in fighting for their own ‘social rights’, also defended the ‘equal rights of all: men and women, young and old, unemployed and wage-earners, workers in the public and the private sector, immigrants and French people’. By challenging the government over social security and retirement schemes, the petitioners argued, they were also defending the entire public service, guarantor of equality and solidarity; for the latter principles were clearly under threat from a government which gave priority to short-term profits. By defending their rights, therefore, the popular movement of contestation opened the way to more democracy, more equality and more solidarity: ‘it engaged a radical reflection on the future of our society’ (quoted from Julien Duval and others, 1998: 7–14, 18–19).

Critique of social movements and symbolic power The confrontation of radicals and reformists over the nexus of welfare, the role of the state and economic constraints, however spectacular in its immediate activity, raises an underlying problem for the theorists of social movements and symbolic power. First, what influence do social movements have either in defining the welfare system, in altering the functions of the state or contesting the adverse consequences of neoliberalism? And second, how can a structurally deterministic theory – notably that of the habitus – give rise to effective movements of protest and even revolt against such a ‘dominant’ system? On the other hand, if students, workers and others can protest effectively – as in 1995 and to some extent 2003 – then why does Bourdieu rule out this possibility for women? (Recall, however, Bourdieu’s affirmation that ‘subversive’


mobilisation is possible – but only under conditions of (undefined) crisis: 1997: 224, 276–9.) That each theorised practice can be defined in terms of the other suggests an answer. Social movements, which according to Touraine combine specific demands with universal principles (such as freedom, equality or social justice), are evidently an expression of symbolic power. At the same time, such ‘symbolic’ activities as the petition of intellectuals in favour of striking workers helps to form and sustain a ‘social movement’. It follows that social movements, whether as defined by Touraine or (in a more confrontational mode) by Bourdieu, are in effect freeing themselves from the conscious and particularly the unconscious ‘dispositions’ of the habitus. Nevertheless, the inability of social movements to change substantially either government strategies or economic conditions, as both Touraine and Bourdieu have to admit, demonstrates the very real power of ‘structural’ (economic and political) constraints. Touraine’s social movements are an intellectually attractive conception, combining specificity with universality, and especially freedom with social integration, thus ‘recomposing’ the shattered world of modernity. Concretely, however, this aim is far from being achieved. The social movements of environmentalists and women, which are as fragmented as the trade unions, receive little attention from Touraine. (In Comment sortir du libéralisme?, for example, he devotes two paragraphs to the ecological movement and three pages to women, but more than twenty pages to ‘new social movements’, activated by ‘cultural’ rather than social rights, such as homosexuals and ethnic minorities.) Like his contrary, Bourdieu, Touraine seeks support for his theory from the protest activities of the ‘unestablished’ and the marginals of society: the immigrants, the unemployed, the homeless, the sans-papiers (illegal entrants, often resident for many years in France, seeking official ‘regularisation’). Yet, as Sylvia Zappi points out: despite the initial success of the sans-papiers in 1998, arousing widespread public sympathy and gaining the attention of the media, the movement, divided on the means of struggle, has since then torn itself apart. (It revived, however, to a certain extent in 2002.) According to Zappi: ‘The political parties of the Left and the trade unions are tired of the issue, petitions are no longer effective and demonstrations are poorly attended.’ Even though communists and ‘Greens’ still appeal for regularisation, they have ceased to give it priority (Sylvia Zappi, Le Monde, 30 August 2000). If no longer concretely a major influence, ‘social movements’ also demonstrate a theoretical weakness. The concept as such has little


relevance to such important social changes as the emergence of the ‘permissive society’ or of ‘mass’ education. It is the wider (if more amorphous) concept of civil society – including the role of individuals as well as voluntary and professional associations – that helps to explain both the significance of personal life-styles, on the one hand, and the demand among middle and lower-class parents for educational qualifications intended to provide professional and economic opportunities for their children, on the other. Even in regard to the environment and women’s rights, where social movements do play a significant role, it is the more inclusive notion of civil society that effectively represents the diversity of opinion among ecologists and feminists. As for trade unions, it is sufficient to note Touraine’s own disillusionment, contrasting with Bourdieu’s enthusiastic support for strikes and demonstrations that resist neo-liberalism. For Touraine, the union movement belongs to the past: an industrial era that has now been superseded by the production of cultural goods and services; it is not an ‘authentic’ social movement because of its political dependence (the CGT on the Communist Party, the CFDT on the Socialists – although both have since evolved); unions are prisoners of their own ‘corporate’ involvement in economic regulation and the welfare system; they are divided and unrepresentative. Less than 10 per cent of the workforce are unionised. (See, for example, Touraine, 1992: 304–6; and 1997: 162–3.) For more adequate explanatory power, the notion of civil society (including the role of the media and public opinion) is needed to complement Touraine’s more restrictive theory of ‘social movements’. Similarly, the notion of ‘reverse’ symbolic power – namely, the powerful appeal of ‘symbols’ in opposition to Bourdieu’s dominant structures – must also be taken into account, whatever the cost to a ‘unified’ theoretical system. Despite Bourdieu’s own deterministic perspective, evident in his major works, his theoretical framework does not preclude the possibility of significant social change. Here it is the ‘fields’ in which economic, political, cultural and other ‘capitals’ interrelate, and where ‘struggles for power’ (admittedly largely among the dominant classes) incessantly take place, that represent the indeterminant element in his theory as opposed to the structuralism of the ‘habitus’. Nevertheless, for Bourdieu, it is the habitus, structured by the ideas and actions of the dominant classes, that in turn structures the behaviour of dominant and dominated classes alike (since the latter internalise dominant values) and thus reproduces the established


social order. He himself defines the habitus as the ‘unifying principle and generator of practices’ (Bourdieu, 1979: 112; also 545–46). Change can only occur in the system, not of the system. Yet the theorist himself is a product of the habitus. How can he escape its ruling ideas? Bourdieu’s own activities demonstrate that ‘symbolic power’ is not the monopoly of the dominant system, but can be used against the system. Indeed, what is more symbolic than being on the ‘Left’, and especially on the ‘Left of the Left’? (Touraine positions himself, by contrast, on the ‘social Left’.) Yet Bourdieu can hardly bring himself to admit the importance of ‘reverse symbolic power’, even though he does advocate a ‘properly symbolic struggle’ against neo-liberal ideas (Bourdieu, 1998a: 118); nevertheless, such a struggle is hedged about with qualifications (1997: 215, 258, 284). Bourdieu’s scepticism in regard to the possibility of change is motivated presumably by his awareness of the damage such ‘indeterminacy’ could cause to the theoretical perfection of a closed structure. One consequence of Bourdieu’s deterministic stance – his insistence that reforms are merely palliative and cannot break the system of domination – is that he is driven to take up extreme positions, including the bitter denunciation of pragmatic socialists, in his exclusive identification with the truth. This fundamental issue dividing Touraine and Bourdieu in his doctrinaire mode – that is, whether to cooperate with imperfect institutions to achieve a partial remedy for social ills or to refuse any compromise of maximum goals – is at the heart of such a major problem as environmental degradation, for France and the ‘endangered planet’. (Notoriously in this case, however, it is an issue that divides the environmentalists.)

Environment: the political will In the 1950s there were 20 great natural catastrophes; in the 1990s four times as many. The number and cost of climate-related disasters – hurricanes, floods, droughts – is steadily rising. In the worst year, 1991, tens of thousands died as a result of floods, storms and eruptions (Tim Radford, ‘Disasters’, Guardian Weekly supplement, August 2002). The World Meteorological Organisation warned in 2003 that such extreme weather conditions, including high and low temperatures and record rainfall and storms in different parts of the world, are consistent with predictions of global warming. Supercomputer models show that, as the


atmosphere warms, the climate not only becomes hotter but much more unstable (Michael McCarthy, Independent, 3 July 2003). So which gets priority in the international community: global warming, economic growth, or the war against terrorism? The choice, which is political (the power to decide) lies at the heart of the environmental debate. Here, Bourdieu’s critique of structures of domination, standing in the way of much-needed change, and Touraine’s advocacy of social movements, putting pressure on political institutions, would seem to be most appropriate, both in drawing attention to the environmental threat to humanity and in suggesting means – radical and reformist, respectively – to deal with it. For the ecological movement is one of the two ‘great forms of recomposition of the world’ according to Touraine. (The other is the ‘more important’ women’s movement, which I discuss in a separate chapter.) Awareness of the environment requires a sense of responsibility for nature instead of the attempt to dominate nature (Touraine, 1999: 75–6). ‘By acquiring the means to transform and even destroy the planet’, people become aware of the limits to human action. No longer can we be confident in limitless progress; instead we must act in solidarity with all the elements that make up our environment (Touraine, 1997: 497). And yet, despite the awesome ecological threat, both Touraine and Bourdieu give only perfunctory attention to the environmental movement. It is in passing that the latter appeals for the conservation of non-renewable resources along with support for public housing, urban renovation and the minimum wage (Bourdieu, 1998a: 74). Bourdieu’s rather tepid endorsement can no doubt be explained by his belief that the Greens are more of a cultural (in Touraine’s sense) than a social movement, that they are more cooperative (partners in Jospin’s ‘pluralist Left’ government) than confrontational, and finally that they are more ‘dominant’ than ‘dominated’ in their social origins. The brevity of Touraine’s concern with ecology is harder to understand, however, given Cohn-Bendit’s approval (see below) of the strategy of collaboration with political institutions for the sake of even partial reforms. And yet (in answer to Bourdieu) the Green ideology is an excellent example of symbolic power – in reverse – exercised against the ecologically-destructive interests and values of the dominant order. Positively, moreover (in answer to Touraine), such symbolic power expresses both an idealistic and a rational projection of an alternative way of life. For the environmental movement provides a fundamental


challenge to the conscious and unconscious assumptions underlying capitalism (and communism, in its time), the industrial revolution, urbanisation, private transport, mass publicity and the consumer society. A major problem for the ecological movement, however, is that although the scientific evidence of environmental degradation is overwhelming, awareness of the ecological consequences has been slow to develop, even in those countries where the destructive impact of economic growth is most obvious. Indeed, a leading American environmentalist, Barry Commoner, had singled out the five major issues of ecological concern in 1971, but they were only addressed seriously by the international community some fifteen years later. These issues are pollution, global warming, reduction of the ozone layer, disposal of hazardous wastes and acid rain. Ever since the industrial revolution, resulting in ever-increasing use of coal, oil and gas, ‘we have been burning these fossil fuels and reconverting them to carbon dioxide, the carbon dioxide concentration of the atmosphere has been rising’, hence the warming or ‘greenhouse’ effect (Commoner, 1971: 29–30). Theoretical predictions put forward by an authoritative international meeting of scientists fourteen years later include possibly devastating effects by the 2030s of rising sea levels, increased frequency and severity of flooding, increased desertification and salination in middle latitudes, a worsening of ‘current critical problems’ of food, water and forests in semi-arid tropical regions, soil erosion and increased frequency and intensity of storms in humid tropical regions (‘The Greenhouse Effect’, 1985). Such global issues can no longer be dealt with at the level of ‘private enterprise’ or ‘national sovereignty’. As the Hague Declaration of major European countries and Japan stated in 1989: ‘Today, the very conditions of life on our planet are threatened by the severe attacks to which the earth’s atmosphere is subjected.’ Scientific measures to protect the environment were proposed at the 1992 ‘Earth Summit’ at Rio and the follow-up conference at Kyoto in 1997. A further report by scientists of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, in 2001, raised the probable range of temperatures throughout the world over the next decades, with extremely harmful effects for developing countries. The director of the institute of environmental sciences in Paris, Gérard Mégie, points out the ‘enormity’ of the increase in global warming as a result of the growing concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. As he puts it, ‘today the system is totally unbalanced . . . The present task is to slow the rate of global warming’ (‘Are we entering a


new climate?’, Le Monde des débats, July–August 2000: 13). Klaus Topfer, executive director of the UN environment programme, warns of an ecological crisis: ‘A series of looming crises and ultimate catastrophe can only be averted by a massive increase in political will. We have the technology but are not applying it . . . there is no incentive to apply it because politicians are not forcing manufacturers to do so’ (reporting on Global Environment Outlook 2000, Guardian Weekly, 23–29 September 1999). Commoner himself raises the question whether the ‘industrial pattern of economic growth is compatible with ecological stability, and even survival of the species’ (Commoner, 1971: 142–3, 217–18, 256–7, 296). This is indeed the question: how to create the political will? I discuss this basic issue, first in global terms – the threat to the environment is a transnational concern by definition – and then as it relates to France. Two noted environmental sociologists, Ted Benton and Michael Redclift, first of all emphasise two different approaches – similar to Touraine’s politically realistic reformism and Bourdieu’s ‘utopian’ alternative. Policy interventions to limit the environmental damage associated with industrial growth can either (1) incorporate ‘sustainable development’ within products and services through better environmental management and techniques or (2) abandon our current technological imperatives, which are leading to environmental disaster, and adopt ‘radically different and much “greener” forms of social life’. This includes ‘life-style’ change, but could include more radical views of social structure change. The first discourse is that of scientists and governments; the second that of the Green lobby and, to some extent, the public (Redclift and Benton, 1994, repr. 1997: 16). Benton criticises the ‘managerialist’ or ‘technological environmental ideology’ because it can only define and propose solutions to environmental problems as they are produced and encountered by the dominant paradigm of growth and development. It can postulate reduced growth but ‘cannot contemplate qualitatively different lines of sociocultural and economic change’. In other words, environmental ‘management’ is a global strategy to secure the long-term sustainability of a particular kind of human culture and its dominant economic and political interests (Benton, 1994: 37). And yet scientific and technical management has proved remarkably effective in resolving one important environmental threat – the thinning of the ozone layer. But this, as Barbara Adam points out (1994: 99), is precisely because the problem is challenging, but manageable. It can be tackled by phasing out chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and inventing an


alternative substance, without needing ‘a change of values, economic practices or political structures’. A more substantial support for the reformist approach is the policy experience of the European Community (now European Union), reported by one of its environmental researchers, Angela Liberatore (1994: 190–8). The framing of the ‘greenhouse effect’ as a policy issue – rather than as a scientific issue alone – started in 1986, with research that acknowledged existing uncertainties, but also argued for taking some immediate countermeasures in the field of industrial, agricultural and energy policy. If the greenhouse effect is shown to have ‘serious impacts’ on climate and agriculture worldwide, according to the European Commission in 1987, then ‘the community should already be thinking about possible responses and alternative energy strategies’. A ‘crucial role’, reported by Liberatore, was played by the 1988 Toronto Conference on ‘The Changing Atmosphere’. It urged a 20 per cent reduction of carbon dioxide emissions in industrialised countries, ratification of the protocol on CFCs, and promotion of a global convention on climatic change. Natural science findings formed the basis for identifying the problem of the greenhouse effect, insists Liberatore, and for framing climate change as a global, largely human induced, and very serious threat (similarly Yearley, 1994: 162). (On the alternative view of the ‘social construction’ of natural science: I do not accept as a consequence the delegitimising of scientific research. Certainly, major inventions, such as the steam engine, textile machinery, radio and telephone, the internal combustion engine and so on, have revolutionised economic development in the interests of economic and political power-holders. But the scientific discovery of global warming, on the other hand, is hardly in the interests of big business.) Indeed, the overall scientific assessment, considered by the European Commission as a basis for evaluating alternative courses of action, can thus be summarised: carbon dioxide is the main contributor to the greenhouse effect; the main source of carbon dioxide is fossil fuel combustion; available models indicate that global temperature increase (between 1.5 and 4.5 degrees) will necessarily occur if atmospheric concentrations double with respect to pre-industrial concentrations. Such climate change may have various negative impacts (rise in sea level, depletion of water resources and of agricultural production, health problems and so on). Natural science findings, Liberatore concludes, need some ‘translation’ in order to become policy issues:


This required the identification, evaluation and selection of measures and strategies aimed at preventing or mitigating the possible negative impacts of global warming. In other words, to become a policy issue the greenhouse effect had to become a ‘treatable’ problem, even if an extremely difficult, though a politically ‘manageable’ one. In this respect, the role of economists, policy analysts and energy technology experts has been crucial and it is their contribution – rather than that of natural scientists – which now represents the main scientific input to policy-making in the EC context. (Liberatore, 1994: 195) As a result, research on and introduction of energy efficiency and renewable energies are now a top priority of EC research, energy and environmental policy. Nevertheless, in view of the massive impact on society of environmental degradation if current economic patterns persist, according to the 2002 Global Energy Outlook, is the limited ‘managerial’ approach sufficient? Indeed, such an approach, relying often on taxation (polluter pays) or on financial incentives (tradable pollution permits) to diminish the global level of warming is strongly criticised by the environmental economist Michael Jacobs (1994: 67–88). As Jacobs points out, the dominant neo-classical project imputes prices to the environment, ‘consumed’ by individuals as a commodity (in the same way as other commodities are consumed), by constructing supply and demand curves. This enables the economist to identify the appropriate (optimal) level of environmental protection for the society to adopt. The next stage is to turn these imputed prices into real-life prices by intervening in or creating markets for them. This enables the identified level of protection to be achieved (70–3). The problem, of course, is that it is ‘consumer preferences’ – willingness to pay so much for the environment consumed – that identifies the desired level of protection and not the condition of the environment, established by scientific research. The environment is likely to be far more degraded – and therefore requiring more costly preventive measures – than ‘consumers’ realise or, if they do, would be inclined to accept. It follows, as Redclift and Benton suggest (1994: 20), that when institutional and sociocultural factors (rather than economic preferences) are taken into account, then direct regulation might be more effective in safeguarding the environment than market-oriented incentives, such as taxation and tradable permits. It is important to realise, moreover, that environmental goods, in general, are not at all like actual commodities.


They approximate much more to ‘public goods’, such as national security, which neo-classical economists already recognise as not susceptible to market-oriented approaches. Economy and environment in France It is in such a context of fundamental questioning of established structures and ways of thinking that les Verts have made their mark in France. Yet, as two researchers point out, in 1981 (when the Socialists came to power with their economic-political programme of ‘rupture’ with capitalism and nationalisation of basic industries) the ecologists were ‘so external to the political field and so deprived of legitimacy’ that they were not considered to have any real influence on public opinion. Eighteen years later, however, it is obligatory to take the positions of ecologists into account. The most important factor in this change, they point out, is the political presence of the ecologists and their direct contribution to debates (Yannick Barthe and Pierre Lascoumes, ‘Dossier/L’Ecologie’, Le Monde des Débats, 1999: 19). A leading figure in the Green movement, Alain Lipietz, claims that the ecologists’ vision of society has replaced that of the socialists by more effectively representing the two major dimensions of socialism: popular resistance to existing conditions of life and work; and the reinvention of a lost sense of community. ‘The Greens consider that the struggle against the economic defects of capitalism – pollution and greenhouse effect – and the profound transformation of society are inseparable.’ And in a Touraine-like conclusion, Lipietz insists that ‘there is something intrinsically libertarian and hostile to the great machinery of state in the ideology of ecologists’ (Lipietz, ‘Dossier/ L’Ecologie’, 1999: 14). But to what extent does the utopian vision of a society purged of capitalist excess correspond to the political strength of a movement which, with a million and a half votes out of 30 million who voted in 2002, has not greatly improved since 1997? (A substantially better performance, however, than that of the Communist Party, whose vote was more than halved.) For the political scientist Hugues Portelli the answer is negative. The absence of a homogeneous social base – which for the socialists (and Communists) was the working class – makes it unlikely that the Greens can play more than a pivotal role, ‘sometimes facilitating and sometimes complicating political life, but never structuring it’ (Portelli, ‘Dossier/L’Ecologie’, 1999: 15). In a debate between the influential editorialist Jacques Julliard and the leader of the European electoral list for les Verts, Daniel Cohn-Bendit


(also a hero of 1968), the former tends to support Portelli’s opinion but also argues that the Greens renew political ideas. The effectiveness of the ecological critique of capitalism is that ‘it intervenes when it is evident that industrial production destroys non-renewable natural resources and that economic liberalism leads to the perversion of democracy’. For Cohn-Bendit, the strength of the Green movement is that it mobilises citizens anxious to participate in the management of public affairs (the classic definition of civil society), both to protest over precise issues and to propose alternatives. It is precisely because ecologists do not have social roots, he argues, that they are much more receptive (than traditional parties) to new problems of society, such as PACS (Pacte civil de solidarité, providing legal rights to couples living together, whether homosexual or heterosexual), immigration and drug consumption. Nevertheless, in order to implement their policies, the Greens need to be associated with other social forces, with which they have to compromise in order to form a political majority. ‘How to organise these necessary historic compromises is precisely our debate today in the government of the Left.’ Modernisation and progress, Cohn-Bendit insists, can only be achieved by changing a way of life, on the one hand, and by creating a new balance in society by moving towards more equity. An important example is the ecologists’ proposal both to reduce the social charges on industry (and thus make it more competitive) and to impose a tax on the consumption of energy. ‘Thus, at the same time, we give resources to the state, we lower labour costs, we contribute to the modernisation of production and we help to renovate housing and city life: a true New Deal’ (‘Dossier/L’Ecologie’, 1999: 16–18). Although a ‘white book’ on taxing polluting activities was published jointly by the ministries of finance and the environment in 1999, the ‘ecotax’ proposals were quietly dropped by the Jospin government. (On these proposals, see the report by Jacques Maire, a senior official and former chief of staff to the minister of the environment: Maire, 2000: 263–4.) Like others, the government appeared unwilling to pay the political – and economic – costs of meeting even the limited requirements of the Kyoto commitment on global warming. Despite the rhetorical support for preservation of the environment by governments both of the Left and Right – thus, ‘environmental preoccupations’ should become an integral part of official policy, according to Prime Minister Raffarin in July 2002, and a constitutional Charter was adopted a year later – the experience of participation in govern-


ment has been disillusioning for environmentalists. One well-known personality, Nicolas Hulot, turned down President Chirac’s offer to head the environment ministry, stating (Le Monde, 5 July 2002) that he knew the former environment ministers and all related bitterly their inability to impose their policies on the more powerful ministries of agriculture, transport and industry. Indeed, Jacques Maire, former senior official at the Ministry of Environment, confirms the serious lack of resources that obstructs environmental policies and, notably, research. Thus, publicly funded research in France produced less than 4 per cent of world scientific publications in 1993, compared with nearly 7 per cent for Great Britain and 41 per cent for the United States (Maire, 2000: 245–6, 249, 264–7). Dominique Voynet, leader of les Verts and the then Minister of the Environment, in effect criticised the over-expectations of her own (unruly) movement as much as the recalcitrance of government. ‘We have often had difficulties in making our propositions heard’, she wrote to her supporters. ‘Paradoxically, we risk appearing without a voice just at the moment when society seems at last to be preoccupied with issues that we raised long before’ (quoted in Le Monde, 17 February 2001). Jérôme Jaffré in turn emphasises the gap between the public appeal of the Verts and their limited electoral capacity. ‘Their bad organisation and absence of credibility on important issues’, confirmed by a disillusioned Cohn-Bendit, ‘prevent them from transforming the sympathy they arouse into votes’ (Le Monde, 15–16 December 2002). The same ‘paradox’, that is, the contrast between intellectual awareness of the need for change and the practical costs of transforming powerful, but outmoded, economic, political or social structures – so evident in regard to the environment – is no less apparent in the complex case of education.

Education: elite or mass It is above all the school, states the philosopher Bruno Mattei, where ‘all the contradictions of the Republic are apparent. In principle egalitarian, its values in practice and its social relations are based on different rules: those of competition and rivalry, which set up hierarchies and in turn legitimise the power of the winners as well as the erratic destiny of the losers’ (‘Sortir de la comédie de la réforme’, Le Monde, 23 March 1999). Despite their very different perspectives, Bourdieu and Touraine agree on this crucial issue of an educational system that favours the elite and


reinforces social inequality. In Bourdieu’s terms, the educational system is in the service of the dominant classes, by reproducing the existing hierarchical order. The latter is portrayed as legitimate because performance in school (and subsequently in professional life) is rewarded according to the Republican principles of merit and equality of opportunity. The evocation of principles, however, obscures the practice of selection whereby superior social (and cultural) origins at the point of entry into the educational system are translated, in scholarly terms, into superior qualifications at exit: the foundation for successful careers. Inversely, those with ‘inferior’ social origins (children of workers, small farmers, artisans and service staff) not only do less well at school but also find it harder to go on to higher education, which is evident from statistical comparisons. They thus end up with ‘inferior’ prospects of employment or, increasingly, with no jobs at all. Family and school function inseparably, according to Bourdieu, as places which constitute the competences judged necessary for society. They are also places where the price of these competences is formed, thus acting as markets, controlling performance by positive or negative sanctions, approving what is acceptable and discouraging what is not (Bourdieu, 1979: 93). Such is the operation, on the positive side, of the symbolic capital of social recognition, confidence and legitimacy, ensuring the reproduction of economic and cultural capitals in the interest of the dominant classes (Bourdieu, 1989: 455, 554). Clearly, mass education should provide a genuinely democratic schooling: instead of the traditional formation of an elite or the modern technocratic training dictated by market requirements. But, given the absence of measures to neutralise the ‘social factors of cultural inequality’, then the political will to give all pupils an equal chance at school or university cannot be effective (Bourdieu and Passeron, 1985: 114–15). Touraine in turn starts with the ‘classic’ Republican tradition of an education intended to free the children from local or regional particularities so that they can enter the universal world of reason and knowledge; to provide a moral as much as an intellectual approach to civilisation and modernity; and finally to select the most hardworking individuals and those most capable of abstract thought as well as devotion to universal (and national) values: in other words, ‘Republican elitism’ (Touraine, 1997: 447–9). Such a conception is far from the democratic educational system which, in Touraine’s view, should focus not on (a hierarchical) society but on the free personality, the ‘subject’. The creative fulfilment of the individual, he insists, requires a political and social context,


not of uniformity but diversity. Thirdly, the ‘new model’ should distance itself from the abstract notion of equality, characteristic of the ‘old model’, and actively correct the real inequalities of situation and opportunity. Currently, however, the advent of mass education has led to the disintegration of the old system, which could only function in association with a high degree of social differentiation (between the bourgeoisie and the ‘popular’ classes), without overcoming both existing and new forms of inequality. Indeed, Touraine endorses the findings of researchers (discussed below) that the school system has increased certain social inequalities at a time when pupils are becoming alienated from the existing ‘scholarly culture’. He concludes, as does Bourdieu, that mass education has not been transformed into democratic education (Touraine, 1997: 462, 480). Indeed, the Republican ‘representation’ of the school, as the sociologist Danilo Martuccelli confirms, has for long been conflated with the historical reality. ‘In the ideal type of Republican School, social selection takes place before entry. Thus, each large social category saw itself destined to a particular level of the scholarly system. Primary school was for the “people”, the sons of workers and peasants, while the lycée was a “bourgeois” institution, reserved for those who knew “spontaneously” the right codes and were socially destined accordingly.’ Teaching methods were adapted for these different publics, guaranteeing in particular the profitability of degrees for the most favoured (Martuccelli, 1997: 127). Into this established environment came the shock-wave of the boom years of the trente glorieuses, inciting the postwar drive for ‘mass’ education, in effect destabilising the selective ‘Republican’ system. How to ‘massify’ a system of teaching designed to favour only the elites? For this was a society, as the historian Jean-Pierre Rioux reports, where social and economic ambitions alike were increasing, and which demanded ‘equality of opportunity’ as well as exemplary success, both the apprenticeship of norms and the fulfilment of youth, tutelage and affection. How would it be possible to translate politically such incoherent attitudes? (Rioux, 1983: 301–4). A decade later, towards the end of the ‘years of expansion’, the educational system had changed in dimension without changing its nature. Access had indeed become more democratic, but its ‘complex and very centralised organisation, the very hierarchical course of studies, the insufficiently diversified and modernised content of instruction and the inadequate guidance of each pupil left social inequalities too much


untouched, thereby often ruining the equality of chances that the system was intended to promote’ (Berstein and Rioux, 1995: 237). Such a contradiction, Jean-Jacques Becker concludes, is at the heart of the current debate. All the evidence goes to show that formal democratisation, that is, the possibility for all social categories to enter secondary education, does not imply real democratisation, meaning the possibility for everyone to enter the best educational streams (Becker, 1998: 51). One reason for the difference in educational performance is revealed in a study by the national statistical institute, Insee. It states that parents from the professional classes spent in the early 1990s between four and five times more on the education of their children than did parents who were unskilled workers. Moreover, of all social groups workers spent the least time educationally on their children. They also admitted that they were the least familiar with the educational system and were out of their depth because they lacked such knowledge. Indeed, the more money and knowledge of the parents, the more they were motivated to help their children. ‘The way in which parents intervene is strongly correlated with the degree of scholarly success’ (Déchaux, 1999: 72). Indeed, the higher the income of parents, according to a recent study for Insee by Dominique Goux and Eric Maurin, the greater the success of their children at school. The researchers include in such scholarly capital the locale and quality of housing, the size and number of rooms, the quality of meals, of medical care, particular courses, access to information technology and purchase of books (Sandrine Blanchard, Le Monde, 21 October 2000). This is not to deny, as Michel Lallemont points out, that as a result of mass education children of ‘disfavoured’ parents have improved their chances of success in school and entry into university. Thus, for children of workers the proportion reaching the third class – the final year of the collège before entering the lycée – without having to repeat the attempt, was less than 40 per cent at the beginning of the 1980s and more than 53 per cent a decade later. Despite this progress, the performance gap between poor and better-off pupils is still very large. Nearly 80 per cent of children of higher executives and school teachers, rising to more than 84 per cent, reached that class during the same period (Lallemont, 1999: 120). Similarly, of children entering the sixth class (the first year of collège) in the early 1960s, those whose parents were executives or teachers/professors were nearly ten times more likely to gain the baccalauréat than were children of working-class families; the ratio was still more than


eight times in the 1980s. The same inequality is evident at university level, even though the number of students massively increased from 30,000 in 1960 to more than one million in 1980 and two million in 1994. Children of workers were eleven times less likely than children of executives to enter university in 1981, improving to seven times less likely a decade later. Certain important faculties, such as medicine, pharmacy and law, were effectively closed to disfavoured children. As for the prestigious grandes écoles, veritable springboard to an elitist career, children from the ‘popular classes’ are twenty-three times less likely to enter the four main establishments (X, ENS, HEC, ENA: broadly, engineering, humanities, economics and administration) than are children of executives (Lallemont, 1999: 120–1). The success rate of the favoured classes is one thing; the failure rate of the disfavoured is another – but with equally significant, but inverted, social consequences. This perspective is emphasised by François Dubet, also an educational specialist and author of a report on the collège for the Jospin government; a member of the centre for sociological analysis, Cadis, founded by Touraine. As he points out, secondary school pupils take part in a competition or ‘market’, where their possibilities of choice are defined, at each selective stage, by their performance. The school does not merely reproduce social inequalities, it actively produces them by acting during the whole selective process as a multiplier of existing inequalities. The school, in effect, becomes ‘an instrument that selects by failure, leaving each individual face to face with his or her failure’. This paradox is all the more acute because the ‘massification’ of entry over the last twenty years has not reduced inequalities – to the contrary (Dubet, 1997: 94). For the greater the mass character of education, the more the system becomes diversified (into different streams: technical, professional and those with greater academic prestige) the more those who know the ‘hidden mechanisms’ can rationally make use of them. In this way a ‘scholarly market’ is produced, benefiting those with the resources to undertake appropriate strategies and investments. The choice of collège and lycée, and of the different educational streams (filières), becomes a decisive factor of success. ‘The biggest division is between those who know how to use the scholarly system and adopt a “professional” role as parent and those who continue to believe in the old Republican school and think that all collèges, lycées and baccalauréats are alike’ (94–5). While middle-class families can effectively reconcile the diverse needs of individuality for their children along with selective ‘market’ require-


ments, for the poorer newcomers to mass education this is hardly possible. The local schools that they go to in ‘popular quarters’ of towns and cities are confronted with social problems – from delinquency to violence – which teachers are less and less able to control (97–8). Finally, as Lallemont points out, with the lengthening of stay at school by more and more young people because of the difficulty of getting a job on the ‘degraded’ labour market – affecting especially those who leave school without diplomas or with ‘inferior’ qualifications – the essential transition from education to work differs greatly from what it was twenty years before. Whereas 57 per cent of those aged between 15 and 29 were employed in 1975, the proportion is no more than 40 per cent today. As for young people under 24 years of age, in 1992 almost half were either unemployed or in ‘precarious’ work. Moreover, the disparity in the rate of unemployment according to the level of diploma has even increased in recent decades. (In a survey of those leaving school in 1998, according to the educational research institute Céreq, only 59 per cent of those without a diploma had found employment compared with 92 per cent of those with a baccalauréat plus two years of further education: Luc Bronner, Le Monde, 29 June 2002.) Lallemont concludes that the type of diploma and its speciality are as important nowadays as social origin or gender (Lallemont, 1999: 124–5) – but attainment of superior qualifications and hence the likelihood of achieving professional and executive careers still depends substantially, as Bourdieu argues, on social origins. Moreover, the ‘malaise’ of the educational system remains, according to Sandrine Blanchard and Nathalie Guibert (Le Monde, 12 January 2001). ‘What instruction should be taught? How to remedy the breakdown of democratisation in the school? How to confront the merchandising of the means of acquiring knowledge?’ Paradoxically, and as if to compensate for social discrimination, the blossoming of personal lifestyle, discussed below, seems to be the least affected (of all forms of behaviour) by the operation of established structures and values.

Permissive society: individual freedom or social evasion Modern society, writes Gilles Lipovetsky in L’Ere du vide, with its belief in progress, science and technique, is dissolving before our eyes, to be replaced by ‘postmodern’ insistence on identity, difference and detente. Confidence in the future is disappearing, the radiant tomorrows of revolution and progress are no longer believed in; henceforth, people want


to live immediately, here and now. ‘The great axes of modernity, revolution, discipline, lay society and the avant-garde, are disaffected by the powerful current of personalist hedonism . . . No political ideology is capable of inflaming the crowds, for postmodern society no longer has either idols or taboos, it no longer has a glorious image of itself, nor a mobilising historical project; it is a void that rules us, but a void without tragedy or apocalypse’ (Lipovetsky, 1983, 1993: 15–16). In such a postmodern society, Lipovetsky goes on, ideas and public values lose their force, only the quest of the ego and self-interest remain, such as the ecstasy of ‘personal’ liberation, obsession with the body and with sex: a hyper-investment in the private sphere and consequent demobilisation of public space. When the ‘social’ is no longer believed in, desire, enjoyment and communication become the only ‘values’. The originality of the postmodern, accordingly, is the ‘predominance of the individual over the universal, of psychology over ideology, of communication over politicisation, of diversity over homogeneity, of the permissive over the coercive’. Yet this ‘desertion of the social’, Lipovetsky argues, does not indicate a major social crisis; rather, popular indifference, apathy and relaxation represent a ‘new, supple and economic socialisation’ necessary for the functioning of modern capitalism (61, 165). Alain Touraine, in turn, considers the division between universality and particularism to reflect the ‘shattered culture’ of modernity – crushed between the objectivist logic of the market with appropriate political and economic strategies and the subjectivist logic of identity, constructing our personality from sexuality and dreams, memories and norms. These become more and more detached both from the role of production and forms of (political) participation (Touraine, 1994: 237). But when society – following the ‘objectivist logic’ – becomes more and more like a market, and ideological and even political issues disappear, there remain only the struggle for money, on the one hand, and the search for identity, on the other. Social problems are replaced by non-social – either the individual or the planetary – which go far beyond the social or political sphere and, according to Touraine, become devoid of content. Such a society is reduced to the state of a market, which cannot explain identity or ‘national passions’ or the culture of the excluded, who are sometimes disoriented and may even become delinquent. Such an impotent, fractured society, he contends, suits the interests of the elites (Touraine, 1992: 235–7). Youth, in particular, experiences this ‘fragmentation of cultural experience’. Outside limited circles, where parents prepare the new gen-


eration to exercise their social responsibilities and develop personal autonomy, youth-formation is chaotic. ‘They live in different stages, either in collège or lycée, or in groups, or in sexual relationships, in the absence for the most part of any principle of integration of these different experiences.’ The idea of submission to the norms of social or professional or family life is weakening. The classic complementarity of imposed norms and acquired autonomy has almost disappeared. A consumer society provides no integrating principle for the personality. ‘For what we see initially as a crisis of the family or the school, hence of education and socialisation, is also a crisis of the formation of personal identity’ (Touraine, 1997: 96–7). Political institutions alone hold no solution for this crisis: the economy counts for more. Moreover, the political system is isolated from society, where youth culture, media messages and consumer attraction give a non-political expression to social demands (Touraine, 1994: 157–8). Although Touraine places his hope in the recomposition of society through the free and creative action of the subject mobilised in social movements, he concludes, sombrely: ‘The subject is threatened today as much by the consumer society, which manipulates us, or by the search for pleasure which enfolds us in our emotions, as it was in the past by submission to the laws of God or society’ (Touraine, 1997: 98). For Pierre Bourdieu, on the other hand, the ‘permissive society’ is the result, not of a fragmented modernity, but of the ‘struggle for power’ within the dominant classes between the new and the old bourgeoisie. As he points out, the fields of force within which economic, political, cultural and other ‘capitals’ interact, form the arena not only for the physical exercise of power but above all symbolic power, creating the categories of perception by which we recognise – or ‘misrecognise’ – the world and our place in it. The new bourgeoisie, in its struggle with the old, therefore creates new ‘systems of classification’ of society. Such is the dialectic of conditions and habitus basic to the ‘alchemy’ that transforms the distribution of capital in a field of force into a ‘system of perceived differences’ making up symbolic capital (Bourdieu, 1979: 192). As Bourdieu puts it: The new bourgeoisie is the initiator of the ethical conversion required by the new economy (from which it draws its strength and profits) whose functioning depends as much on the production of the needs of consumers as of the products themselves. The new economic logic replaces the previous asceticism of production and accu-


mulation, founded on abstinence, sobriety, saving and calculation, with a hedonistic consumer culture, based on credit, expenditure and pleasure. The new economy demands a social world which judges people by their conspicuous consumption, their ‘standing’ and their way of life as much as by their productive capacity. Its spokesmen are those who sell symbolic goods and services: those who own or manage tourist enterprises, journalists for the press, cinema, fashion and publicity (356). The new bourgeoisie, according to Bourdieu, finds its ‘natural ally’, economically as well as politically, in the ‘new petty bourgeoisie’, which enthusiastically collaborates in the imposition of new social norms. It is this new petty bourgeoisie which acts as the avant-garde in everything related to lifestyle, especially domestic life and consumption, relations between the sexes and generations, and the reproduction of the family and its values. In the struggle between old and new, as Bourdieu points out, the ‘morality of duty’ is replaced by the ‘morality of pleasure’ (423–5). It is the ‘new intellectuals’ of the culture industry who lead the way in attacking ‘taboos’ and liquidating ‘complexes’, adopting ‘emancipated’ postures and a ‘cultivated’ disposition in the arts as in matters of personality (sexuality, education, leisure) and existential conditions (relation to nature, love, death and so on). But all this affectation, in Bourdieu’s scathing account, is no more than a ‘romantic flight out of the social world’, which fits perfectly with the ‘social policy’ of a dominant class, making some ‘liberal’ concessions in order more effectively to preserve its power (429–31). Is such a ‘permissive society’ the product of (changes in) class domination, as Bourdieu contends, or is it the result of the ‘break-up’ of modernity, with its division between economy and culture, as Touraine insists? However Touraine exaggerates the degree of fragmentation, for it is evident that ‘mass culture’ as well as consumerism are not so much separated from the economy but form part of it – that is, they make up the demand of individuals and households for ‘cultural’ goods and services that keeps the economy growing. Lipovetsky accepts this argument, but considers – contrary to both Bourdieu and Touraine – that such economic development is entirely compatible with an effective democracy. For Bourdieu, economic and political capitals form the (changing) structure of dominant power over the dominated, which is by definition undemocratic. Touraine’s conclusion is not dissimilar. But in his view the divorce between political


institutions and citizens reflects the fissiparous character of postmodern society. Only the reforming energy and influence of social movements on politics can bridge the gap and ‘recompose’ society. For Bourdieu, such parliamentary reformism is an illusion – indeed, a perfect example of the dominant exercise of symbolic power over the dominated, ‘misrecognising’ structural realities. The confrontation between such perspectives – so crucial to an assessment of modern, or postmodern, society – is most clearly shown in their rival attitudes to the women’s movement in the following chapter.

The autonomy project Nevertheless, confronted with the advance of neo-liberalism, Bourdieu has to some extent shifted his ground, admitting a certain potential for social change. Just as the French technocratic elite has moved from state-centric policies to a more market-oriented approach, when confronted with the challenge of a global economy, so the emergence of different forms of capital and of differential fields in which capital can be invested gives rise to the possibility of divergent ‘trajectories’ through social space (Lane, 2000: 151–2, 154, citing Bourdieu). Such divergent possibilities are enhanced by the ‘relative autonomy’ of agents in these various fields. In the bureaucracy, for example, officials (involved in the struggle for power among dominant factions) seek to legitimise and reinforce their autonomy. In doing so, Bourdieu affirms, they find it in their interest to give a ‘universal form to the expression of their particular interests’ by elaborating a theory of public service and public order – the res publica of ‘Republican values’. The relative autonomy of bureaucrats therefore not only consists in their ability to determine their own rules of functioning (as professionals in a particular field) but also their ‘interest’ in being or appearing to be ‘disinterested’. Such an interest, substantiating their legitimacy, obliges agents to develop their particular interests in conformity with a universal interest, namely the public good (Bourdieu, Raisons pratiques, 1994, quoted by Lane, 2000: 182). Now, the incessant penetration of neo-liberalism in non-economic fields renders it all the more important to preserve the autonomy, not only of ‘public servants’, but no less of agents in intellectual, political and educational fields. Politicians, in particular, need to bring their specific interests into accordance with ‘universal ethical criteria’ if they are to strengthen their autonomy from the power of market forces (Lane, 183, see also 168–9). However Lane (175) notes Bourdieu’s scepticism


in this regard, because of the increasing accommodation of the French civil service – and of the major political parties – to the interests of business and the market. Nevertheless, despite the material obstacles to ‘advancing the universal’ (Lane, 168–9), Bourdieu’s acknowledgement of the potential for autonomy is certainly compatible with Touraine’s own emphasis on the creative subject (individual or collective) uniting specific interests with universal values. The problem, as always, is to express the ‘general interest’ in terms of concrete activities (which may impinge on particular interests) rather than as formulas that are widely acceptable so long as they remain abstract. The issue of autonomy is related. How is it possible to prevent the enlargement of autonomy in a particular field from developing into a ‘corporate’ interest at the expense of the general interest? The corporatism of trade unions, for example, when defending the privileges of a minority to the disadvantage of the general public, is surely as unacceptable (to Touraine, at least) as is the corporatism of professional politicians who, whether in opposition or government, have more in common with each other than with the public they are supposed to represent. (Such a ‘disposition’ is rightly criticised by Bourdieu as a betrayal of Republican values.) Both Touraine and Bourdieu are justified, however, in their insistence on universal criteria by which to judge and to orient particular policies. This is all the more important in the case of such fundamental issues (discussed above) as the place of the workforce in the global economy, the social inequality of education, the degradation of the environment and (in the following chapter) pervasive discrimination against women. Each of these issues is an example of the need for autonomy in specific fields – notably against the imposition of market values, but also against the abusive power of the state – and the need for ‘utopias’, that is, the overriding goal of the ‘common good’. (See also the brief introduction, in the Index, to such key themes as capitalism, civil society and democracy.)

4 The Rights of Women: a Case Study

1. Theoretical perspectives Autonomy and values Autonomy is self-development in a particular field, through the inspiration of values proper to that activity or condition – but which can be projected universally. In terms of values, social welfare, for example, realises the utopian slogan ‘From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs.’ However attenuated in practice, the welfare state provides the essential safety net for a decent life, in principle available to all. Education, too, is inspired by the threefold goals of responsible citizenship, self-fulfilment and preparation for work. Work itself is given meaning by the ‘labour theory of value’, that is, rewards proportionate to work done. This is an ideal (‘labour . . . puts the difference of value on everything’) reflected in the writings of Locke, author of the famous contract theory, justifying the right of people to resist an ‘unconstitutional’ regime. Similarly, the natural environment – essential for human existence – has to be safeguarded from the predatory practices of powerful economic interests. The rights of women – victims of apartheid: separate but unequal development – are no less universal. In each case, reforms are means to achieve a utopian goal – but in the long term. A ‘radical break’ with existing structures of domination, on the other hand, attempts the immediate achievement of such goals. Each then is the opposite of the other. For reformism, according to radicals, saps the revolutionary will needed to destroy the old society, as a precondition for constructing the new. Radicalism, according to reformists, requires such ruthless nihilism in regard to existing society as to end up either in anarchy or despotism. As for the ‘paradigmatic’ 83


case of women, the reformist and radical perspectives of Touraine and Bourdieu are discussed below. This clash of perspectives cannot be denied, but it does not mean that they are irreconcilable. I suggest the following argument. The goal is the emancipation of women through the achievement of equality. Concretely: equal pay for equal work; no discrimination in promotion to important posts, economic and political; and fair share in domestic work. (Whatever the variant of feminism – from egalitarian integration into society to insistence on the difference of the sexes – the negative condition of women revealed in the three instances above is evident to all.) Such a revolutionary goal requires a change in the mentality and behaviour of men in general and those in positions of authority in particular. Reformism, according to radicals, however, presents only the illusion of change because of the need to compromise with existing institutions: there is no substantial change in the structure of power. Reformists argue that their practice is not incompatible with utopian goals: on the contrary, they are interdependent, each requiring the other for fulfilment. For reform – to achieve real equality – requires an intense mobilisation, inspired by universal values, in order to overcome the powerful obstacles in its way. Three reforms of this kind have indeed had revolutionary consequences for women, as Geneviève Fraisse points out. These are access to contraception and abortion; economic independence; and universal education. The first enables women to control their own bodies, and was gained only after a long and bitter struggle (Fraisse, 2000: 53). The second is no less revolutionary, in that women are no longer dependent on their fathers or husbands. Before 1965, for example, wives needed the authorisation of their husbands to seek employment (91, 114–17). Finally education – acquiring knowledge – enables women to prove themselves as professionally competent as men (149, 163). In each case, patriarchal mentality and behaviour has changed, however reluctantly. In other words, revolutionary change is not inconceivable (pace Bourdieu), even by the gradual process of reform. A similar change in the dominant mentality took place in Victorian Britain in terms of the (male) franchise, which was gradually extended once the ‘lower classes’ were no longer seen as ignorant, barbarous and a danger to society, but as increasingly educated and responsible citizens deserving to take part in public decisions. But women had to struggle against the physical and symbolic violence of the state to achieve the same aim.

The Rights of Women: a Case Study

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As Fraisse argues (111), it is democracy by its ‘neutral’ vision of individuals (not seen as either male or female) that provides the very principle by which the division of labour – justifying male domination of the public sphere, while women are relegated to domestic tasks – can be overcome. (Neutrality, however, can also mask real inequalities.) In my view, moreover, democratic institutions alone are insufficient. Two safeguards against abuse of power by the majority are essential: first, human rights legislation to protect minorities; and second, a mature civil society to put pressure on politicians to achieve social justice and welfare. Now, democracy is reformist – not revolutionary – by nature, because change (but see above) takes place by consent. Only when democracy is absent, therefore, may revolution be justified as a last resort, as Locke envisaged and as Americans put into practice. Gramsci, too, makes the crucial distinction between conditions of peaceful change, resulting from ‘hegemony’ through civil society, and conditions of immaturity, where the state is all-powerful and civil society is either weak or nonexistent. In such a case hegemony is not possible, and the way is open to force. The radical view of Bourdieu (reform is an illusion) and the pragmatism of Touraine are, nevertheless, contrasted in the following pages in order to bring out the strengths and weaknesses of their theoretical perspectives, leading to the conclusion that reformist change can have a revolutionary effect. Radicalism and reform Reformism, with Touraine, strives for the better integration of women in society. Radicalism, with Bourdieu, insists that society itself must be changed if women are to achieve equal rights with men. Feminism as a social movement, in Touraine’s view, demands a pragmatic struggle for women’s rights, in law, in the economy and in politics; this is analysed in the first part of the chapter. Radicalism, to the contrary, demands the uncompromising rejection of male domination of society by the revolutionary overthrow of institutions that reproduce structural inequality. Although Touraine supports the reformist project, there are only scattered references in his works to the feminist movement and the situation of women. He had proposed such a study, according to Laurence Bell (2001), but it was never written. This omission is surprising, because Touraine is undoubtedly sympathetic to the pragmatic mainstream of feminism as a social movement, emphasising its ability to mobilise


support, to reinforce solidarity and, above all, to put pressure on political institutions to carry out much-needed reforms. The efficacy of such pragmatic reformism was especially evident in the 1970s (legalising abortion, reimbursing methods of contraception, establishing women’s equality in the family) but it was followed by stagnation and internal dissension. Only in the 1990s did the women’s movement revive with the (successful) campaign for ‘parity’ (parité), that is, equal access of men and women to elected positions. Indeed, the campaign largely by women to achieve ‘equal access’ to elected positions, Touraine argues (1999: 96), is the most important attack on the very principle of polarised society, founded on inequality. Thus, the movement for parité is of great symbolic importance, for it affirms that the ‘Rights of Man’ now only exist ‘in the form of man/woman duality and, consequently, the universality of rights is inseparable from recognition of the differences between men and women. Women want to be at once equal and different.’ (Recognition of ‘difference’, for Touraine, is therefore positive, contrary to the negative status accorded to women in Bourdieu’s division of labour between the sexes.) Touraine’s affirmation of parité – contrary to Bourdieu’s ‘misrecognition’ of its symbolic importance – stems from his theoretical emphasis on the creation of a free and active ‘subject’ – in this case emancipated women – working collectively as a ‘social movement’ to put pressure on democratic institutions to carry out meaningful reforms. Men as well as women therefore have the capacity to overcome the division of labour between the sexes that reinforces (if not legitimises) the inferiority of women. Hence Touraine’s advocacy of the ‘duality of men and women’ (as in parité) and thus the complementarity of public and private spheres – and not the segregation of one from the other. Evidently, Touraine prefers pragmatic reform to abstract (Utopian) perfection, social pluralism to ‘Republican’ uniformity, and an inclusive rather than exclusive ‘identity’. Accordingly, Touraine chooses a middle way between what he sees as the two rival streams in the women’s movement (1997: 307–8) – between those who give priority to the drive for equality with men, and those, on the contrary, who insist on the ‘difference’ between men and women. The former, he argues, take an unrealistic ‘hyper-liberal’ stance by insisting (on the basis of universal values) that gender should not be a factor in the choice of social roles – although in practice the choice is obviously weighted in favour of men; this is, of course, precisely the


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reason for ‘positive discrimination’, in the form of parité, to redress the balance. The second stream, insisting on female difference, however runs the risk of closing off the women’s movement by its ‘obsession with identity’, tending to a sectarian or ‘comunitarian’ exclusiveness. Instead, Touraine urges that social movements, besides defending their own interests, should have a ‘general conception of society’, thus uniting the particular with the universal. Rather than opposing feminine to masculine values, Touraine affirms the necessity and possibility of combining professional and personal life, culture and identity, and thus ‘recomposing’ shattered modernity (308–9). It is precisely on the issue of parité that reformers and radicals diverge. (Note that I do not consider either ‘radicalism’ or ‘reformism’ pejoratively, despite the utopian tendency of the one and the inclination to compromise of the other.) Bourdieu is uncompromising on parité. In La domination masculine (1998b: 124), he writes that even if the feminist movement has contributed a great deal to the enlargement of political discussion and confrontation on issues that were previously evaded or ignored, one cannot ignore the negative and for the most part unconscious attitudes – both of men and women – which ‘contribute so strongly to the social relations of domination between the sexes’. He recognises that feminist political forms of struggle, such as the concrete demand for parité between men and women, have the merit of reminding us that ‘universalist principles’ proclaimed by constitutional law are not as universal as they appear, since they refer only to abstract individuals deprived of social qualities. But, he argues, such struggles indicate another form of ‘fictitious universalism’, because the women who will benefit from parité come from the ‘same regions of social space’ as the men who currently occupy dominant positions (124). In other words, one form of domination (masculine) will be replaced by another (that of men and women) all of whom are members of the same dominant classes. ‘Objective complicity’ and ‘institutional structures’ – that is, symbolic power and agents of socialisation exercising that power – are the twin forms of domination of those who possess economic, political, social and cultural ‘capitals’ over those who do not. ‘Masculine domination’ over women is thus part of the overall domination of the possessing classes over the dispossessed. That is why Bourdieu does not accept the feminist claim that the ‘conversion of consciousness and will’ by women is sufficient to overcome


masculine domination. For ‘the basis of symbolic violence does not reside in the mystified consciousness (of women) which only needs to be enlightened’, but in these largely unconscious dispositions produced by ‘structures of domination’. Among such dispositions are precisely the ‘relations of complicity’ that the victims of symbolic violence accord to the dominant in society. Only the ‘radical transformation of the social conditions of production’ that make the dominated accept the point of view of the dominant (that is, their ‘complicity’ in domination) can emancipate women from their treatment as objects in the social ‘market of symbolic goods’ (48; see also Bourdieu, 1997: 127, 130–1). Bourdieu accepts that the ‘immense critical work’ of the feminist movement has brought about a major change in the sense that masculine domination can no longer impose itself as before. The improved education of women is also a major factor. But better access to professional employment and the great increase in the numbers of women at work cannot conceal the fact that women are paid less than men for the same work, that with the same degrees as men they get lower positions of authority, and that they are more affected by unemployment and ‘precarious’ employment (1998b: 95–100). Above all, despite legislative and social reforms, ‘structural inequalities’ persist, which determine and limit the possibilities of change. Bourdieu concludes bleakly (1998b: 125) that only ‘long-term’ political action, taking into account all the effects of domination – which works through the ‘objective complicity’ of men and women as well as the ‘structures of great institutions’, notably the State and the School – only such action, taking advantage of ‘inherent contradictions’ in these institutions, can ‘contribute to the progressive weakening of masculine domination’. Nevertheless, it could be argued, contrary to Bourdieu’s interpretation, that the symbolic power that facilitates male domination is not necessarily a one-way process. There are instances in Bourdieu’s work of what may be termed ‘reverse symbolic power’, when the dominated reject dominant values and instead proclaim an alternative set of values – as with those who demonstrated in 1995 for a more interventionist state needed to bring about social reforms (see Chapter 3). A more impressive example of reverse symbolic power is the vision of an alternative society presented by the French Communist Party in the postwar years: indeed, the comradeship of members of an oppressed class in their struggle to create a society without exploitation provided a powerful symbol of a better life to many at that time. And it is precisely such a radical alternative – both to capitalism and to male


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domination – that inspires the work of the neo-Marxist Christine Delphy, discussed in the second half of this chapter. Reverse symbolic power, I argue, is no less characteristic of feminist ‘essentialism’, emphasising both equality and difference between men and women, as with certain psychoanalysts and literary feminists, also discussed below. These reformist and radical perspectives, that is, Touraine’s emphasis on the creative freedom of subjects in social movements and Bourdieu’s insistence on the symbolic power of the mechanisms of male domination, form part of the conceptual framework composed by the feminist cultural anthropologist Nicole-Claude Mathieu. In her challenging work L’Anatomie politique (1991: 231) she presents a three-fold classification of women’s consciousness of identity: the individualist consciousness of ‘sexual identity’, where gender – the psycho-social aspects of sex – translates sex; the group consciousness of ‘sexed identity’, where gender symbolises sex; and class consciousness of the ‘identity of sex’, where gender constructs sex: as in Simone de Beauvoir’s famous phrase, ‘On ne naît pas femme, on le devient.’ The first is the dominant heterosexual model, in which the difference of sexes constitutes personal identity as well as social order and symbolic order; homosexuality is considered to be an anomaly or a perversion of the norm (232). It is the model of masculine domination analysed by Bourdieu. The second model, which is also one of ‘bipartition’ (two social categories of sex), defines social behaviour on the basis of biological sex. Personal identity is strongly linked to a form of group consciousness: a group of women, a group of men, who experience their gender collectively. ‘It is the problematic of the social and cultural complementarity of the sexes, whether this complementarity is considered to be harmonious (“equality in difference”) or lacking in harmony (“sexual antagonism”, which is more or less unavoidable), with variations according to societies, classes, historical eras, etc.’ (239). ‘Cultural feminism’ and ‘cultural lesbianism’ – two tendencies in the women’s movement – are also expressions of group consciousness of sexed identity. In addition, Mathieu places in this category certain socialist or Marxist feminists, who seek to remedy the injustices in the respective status of men and women, by demanding equality of sexual roles and a change in ‘mentality’ – but without infringing the solidarity of men and women, which is considered necessary for ‘global’ struggles, whether anti-capitalist or nationalistic (240). The pursuit of equality, improvement of material conditions of women and change in mentality (especially among men) may thus be linked either to the


‘harmonious’ (reformist) strategy advocated by Touraine or to the radically ‘antagonistic’ strategy of Bourdieu. The third – (ultra) radical – model is that of class consciousness in the ‘identity of sex’. The ‘bipartition of gender’ in the first two models is seen as foreign to the biological reality of sex, that is, the political and social correspondence between sex and gender. Indeed, Mathieu considers the ‘heterosexual gender’ of the male-dominated and group models to be the basis of the definition and oppression of women. From this point of view, radical feminists, political lesbians and male homosexuals create an identity of resistance to gender-definitions; they refuse bipartition into separate ‘masculine’ and ‘feminine’ attitudes and roles. Rather than the ‘static notions’ of male domination or sexual inequality of the first two models, Mathieu emphasises the ‘dynamic notion’ of domination, exploitation and oppression of women by men (255–6, 258, 260). The oppression of women therefore stems from the social construction of differences of sex and, in particular, the constraints on women’s sexuality imposed by men, such as the institution of marriage (specialising women for reproductive purposes) and, indeed, the ‘channelling’ of women’s ‘normally polymorphous’ desires into purely heterosexual relations. Such male impositions render the notion of gender no longer a ‘symbolic mark of natural differences’, as in the earlier models, but as the ‘operation of the power of one sex over the other’ (258). As with Bourdieu’s theory of masculine domination, Mathieu notes that it is precisely this power which, in every society, forbids certain tasks to women, thus reserving for men the possibility of control of key means of production as well as mastery of the symbolic and political organisation of society (265; see also 38, 59, 76, 125). ‘Feminism’ for Mathieu can thus be defined (135, n. 4) as the analysis, by women, from their own marginalised experience, of the oppression of women, as a group or class, by men as a group or class, in various societies – and the will to act for its abolition. She does not consider, however, that she needs to discuss (in this work) the ‘internal political debates of women’s movements concerning definitions or tactics’. Yet it is precisely the relationship between objectives and how they are defined – in this case ‘abolition of oppression’ – and the means to achieve these objectives (‘tactics’) that are crucial both to feminism and to any other social movement. Indeed, the problematic of radicalism or reformism, raised by all three scholars (Bourdieu, Touraine and Mathieu), is a key to this issue.


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As the authors of Histoire du féminisme français rightly point out (Albistur and Armogathe, 1977: 455–6): ‘The problems begin when it is necessary to determine the objectives and define the tactics of struggle’: Which had priority, the struggle against male power or the struggle against capitalism? Which new analyses could women provide in regard to Marxism and the work of Freud? How should struggles be popularised, by direct and spectacular action against all the fronts of patriarchy, or rather by a more classical way of using tracts, newspapers and demonstrations, etc.? Finally how to organise at a minimum level and how to meet, speak and decide: by turbulent general assemblies favouring power tactics, or in small study-groups, less open to direction, but also less representative and perhaps less effective? Such are among the ‘tactical’ issues, clearly related to definition of objectives, that confront ‘radical’ feminists. As for those whom Albistur and Armogathe consider to be ‘reformist’ – feminist groups that are uncritical of the existing order and aim for a better integration of women in society by ‘temporary improvements’ in their situation (447–8) – they are reproached for ‘isolating the problem of women from ideological reflection’ and for seeking only ‘partial claims’. Such claims, however, are stated to include the construction of an equitable society for both men and women, the right to sexual information, free contraception and (for most reformists) legal abortion, divorce reform, maternity recognised as a social function as well as improvements in education, urban standards and professional life, and ‘equal pay for equal work’ (451–3). Now, the radical feminist groups in and around the Mouvement de libération des femmes (MLF) have also come out in favour of environmental reform, free abortion and contraception, denunciation of sexual discrimination, the need for women to be informed of their rights, for changes in the sexist texts used in schools, for reform of rape laws and prevention of domestic violence (455, 457–60). As a result of such efforts, by reformists and radicals, an improved definition of rape was legislated in 1980 and a law against sexual harassment passed in 1992 (Bard, 1999: 312; Louis, 1999: 409; see also Allwood, 1998, esp. chs. 5 and 6). In the first large-scale statistical inquiry on domestic violence, in December 2000, it was estimated that nearly 10 per cent of women living as a couple were subjected to violence by their male partners.


According to the official report, ‘the effects of masculine domination are still to be felt’. And again: ‘Masculine violence can be analysed as a fundamental mechanism of social control of women . . . expressing a situation of domination’ (report to the Secretary of State for the Rights of Women, Nicole Péry: Pascale Krémer, Le Monde, 8 December 2000). It would seem, then, to be a difference of degree (rather than a difference of kind) in the attitude of most feminists towards reform. (Indeed, radicals as well as pragmatists have supported the campaign for parité which is discussed below.) Nevertheless, at the ‘ideological’ level the question remains: are reforms a necessary stage on the way to ‘abolition’ of repression of women, or are they a deviation from that objective (that is, by assuring ‘token’ or short-term satisfaction of demands they weaken the ‘revolutionary’ will to fight to the end)? The reformist view is clearly advocated by Touraine and by feminists such as Gisèle Halimi and Françoise Gaspard in the struggle of social movements for parité. The revolutionary view is that of Bourdieu (and Mathieu), condemning the reformist notion of ‘complementarity’ of the sexes as ‘misrecognition’ of the symbolic power of male domination. The latter can only be ended, not by ‘awareness’ of their situation, but by the ‘radical transformation’ of the social conditions of (re)production of institutional and symbolic power. Bourdieu correctly claims that, despite social and political reforms, structural inequality persists. But he minimises the very real improvements in the situation of women that have been achieved in comparison with their position half a century ago, or indeed compared with the present plight of women in much of the developing world. (Before 1965, to recall, French wives could not go to work without the authorisation of their husbands.) How to assess these differences is a matter of perspective: judged from the point of view of the intended end-result, women suffer greatly from inequality; from the point of view of the process of reform, women have gained immensely. So far from such ‘temporary’ satisfactions representing a deviation from the ultimate objective, it could be argued that the achievement of one reform provides the incentive to mobilise for another: l’appétit vient en mangeant. Moreover, on the very issue of revolution or reform, as Françoise Picq emphasises, the 1968 ‘paradigm’ of women’s liberation can no longer be expected. ‘The extravagant hope to put an immediate end to oppression and to abolish patriarchy within a generation has been extraordinarily effective . . . in denouncing the soft consensus, in undermining the existing relations between the sexes and in forging new representations of women.’ But it is hardly probable, she adds, that such a radical


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movement can develop in a ‘reasonably reformist’ France, which has lost the taste for rupture and confrontation, and no longer believes in grand ideological systems of liberation. Instead, the fundamental gains of the 1970s must be maintained – to freely dispose of one’s body (F. Picq in Cités 9, 2002b: 28–9). As Françoise Gaspard puts it, women also demand equal participation not only in making political decisions but in adminstrative, social and cultural affairs as well. ‘It seems no longer to be a matter of rupture but of integration, not an issue of revolution but of reforms’ (Gaspard, 2002: 69). Even those who insist on the ‘fundamental’ distinction between ‘feminism’ as an uncompromising ‘challenge of patriarchy’ and the reformist ‘women’s movements’, which are prepared to renegotiate existing hierarchies in order to gain an equal place for women, at the same time acknowledge that the difference between the two ‘can be problematic in real life’. For the sake of practical analysis ‘it will be accepted that feminism can and often does inspire and inform the strategy and action of women’s movements whose primary goals may not be to challenge patriarchy’. In such a case, the definition of feminism is ‘stretched’ to include attempts to achieve equality, to improve the status of women and to fight against ‘their systematic oppression by men’ – as well as the radical aim to change the power relations between men and women (Allwood and Wadia, 2002: 213–14). There is, however, yet another perspective – that of the ‘differentialist’ model of feminist consciousness analysed by Mathieu. In this respect, Albistur and Armogathe also suggest a typology that is close to the one used in this chapter: as they point out (1977: 461), the merit of radical feminism is to have encouraged the flowering of bold and original thought on the multiple aspects of repression. Moreover, and despite the extraordinary range of subjects that radical feminists have treated, there is unanimity on three ‘fields of reflection’, which they say it is indispensable to consider in depth: that is, the articulation of sex and class, the sexed body and feminine (literary) creation. Symbolic power of Marx, Freud and Joyce! In this chapter, I follow the same procedure. I observe the same major distinction (as do Albistur and Armogathe, and Mathieu) between pragmatic reformism, analysed empirically (as is appropriate to the subject) in the first half of the chapter, and the three ‘fields of reflection’ of radical feminism, theorised in the second half. Recall, however, that ‘reformism’, in my interpretation, often overlaps with the practice (if not the theory) of radical feminists, such as Christine Delphy’s qualified support for parité. (Thus, she writes in her editorial for Nouvelles


Questions Féministes (1994a) on the need to regard abstract problems in the light of experience and ‘concrete situations’, which indicate the problem caused by the ‘disappearance’ of women from the political and cultural representation of the nation. She also considers the debate on parité (1994b) to be a turning point in the history of feminism.) In this respect, Delphy’s radical objective of abolishing the oppressive ‘domestic mode of production’ can be considered to be the ‘maximum goal’, while concrete reforms improving the situation of women are ‘minimum goals’. (See also Delphy, 2001: 36–40 on the means-ends problem posed by parité.) As for the second half of this chapter – analysing the radical theories of articulation of sex and class, the sexed body and feminine creation – my selection of feminist writers also overlaps with those chosen by Albistur and Armogathe in their chapter on ‘contemporary feminism’. It is, of course, impossible to do justice to all the strands of important feminist work: selection is essential. My own selection has been conditioned by the twin themes of social movements and symbolic power, expressed in theory and practice as reformism and radicalism. The feminist radicalism of ‘difference’ discussed in this chapter is also a form of symbolic power. To sum up: the conditions of inequality and discrimination experienced by women in economic, political and social life and their practical efforts to overcome them are analysed, below, in the second section of this chapter. The radical conviction of ‘difference’ between the sexes – economically, psycho-socially and in terms of creativity – is examined in the third section. (Note that I include in the struggle for the ‘Rights of Women’ both feminist movements – of different tendencies – and ‘women in general’, who may or may not be feminists, but who are subject to discrimination in education, work and politics.)

2. Against discrimination: social movements In no other area has the force of social movements been so important as in the case of women. In no other area has symbolic power played so ambiguous a role, both in asserting the rights of ‘half of humanity’, on the one hand, and in ‘mystifying’ the centuries-long domination of men over women, on the other. I start with a brief historical introduction, then consider the shockwave (both for men and women) of Simone de Beauvoir’s Le Deuxième Sexe, followed by the present situation of reform amidst inequality – at work, in education and professional careers and in politics.


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The French Revolution, which remains a vital reference for the ‘Republican’ model of liberty and equality, exemplifies these contradictions. The ‘Rights of Man’ is the very symbol of emancipation from feudal privilege and despotic rule. Moreover, it proclaims the right to participate in the most fundamental democratic activity, that of voting to represent the people’s sovereign power. But during the French Revolution – and for the next 150 years – ‘universal’ suffrage meant the rights of ‘men’, not women! Symbolically, as Michelle Perrot points out in Les Femmes ou les silences de l’Histoire, men have drawn a veil over the humanity of women, just as the Christian Fathers of the fourth-century Church, agonised by temptations of the flesh, imposed the veil on nuns (Perrot, 1998: 396). Not only did the early ‘Patriarchy’ deny their own lust, they projected it on the object of their desire: women. For it was the woman, embodiment of vice from the beginning of time (Adam blames Eve for the original sin), who needed to be concealed, secluded, subjugated. Symbolic discrimination thus reflects real inequalities – economic, political, social – which ‘women’s liberation’, an authentic social movement, seeks collectively to overcome. Yet the weight of the past lies heavily over the present, affecting both the way in which men are accustomed to denigrate or marginalise the public role of women, who should be kept in their ‘proper’ domestic place, and also the way in which women accept as ‘natural’ their customary subordinate role. Indeed, the great philosopher of the ‘general will’, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, whose Contrat social inspired the revolutionaries of 1789, established the moral tone of sexist discourse in his celebrated treatise on education, Emile. The woman (Sophie): should be a woman as Emile is a man, that is to say all that conforms to the constitution of her species and her sex to fulfil her place in the moral and social order . . . The one (Emile) should be active and strong, the other passive and weak. Having established this principle, it follows that woman is especially made to please man . . . When the woman complains of the unjust inequality to which she is subjected by man, she is wrong; for such inequality is not at all the work of prejudice but of reason. (Quoted by Guigou, 1997: 49) More influential still was the sophisticated argument of the abbé Sieyès, in his celebrated speech initiating the Rights of Man, when he


distinguished ‘passive’ female rights from ‘active’ male rights of citizens. Natural and civil rights (passive), he argued, are those for which society is formed; political rights (active) are those by which society forms itself. All the inhabitants should enjoy the rights of passive citizens: protection of the person, property, freedom and so on. ‘But not all have the right to take part in the formation of public powers: all are not active citizens’, such as women at present, children and foreigners. Those ‘who contribute nothing to sustain the public establishment’, Sieyès logically concluded, ‘should not actively influence public matters’. Such a statement is fundamental in understanding the history of representative democracy (Gaspard et al., 1992: 51–3). Half a century later, the revolution of 1848, putting an end to the restoration of the monarchy, inaugurated ‘universal suffrage’ by including (for the first time) all citizens 21 years of age and over, whatever their social situation, regardless of earnings or property qualifications. Even the poor, the servants, vagabonds, illiterate and mentally deficient could vote. But not women (Guigou, 1997: 63). But there were some who had the temerity to assert rights for women as well as men. Among them was the female revolutionary Olympe de Gouges. Rewriting the famous ‘Déclaration des droits de l’homme et du citoyen’, she pronounced that ‘Woman is born free and has equal rights with man.’ The exercise of such rights, she went on, is ‘limited only by the perpetual tyranny that man imposes on her; these limits should be reformed by laws of nature and of reason’. For such heretical statements she was treated as hysterical, irrational and unreasonable – and (as a member of the opposition Girondins) sent to the guillotine (Callamard, 1999). It was not until the liberation of France in 1944 that women, too, were entitled to vote. But even though women as well as men had behaved with great heroism in the Resistance, their reward by a grateful government was entirely symbolic: more than one thousand men were honoured as ‘Compagnons de la Libération’, but only six women (Perrot, 1998: 363). Does such an unflattering comparison, one might ask, express the greater risk to life of men rather than women in the Resistance? Or does it reflect the male (military) evaluation of the greater virtue of ‘warriors’ rather than that of equally dangerous ‘domestic’ tasks (sheltering members of the Resistance, acting as messengers)? Although it was General de Gaulle who recognised that the time had come for women to vote, nevertheless he retained a patriarchal vision of society. According to Bernard Tricot, a technical councillor in de Gaulle’s administration, explaining why no women were represented in


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the Presidency, ‘the General thought that women were a source of complications. They brought with them elements of feeling, emotional factors, personal preferences or animosities, which risked upsetting relations among administrative collaborators. In other words, they would alter the objectivity, the impartiality, even the coldness with which he wished matters to be treated’ (Bernard Le Gendre, ‘De Gaulle is installed in the Elysée’, Le Monde, 10–11 January 1999). Nor are manly attitudes confined to the elite. Perrot points out that the male working class, too, constructs a ‘virile’ identity for itself, with its taste for ‘physical’ sports such as football, rugby and boxing, and its exaltation for activists like male soldiers or the ‘army of the proletariat’ and its vision of revolution as an armed struggle. Indeed, the sociallydominated categories tend to reaffirm their identity, according to poles of virility on the one hand, submission of women on the other (Perrot, 1998: 398). The subjection of women is illustrated by their ‘silence’ throughout history, for they leave so few traces. When private archives are kept in the great public depositaries, these are ‘almost exclusively those of “great men”, politicians, entrepreneurs, writers, creators’. The silence of women thus reflects the relation of forces in society and the prevailing system of values. Only in the past 25 years, Perrot states (1998: Introduction), has the silence been broken.

Le Deuxième Sexe Simone de Beauvoir’s pioneering study, Le Deuxième Sexe, published in 1949, was vilified by important public figures (men) – and then forgotten. (On the crudity and violence of male reactions, Beauvoir, 1963: 203–11; see also Chaperon, 1999: 269–81.) But Beauvoir’s work was an inspiration to many women. All contemporary feminism, as Albistur and Armogathe state (1977: 414), proceeds from this work. Her message, essentially, is that the unequal status of women – at work, in the professions and especially in politics – as well as their own feeling of inferiority are not the result of biological ‘eternal’ differences but are historically and socially created. What was done, at one time, can therefore be undone – but only by the individual and collective effort of women and a change of mentality by men. Hence the ‘constructed’ character of women throughout the ages: ‘She has the spirit of contradiction, she is prudent and sly, she has no sense of truth or precision, she lacks morality, she is crassly utilitarian, she lies, play-acts, has ulterior motives.’ There is some truth in these


remarks, Beauvoir admits, but such attitudes are not due to hormones but to ‘economic, social and historical conditioning’ (Beauvoir, 1949: vol. 2, 306). For ‘women are integrated into a community that is governed by males and where they occupy a subordinate place’. It is ‘men who have fashioned her and who still dominate her today’. It is understood that she is inferior, dependent: she has never emerged as a ‘subject’ in the face of other members of society. ‘Enclosed in her flesh, she feels passive’ in relation to men who ‘define ends and values’. Like workers, slaves and the colonised, her fate is to obey and to respect her superiors (307–8). Women have been taught to accept masculine authority and therefore they renounce either criticising or examining or judging on their own account. They leave that to the ‘superior caste’. In the eyes of women, ‘force creates the law because the laws that they recognise from men come from their force’. They know that they are powerless against things: police, employers, men. ‘Women are made to suffer’, they say, ‘but that is life; one cannot do anything about it.’ This resignation engenders patience among women, which is so often admired. But it also leads to a kind of fatalism. ‘Never having experienced the power of freedom, they do not believe in liberation. The world seems to be ruled by an obscure destiny against which it is presumptuous to rise up.’ And yet to overcome the inferiority in which women have been ‘situated’, they must revolt. ‘This is the only way open to those who cannot construct anything. They must refuse the limits of their situation and seek to open the ways of the future . . . There is no other issue than to struggle for liberation’ (310, 314, 349). The subsequent struggle of the women’s movement – and its divisions – are well described by Christine Bard (1999: 301–26). Nevertheless, she acknowledges in conclusion ‘the persistence of social inequalities’ (325, 463). Inequality at work ‘Even when (women’s) rights are recognised in the abstract’, Beauvoir points out, ‘long-standing habits prevent them being realised concretely.’ This is especially the case in the economy, where men and women form virtually two separate castes. In general, men have more advantageous situations, their salaries are higher and they have a greater chance of success. They hold the most important posts in industry and politics. ‘At present women are beginning to take part in the development of the world, but it is still a world that belongs to men’ (Beauvoir, 1949: vol. 1, 20, 22).


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That is why, even today, for a plurality of women (in a poll reported in Le Monde, supplement, 22 April 1999), ‘success in life’ means financial independence, because women still earn very little money and many of these are on the minimum wage (Smic). ‘What they want through money is autonomy’, the sociologist Nathalie Heinich analyses the poll, for it ‘gives them the possibility one day of leaving their husband.’ (Slightly smaller proportions, however, viewed success in terms of a couple living together, of having children, and of having a profession that pleased them.) As for the feminist struggle, more than two-thirds of women polled consider it to be still relevant, especially in the economic context. The least concerned are higher executives and professionals (still amounting to 62 per cent) who have personally integrated the results of feminism. But for 81 per cent of working women and 67 per cent of women in service occupations the struggle is far from over. ‘Those who come from a privileged background do not realise the extent to which feminist achievements are unequally shared throughout society. The lower one goes down the social scale the more women realise that they must fight’, Heinich declares. Three-quarters of young women are also very much concerned with feminist struggles. For more than half the women the main objects of struggle – for which they are ready to ‘mobilise’ – are equal salaries for men and women and the ‘equal access’ of women to positions of responsibility. ‘When one knows that there is still a gap of 27 per cent between the salaries of men and women and that only three out of ten executives are women one understands why.’ (In a Sofres poll, reported by Le Monde, 9 March 2002, the ‘priority’ for 70 per cent of women was equal pay for equal work.) The importance of political action to bring about greater equality is closely correlated with educational and social levels, according to Heinich. Thus, nearly half the higher executives and professional women are ready to mobilise in defence of democracy (to achieve such results) compared with only one-quarter of women workers. (Altogether, the priority of 17 per cent is to defend democracy, 15 per cent to defend the environment, 10 per cent to preserve the right to abortion and 7 per cent to support the sans-papiers, that is, foreigners without legal entry documents.) The September 1999 report of the Socialist deputy Catherine Genisson to the Jospin government amply confirms the unequal status of women at work. ‘In spite of being prohibited, discrimination in terms of hiring, salary, access to training and promotion has not disappeared.’


While 80 per cent of women between 25 and 55 years old are at work they still have to support 80 per cent of domestic tasks as well. (While men and women living alone each devoted about the same time to household tasks, men forming part of a couple without children worked two hours and women four hours a day on domestic tasks; with two children the father worked an hour and a half, the mother well over six hours: Pascale Krémer, Le Monde, 27 May 2000; on the unequal division of labour, see also the important work of Méda, 2001: 27–8, 33, 44–5, 66–8, 103–4, 107.) Moreover, women are to be found predominantly in part-time work with low salaries, according to the Genisson report. Thus, only 45 per cent of women are in full-time work compared with 77 per cent of men; 20 per cent of women work part-time, but only 4 per cent of men. Less than one-quarter are men but three-quarters are women in the 20 per cent of least-paid workers; two-thirds men and one-third women make up the 20 per cent of highest-paid work. To put it another way: 80 per cent of low-wage earners (less than the minimum wage) or very low, getting less than 3650 francs a month, are women. (The average monthly wage for a male worker, in 1997, was around 9500 francs.) Moreover, the difference in earnings between men and women has hardly changed since the 1970s, according to the national statistical institute, Insee, in 2001. Today, when men and women carry out the same type of work – in terms of qualifications, sector of work, size of enterprise and so on – at the beginning of their careers, men still earn 8 per cent more than women (it was 10 per cent in the 1970s). As for economic activity as a whole, the gap between the sexes increases to 26 per cent after five years of employment, exactly the same as in the mid1970s (Pascale Krémer, Le Monde, 24 August 2001). The rate of unemployment is higher for women than for men, especially for young women. Nearly one-third of women under 25 seeking work are unemployed, compared with 22 per cent of young men (already nearly twice the average unemployment). Occupationally, too, there are serious disparities: while 5 per cent of women executives are unemployed, the rate climbs to 16 per cent for office staff and 21 per cent for women workers. Indeed, the selectivity of unemployment functions as an indicator of classic social inequalities – according to sex and social class (Maruani, 1999). Although required by law (1983) to produce comparative reports on the situation of women workers, less than half the firms (employing more than 50 workers) have done so. Where reports have been submitted they tend to produce general statistics ‘lacking diagnosis’.


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The Loi Roudy, according to research by Margaret Maruani, does not prevent discrimination in hiring women, nor inequalities in wages and careers. Interviewed by Pascale Krémer (Le Monde, 2 September 1999), Yvette Roudy now considers her law, which authorises state subsidies for innovative plans to achieve greater equality, to be rather naive. ‘I was not aware of the indifference of public authorities, trade unions and heads of firms.’ She now believes financial penalties are needed for firms that fail to fulfil their obligations. Yet, as Maya Surdut, head of the national collective for the rights of women, points out: ‘There are no constraints on the employers. Everything is left to social dialogue, although the present relation of forces is well known, including the fact that women’s demands are so little supported by the unions.’ As Roudy admits, a ‘real will to act’ by the government is also lacking. (See also Michel Miné on the ‘defects in the application’ of the Roudy law, Cités 9, 2002: 99–100, esp. n. 1.) Trade union struggle ‘Transforming social mobilisation into results’ is the key to the policy of Nicole Notat, the first woman head of a major trade union confederation. In this she is following the aim of Edmond Maire, the influential former Secretary-General of the centrist Confédération française démocratique du travail (CFDT), who urged the ‘replacement of an authoritarian society, where decisions are made in secret at the top, with a society where the social movement will be taken into account’ (Flandrin, 1997: 90–1). Yet Notat, like Gisèle Halimi of the women’s movement, Choisir, and Elisabeth Guigou in politics, exemplifies the double challenge facing women – reconciling domestic life with professional obligations. For many women this means either sacrificing domestic life for the sake of a career or the other way round. In the first case, as with Notat, it may seem necessary, in a man’s world, to adopt the ‘forceful’ characteristics of men. But the dilemma, as Beauvoir defined it half a century ago, is that even when a woman has attained economic independence – and is therefore in a position to choose between objectives – her moral, social and psychological situation is not the same as that of men. Man’s privilege is that his social or intellectual success in life is not contradicted by his ‘male destiny’: ‘he is not divided’. But for a woman to choose ‘femininity’ is to make herself an ‘object’ for men and thus to renounce her claim to be a ‘sovereign subject’. Conversely, to refuse to be confined to her role as a female so as not to be ‘mutilated’ (as an


independent subject) is also a form of mutilation when it comes to repudiating her sex (Beauvoir, 1949: vol. 2, 435). In this context, changing the economic condition of women is primordial; but unless it leads to moral, social and cultural changes, Beauvoir argues, the ‘new woman’ will not appear. Only with freedom and ‘real equality’, going beyond sexual differentiation, can women unite their history with that of humanity (480, 495–504). Nicole Notat’s case is exemplary. She came from a rural background, trained as a teacher, became a union representative and finally by strength of will, devotion to work and organisational ability, was able to assert herself as head of the CFDT. In one respect, however, Notat has avoided Beauvoir’s dilemma – having to conciliate domestic and professional lives. ‘For her, work is all that counts’, according to a former union leader (Flandrin, 1997: 66–7). Notat succeeded by her ability to unite superior organisational skills with experience of the lives of ordinary people undergoing profound economic changes – the de-industrialisation of much of north-eastern France (coal mines, steel mills, metallurgy). ‘At the time’, Notat recalled, ‘I took part in all the struggles . . . Trade union action, confronting such great changes, demonstrated how necessary it was to be with our people, understanding their disorientation and feelings of revolt . . . At the same time, for those in charge, to know what can be saved and what cannot be changed.’ What was important ‘was to feel for the suffering of ordinary people, but also to go a step further, by working out a plan for the future . . . (to produce) an environment to allow people to recover hope, interest and motivation’ (68–9). Such was the experience of a genuine social movement uniting solidarity with realism. For, as Flandrin points out, Notat’s was a new generation of unionists – often teachers, technicians, executives, rarely workers – without direct experience of class struggle. It was Edmond Maire, the long-time leader of the CFDT, who ‘re-centered’ the union accordingly, away from the leftist ‘illusions’ of the 1968 ‘events’ and towards more pragmatic, cooperative and ‘responsible’ policies: ‘a unionism of results’ not revolutionary rhetoric. As Maire put it in 1979: the aim is ‘to obtain concrete results, to give hope, which requires compromises with those who direct the economy and social life’, that is ‘negotiation linked with action’ (70–2, 84). Such practical results, for Maire’s successor, also include action to help women workers to overcome discrimination. From her own experience she had passed from the stage of ‘token woman’ to that of ‘mixité’, or a combined vision of men and women working together, with equal


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wages for the same work, equal access to training and time off for private or family life. (But note the critical attitude towards Notat – advocate of ‘realism’, but not a champion of women’s issues – of Allwood and Wadia, 2000: 100–4.) Notat, moreover, impressed the national bureau of the union by her skilful negotiation with employers to hire young workers. ‘By that I gained my credibility. I was a woman, but I was also capable. Thus I was forgiven for being a woman’ (Flandrin, 1997: 105–6). To be sure, such a remark reflects the sexist attitudes of most (male) trade union leaders – and members – criticised by Dominique Loiseau (1999: 355–6, 360–4). Notat retired as head of the CFDT in 2002 to found a European agency evaluating the social and environmental performance of firms. Education and inequality Notat’s experience is exceptional. Inequality at work, in the professions and in politics is still the norm. Only 7 per cent of leading executives in the 5000 biggest firms are women (Le Monde, 8 March 2000; 8 March 2001). Less than 12 per cent of parliamentarians (elected in 2002) are women. The problem, particularly affecting professional careers, is first educational (the different attitudes of and towards girls and boys) and then promotional: men and women often start on an equal basis, but when it comes to promotion to senior positions women hit the ‘glass ceiling’. An important factor, as Dominique Méda points out, is that many women are penalised, at the crucial period in their careers, by their dual responsibility as workers and mothers (Méda, 2001: 30, 38, 91). As one observer reports, from the earliest school years a ‘subtle mental conditioning’ seeks to maintain the division of labour between girls and boys. Toys, children’s books, advertising, comics, video games and films insidiously dictate their different behaviour, assigning different functions to girls and boys. In France 60 per cent of pediatricians are women, but of 21 children’s books describing doctors 20 show only men. In the same books, the professional activities of mothers are presented in only 5 per cent of cases even though 75 per cent of them are at work. Of more than 500 illustrated albums, issued in 1994 by 46 different publishers, male personalities dominate three-quarters of them (Ramonet, 1999). In secondary and higher education girls, too, tend to be less active and less ambitious than boys in regard to their future careers. Does this more modest behaviour conform, unconsciously, to the anticipation of what employers want, ask Christian Baudelot and Roger Establet, or is


it rather the result of parents’ expectations? For when parents are asked what factors they think are most important for the happiness of their children, they reply, for their sons: material success (profession, money) equally with domestic happiness; whereas for their daughters family happiness is considered three times more important than professional success. As a result, in France only 24 per cent of physicists and 20 per cent of mathematicians are women, and fewer still occupy positions of responsibility. The low participation of women in such essential fields has serious social consequences (Carlander, 1999). Official research (by the Observatoire des sciences et des techniques) shows that fewer than one in three researchers is a woman and only 4 per cent are at the top; their prospects of promotion are scarcely better at the universities (reported by Pierre Le Hir, Le Monde, 2 November 2000). Grandes écoles Not the least important consequence of discrimination is that the preparatory classes for the prestigious grandes écoles, notably the Ecole nationale d’administration, recruit their pupils especially from among those who have taken the scientific baccalauréat: but girls, who make up more than half the school numbers, are only 41 per cent in the science stream – although they are more than 81 per cent in literature, again conforming to female stereotypes. Taking the same educational level and the same socio-professional categories (higher executives) for girls and boys, 51 per cent of boys prepared themselves to enter the grandes écoles, but only some 30 per cent of girls (Carlander, 1999; and Antoine Reverchon, Le Monde Economie, 9 March 1999). Executives and professionals According to the Insee survey of employment in 1998, nearly twice as many men were in the category of ‘executives and intellectual professions’ as women (8.7 and 4.5 per cent respectively). At the end of ten years’ work experience, the holder of a general baccalauréat had a 17 per cent chance of being an executive (cadre) if he was a man, but the figure was only 8 per cent for a woman. For those with a university degree the chances were 76 per cent for men and 57 per cent for women. And for graduates of a grande école the chances were 85 per cent and 76 per cent (‘Discrimination’, Le Monde Economie, 9 March 1999). As for teachers in higher education, 50 per cent are women; but only 10 per cent of full professors are women (Delphy, 1999). While in the workforce as a whole, the average monthly wage in October 1997 for a male worker was 9500 francs, and 7860 for a woman, the average for an executive


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was 23,860 francs for a man, and 19,430 for a woman (Le Figaro, 29 April 1998). By comparison, women in the United States make up nearly half the managerial and professional staff – but only 12 per cent of corporate directors. In Europe, women account for 30 per cent of middlemanagement and administrative posts. In Great Britain only 5 per cent of directors of the 200 leading companies are women (Guardian Weekly, 28 Nov.–4 Dec. 2002). Administration In the public service, as Prime Minister Jospin admitted in February 1999, women are a majority of employees, but only a few reach the top. ‘Our country is backward in this matter in comparison with the other great European democracies. We are substantially below what is necessary. Therefore we must carry out a more active policy of promotion’ to higher positions. The report by Anne-Marie Colmou on the positions of men and women, referred to by the prime minister, showed that although women formed 57 per cent of salaried employees in the public service ‘they are rare in executive posts and positions of responsibility’. Women represent two-thirds of Category B posts (service staff), more than half (52 per cent) of Category A executives – only one-third if teachers are excluded – and one in eight of senior officials (encadrement). In June 1997 there were 118 women in the 619 posts of service chief and assistant and deputy director; and only 13 women in the 168 posts of director. There are 5 women prefects for a total of 109; and still only 41 of 448 sub-prefects. There are four women university presidents out of 88; nine women inspector-generals of finance out of 74; 40 of the 201 members of the Conseil d’état. Moreover, the report noted the very ‘masculine’ particularity of the senior public service (reported by Gérard Courtois, Le Monde, 18 February 1999). As an example, an official conference was recently organised on the important problem of the ‘working poor’. Not one woman was invited to intervene; yet threequarters of the working poor in France are women (Margaret Maruani, Le Monde, 2 November 2000). Political struggle The aim of social movements (as Touraine insists) is to put pressure on political institutions to produce important social reforms. The process was effective – if belated – during the early 1970s, when the combination of political leadership, a dynamic social movement


galvanised by the May 1968 events and substantial media exposure put an end to some of the worst instances of discrimination against women. Thus, in 1971 ‘paternal’ authority over children was replaced by ‘parental’. As for methods of contraception, although authorised in 1967, they were not reimbursed by the health service until 1974 (Gaspard, 1997: 163). The major issue, however, was the right to abortion: since the 1920s this had been a crime. In 1971, the ‘Manifesto of 343’ women, claiming the right to abortion, created enormous publicity. By 1974, twothirds of people surveyed were in favour of legalised abortion. President Giscard himself (during his reforming phase) argued that ‘civil law should be made compatible with the state of society’. After stormy scenes, legislation, moved by the Minister of Health, Simone Veil, was eventually passed (Becker, 1998: 38–42). One of the main proponents of political action, Gisèle Halimi, had consistently argued for the right of women to decide for themselves whether to have children or not, for equality at work, economic independence and protection against sexual violence. Contrary to Simone de Beauvoir, who in Halimi’s view was suspicious of political engagement, Halimi insisted that it was not enough to ‘theorise’: it was necessary to translate theory into action (interview with Rodgers, 1998: 27, 144, 152–3). Nevertheless, there are still major obstacles to the participation of women in politics. As Elisabeth Guigou, who became Minister of Justice in the Jospin government, points out, this is not so much because of the passive attitude of women themselves but rather the organisation and functioning of institutions in France: notably the single-member constituency, the accumulation of elected positions, enabling members to be both mayor of a city and deputy in the national assembly (cumul des mandats), the disregard for women among political parties, extreme centralisation of power, exaggerated strength of the executive as against the legislature – ‘all these characteristics, which form the singularity of political life in France, combine against the entry of women into politics’ (Guigou, 1997: 85–6; see also Allwood and Wadia, 2000: 133, 152–4). It is the cumul, according to Guigou, that is most responsible for the degradation of French politics (indeed, it is virtually unknown elsewhere in Europe): it encourages absenteeism and conflict of interests, a single member holding both legislative and executive functions, often deciding on (lucrative) public works contracts. But it is the combination of cumul with single-member electoral lists that in


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practice causes the greatest difficulty for women candidates and for all newcomers to politics. ‘Because such lists personalise elections they favour politicians who are already known in their constituencies and who insist, not without reason, that they have more chances of winning.’ It is all the more difficult to contest a ‘notable’ (the local elite) who makes the most of his local roots, his fame, his experience and ability to win. (Guigou’s subsequent attempt to become mayor of Avignon in 2001 and remain a minister – in flagrant contradiction with her principles – only goes to show how deeply rooted is the resistance to reform even among its supposed supporters.) Nevertheless, 44 women were elected mayors of larger towns and cities in the municipal elections of 2001, compared with around 30 previously, while the percentage of women elected to municipal councils dramatically increased from 22 to 47.5 per cent. (But see Sandrine Dauphin’s qualified assessment: women have still not gained access to the ‘real source of power’: Modern and Contemporary France, vol. 10, no. 1, 2002: esp. 61–2, 64, 66.) Such an achievement is the result of the campaign for parity by the women’s movement, supported strongly by public opinion. According to one poll reported by Le Monde (27 March 2001) two-thirds of respondents favoured women as mayors, while the same proportion believed that feminisation of municipal councils would ‘improve local political choices’. As Guigou argues in her earlier work, because politics, dominated by men, is so ‘profoundly discredited’ therefore the arrival of women in substantial numbers provides hope for renewal. Such is the situation: ‘Broken promises, corruption and the spectacle of politics render all the more unbearable the extent of unemployment, precarious work and exclusion in face of insolent wealth and its financial advantages’ (Guigou, 1997: 207). For it is not only the centralisation of power that ‘stifles democracy’, but also the elitist networks of the grandes écoles (recruited, in the case of the ENA, largely from the Paris bourgeoisie) which serve to reproduce and reinforce existing inequalities in society (211). Guigou insists that women can make a difference in politics. ‘They wish their identity as women to be recognised, but they also claim an equality of rights, including political rights.’ But to achieve this ‘real equality’ they must invest massively in politics. ‘For if politics remains open only to a few women members these exceptional women have no other choice but to fit the masculine mould’ (234–5, 240–1). Indeed, an effective feminist politics, according to Allwood and Wadia (2000: 229),


needs to engage on all fronts, both within and outside institutions, from the grass roots as well as from above. Hence the importance of parité. ‘Sexual and social admixture is indispensable to create the society of solidarity that we need . . . If the parity of sexes is realised, society as a whole will function differently’ (Guigou: 243). The campaign for parity In a brief account of a complex subject, the early experience of Gisèle Halimi, prime mover in the campaign, provides an object lesson. In spite of the intense excitement aroused by the Socialist victory in 1981, a year later they still had done nothing for the citoyennes. Halimi was among the new deputies of the Left. She decided to act. First, at the weekly meetings of the Socialist group, she emphasised the need for a more just representation of women and to legislate accordingly: ‘Stormy, deceptive debate’. Some were opposed to legislation, while a few supported the idea, but without great enthusiasm (Halimi, 1997: 107–8). The second act was ‘intensive lobbying’ of all political groups. Whether on the Right or the Left she met a similar reaction. She remembered the words of the German Socialist Bebel: ‘Some Socialists are no less opposed to the emancipation of women than capitalism is opposed to socialism.’ Things are beginning to change, she was told, or ‘what stops you from getting elected?’ She realised that if, in logic, parity was required, she could never achieve a consensus among the deputies. First she tried for 40 per cent representation of women, then 35 per cent and finally 30 per cent, on which the Socialists finally agreed. Although the ‘barons’ of the hard-core Right were obstructive (and offensive) the centrist UDF was more understanding. But all, Left or Right, had to avoid the trap of appearing to be against a popular measure (public opinion was strongly in favour of parity). The vote for mixité – now reduced to 25 per cent women – was passed virtually unanimously, but was struck down by the Conseil constitutionel as contrary to the Constitution! (Average age of its members: around 76; not one woman member; a particularly conservative former Minister of the Interior at its head.) The Conseil considered that the proposed law tended to ‘divide electors by categories’ – that is, men and women – and was therefore contrary to Republican universality. Women, a majority of humanity, were reduced to a ‘category’ (109–21). A decade later the campaign again got under way: Françoise Gaspard, Claude Servan-Schreiber and Anne Le Gall denounced the situation in


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which the university population was more than half women, women made up 44 per cent of the workforce, and yet their political representation was virtually nil (Gaspard et al., 1992: 120). The manifesto for ‘democracy with parity’ was signed by many women in November 1993. With a Socialist government once more in power four years later, deputies and senators finally agreed in 1998–99 to the ‘equal access’ of men and women to elected positions. The law was finally adopted in May 2000. Curiously the great debate for parity – appearing, for example, in the opinion pages of Le Monde throughout February 1999 – found women divided against women: basically over the same ‘Republican’ issue of ‘universality’ versus ‘difference’ (that is, making a special case of and for women). Those who insist on universality argue that privileging women by way of parity opens the floodgates to the dreaded ‘communitarianism’, which would spread to ‘other minorities’ (ethnic, regional, religious and so on) and so tear apart the Republic, ‘one and indivisible’. Note for example, in the pages of Le Monde, the universalist conception of Elisabeth and Robert Badinter; of Evelyne Pisier: supporters of parity are no longer fighting for equality but for difference – a special ‘privilege’ for women; and Elisabeth Roudinesco on the ‘perverse effects’ of claiming a right to difference, which undermines the principle of the undivided sovereignty of the people. The defenders of parity, on the other hand, point out that the inequality of women cannot be remedied under conditions of ‘abstract universality’ – the constitutional equality of ‘citizens’ – which ignores the reality of women’s subordinate place in economy, society and politics. Instead, a form of positive discrimination or ‘affirmative action’ in favour of women is needed to overcome the barrier of years, if not centuries, of male prejudice and entrenched power that make women an inferior species. Thus, also in Le Monde, Sylviane Agacinski: the new French feminism affirms sexual duality as the only universal difference within humanity itself; yet to realise equality between the sexes, women cannot simply take part in the world as it is, ‘constructed and conceived by men’, but must transform it. In turn, Michelle Perrot asks, why legal parity? ‘Because the injustice done to women as a dominated gender is flagrant and because politics is not only a bastion that resists (women’s rights) but is the means and symbol of their oppression.’ To await a change of mentalities is not enough, especially in France, persuaded as it is of the excellence of the Republican model that accommodates so many inequalities. Rather, it is necessary to change the law, which has the


power and the duty to provide a corrective. And Blandine Kriegel: to identify women with an ethnic, social or cultural category, to reduce women to a form of minority, is nonsense. ‘Femininity is no less universal and no more different than masculinity.’ Both are part of a common humanity. See also Geneviève Fraisse in the debate over parity (2000: 142–51) on ‘identity and difference’ of the sexes as two possible representations of reality. Important contributions to the debate had previously appeared in Nouvelles Questions Féministes (vol. 15, no. 4, 1994 and vol. 16, no. 2, 1995). Those against were Michèle Le Doeuff, querying the need to render parity obligatory by law; Eleni Varikas, in effect rehearsing the universalist argument; and Josette Trat, criticising the ‘alliance’ of women on parity, which did not refer to the ‘social project’ of questioning social inequalities and the sexual division of tasks. Those for parity included Françoise Gaspard, urging the need to share political power; Alain Lipietz of the Green movement; and Eliane Viennot, asserting that the massive participation of women in public decision-making will improve political life. Indeed, for Françoise Gaspard and her fellow-authors, there can be no real democracy without parity of the sexes in political assemblies. They appealed, as did other feminists, for alternation of men and women candidates in party lists to ensure parity of elected representatives. (This proviso did not form part of the subsequent law, which leaves it to the parties to decide how male or female candidates should be placed. In effect, men and women were placed in equal numbers in blocks of six for the 2001 municipal elections.) Nevertheless, once parity comes into effect, the psychological, social and political barriers against female candidates, in a society dominated by men, will disappear. The day women are legitimated in democratic space, then the exclusion of women, which is socially constituted, will also change (1992: 159–60). Halimi, in turn, argues that when (political) segregation between men and women is legally at an end, when roles are interchangeable, then values will also be shared: ‘parity itself will create a cultural change in the widest sense’ (interview with Rodgers, 1998: 156, 162) – a tribute to the reformist vision. Nevertheless, the legislative elections of 2002 were a severe disappointment. Despite the parity provisions, only 68 women out of a total of 577 deputies were elected. The proportion of women members thus rose from less than 11 per cent to less than 12 per cent. The rightist UMP selected only 20 per cent of women (instead of the 50 per cent parity) as candidates and the Socialists selected 30 per cent. Both parties


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placed male candidates in most of the winnable seats, preferring to pay a (not substantial) fine for their transgression. As Françoise Picq observes, the political and intellectual systems are to blame, along with the electoral scheme, the practice of accumulation of mandates, the oligarchic structure of the parties and their aggressively masculine political culture. She concludes that the ‘hard core’ of masculine domination is still in place: women are mainly in charge of domestic affairs, while men retain the essentials of power (Picq, 2002a, in Modern and Contemporary France, vol. 10, no. 1: 15–16; an issue devoted to parity). Clearly related is the work of Dominique Méda (2001: 27–8, 33–4, 45–7, 204–16) on the unequal division of domestic tasks, a subject which has never had a real impact on public debate because of institutional, and especially male, resistance to changing the ‘natural’ order of things. To conclude: leaving aside the minority of Republican ‘universalists’, at least among women, reveals the feminist movement to be divided into four main streams: pragmatic feminists, such as Gisèle Halimi, close to the founding ideas of Simone de Beauvoir, but not sharing her rejection of maternity (considered a fatal ‘handicap’ to woman’s emancipation); neo-Marxists, such as Christine Delphy and Geneviève Fraisse, who combat the ‘enemy’ of patriarchy allied with exploitative capitalism; psychoanalytical feminists, such as Antoinette Fouque and Julia Kristeva; and postmodern ‘literary’ feminists like Luce Irigaray and Hélène Cixous. (For selected portraits of French feminists see the valuable interviews in Rodgers’ work; on Irigaray and Cixous, see Albistur and Armogathe (465–9), and the section on ‘postmodernist feminists: affirmation of difference’, below.) A word on the ‘problem’ of Kristeva, Irigaray and Cixous, the ‘three Graces’ who are often admired in America and Britain (to the exclusion of others), but are criticised in France as being unrepresentative of French feminism (and for not being, or no longer being, feminists). First, it is evident from my discussion so far that these three do not monopolise the scene; and second, they are influential in the differentialist stream of feminism. Among the critics, Gill Allwood, for example, does recognise the importance of Luce Irigaray as ‘the best-known defender of the difference position in France’, by insisting on the ‘autonomy and specificity of the feminine’ and suggesting alternative ways of thinking and writing that undermine dominant ideas of knowledge (1998: 73–4). And for the influence on Cixous of poststructuralist theory – subjectivity is not innate, but produced socially through language – again, see Allwood (65–6). As for Kristeva, no less prominent a feminist than Françoise Picq acknowledges the two tendencies of French feminism,


one stemming from the universalist assumptions of Beauvoir, the other privileging distinction of the sexes, refusing male definitions of ‘complementarity’ (subordinating women) by a new reading of psychoanalysis. Although she does not mention names, Picq (2002a: 15) points out that such feminine specificity is charged with subversive value in relation to the patriarchal system and its symbolic order. My argument, to sum up, is that mainstream feminists – and, to achieve ‘concrete results’, neo-Marxists – are in the line of social movements: they are struggling for practical equality with men and are ready to cooperate with as well as contest existing political institutions. The psychoanalytical and postmodernist streams, on the other hand, emphasise women’s separate identity, and express their difference – for materialists, rather, it is a question of ‘specificity’ – in terms of symbolic power. For Marxist-feminists, in particular, it is the emotional and intellectual goal of ‘liberation’ that signifies the symbolic power of solidarity and recognition.

3. Identity and symbolic power The sign of Marx The sociologist Christine Delphy, co-founder (with Simone de Beauvoir) of the review Questions Féministes, now Nouvelles Questions Féministes, is a major theorist of the women’s movement. She has elaborated a theory to explain the oppression of women: that is, their professional and political inequality, their exploitation in the household, and their social valuation as ‘inferior’. It is a feminist theory of ‘domestic mode of production’ appropriated by the ‘patriarchy’, stated by Delphy to be the ‘principal enemy’, which differentiates her from orthodox Marxists. Like the latter, however, it is an uncompromising revolutionary theory, which differentiates her from pragmatists and reformists. Above all, it is a ‘materialist’ theory, which differentiates her from psychoanalytic feminists as well as biological determinists (affirming life-enhancing female values), both of whom Delphy classifies as ‘idealists’. Not only does Delphy consider all other feminist approaches as ‘unscientific’, they also betray the cause of women by diverting attention from the real source of their oppression – the domestic mode of production in the service of patriarchy – and thus weaken the struggle for women’s liberation. First, the domestic mode of production. This, for Delphy, is household work by family members, and especially wives, which is unpaid


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and therefore serves the material interest of fathers and husbands. Every mode of production is a mode of circulation, which in this case is the transmission of family wealth, regulated in part by rules of succession. The owners of the means of production benefit from the patriarchal system, while the ‘disinherited’, that is women and (in rural areas) younger family members, instead provide free work for their husbands and the brothers who inherit the family wealth. ‘But patriarchal transmission is equally important at another level, by reconstituting, generation after generation, the capitalist mode of production.’ Thus, there is not only a division within families (between the possessors and the dispossessed, chiefly girls and wives) but also between families, that is between those belonging to the dominant classes in the capitalist system and those who are dominated. Hence the articulation of two modes of production, domestic and capitalist (Delphy, 1998: 12). Both modes work to the detriment of women, Delphy argues. ‘The systematic discrimination against women in the wage-earning labour market’ – that is, the capitalist as distinct from the domestic mode of production – ‘dispossesses them from the means of earning a proper living and thus drives them into entering into domestic relations of production, chiefly by marrying’, where they do unpaid work in return for being maintained by their husbands. ‘The marriage contract is a work contract.’ In this way the capitalist mode of production is the structural condition on the basis of which the exploitation of domestic work in the family is realised (13–14, 45–6, 136, 187). For Delphy, ‘the appropriation and the exploitation of their work in marriage constitutes the oppression which is common to all women’. In this relation of domestic production they form a class. When, in addition, they work outside the family in the capitalist mode, they are then doubly exploited – in each case as women. For men and women in the household form antagonistic classes – the former receiving material profit from the exploitation of the latter. The claim that women belong to the same class as their husbands is designed to conceal ‘the reality that they are a property of their husband’. It also serves to deny the existence of a separate (domestic) mode of production, and thus prevents women rebelling against the patriarchal system (50–1). It is important, therefore, to carry out class analyses integrating individuals into one or the other of the systems of exploitation on the basis of their objective interests. This is necessary in the short term to mobilise them for immediate struggles; and, in the long term, to envisage how the dynamic of the anti-patriarchal struggles and the anticapitalist struggles can be oriented and combined in the revolutionary


combat. ‘At present this presupposes that women’s liberation cannot take place without the total destruction of the patriarchal system of production and reproduction. As this system is central to all known societies, such liberation implies completely overthrowing the bases of all known societies. Such an overthrow [bouleversement] cannot be carried out without a revolution, that is to say, the seizure of political power’ (54). Such a revolutionary struggle is, first of all, the contrary of palliative measures or reformism (259). During the thirty years that have elapsed since Delphy first theorised the ‘domestic mode’ her ideas have evolved – in four main ways – but without renouncing either her diagnosis (social mechanisms of oppression) or her goal (emancipation of women). The first important evolution is her acknowledgement that ‘few feminists’ imagine a revolution according to the Marxist-Leninist model, that is, ‘seizure of power and a sudden coup d’état’. And even though ‘radical feminists’ insist that ‘the (patriarchal) system is fundamentally bad and must change’, they do not know by what stages this will come about, except that it will not be by ‘sudden and violent means’. Even gradual changes are possible, so long as the goal is one of ‘radical and total transformation’ (Delphy, 2001: 85). Secondly, Delphy raises the crucial question: why, if patriarchal oppression is so unbearable, do women not revolt? If they really wanted to, she states (35), the situation would change from one day to the next. Her (surely debatable) explanation as to the absence of rebellion is that ‘women, like all those who are oppressed, have an aversion to feeling themselves as women, because they have an aversion, like all human beings, to feeling oppressed’ (232–3). Behind this improbable assertion is the more prosaic notion of fear of change, even if it is in one’s interests. Moreover, as Delphy rightly points out, the patriarchal ‘ideology of gender’ – emphasis on sexual difference and with it the unequal division of labour – is ‘so anchored in everyone’s conscience . . . that it affects the way we perceive the world’ (32), creating a ‘mystical and nonrational’ cosmogony (259) that is a profound obstacle to change. Awareness of this ‘slow-down’ (tassement) of feminist ideas (85) no doubt contributes, in the third place, to Delphy’s more accommodating attitude to reform, which is no longer rejected out of hand as a ‘treasonable’ diversion from the revolutionary struggle. As she now puts it: ‘the revolutionary concern (of radical feminists) is not hatred for all reform, but rather the need to distinguish between reforms that block the future – by supporting the status quo – and reforms which, to the contrary, allow one to go further’ (39). This poses the question of the


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content, and not just the form, of such changes and above all their ‘capacity to bring about other changes, namely, their revolutionary potential’ (374). Nevertheless, the problem for feminist theory remains: if it is too deterministic it undermines the motivation to bring about change, while if it is too ‘voluntaristic’ it blurs the distinction between what one can realistically change and what (objectively) one cannot (89). The final evolution is the concern to ‘think gender’ ( penser le genre), that is, to consider gender, the oppression of women and the political system of patriarchy as aspects of the same phenomenon. For ‘patriarchy’ defines the ‘system’ of oppression of women, while ‘gender’ refers to ‘the system of hierarchical division of humanity into two unequal halves’. Patriarchy is a way of insisting on the political aspect of oppression, while gender denotes the ‘social construction of the system’, which is also a dynamic process unfolding at all levels of society (52–3, n. 4). It is oppression that creates (the notion of) gender: that is, ‘the hierarchical division of humanity into two transforms an anatomical distinction, which in itself has no social implication, into a distinction that is relevant to social practice’ (230–1), whereby ‘sex’ becomes simply a ‘marker’ of social division: ‘it serves to recognise and identify the dominant and the dominated’ (252). But intellectual analysis alone is inadequate, Delphy insists. For oppression – the sense of being unjustly treated – is unbearable and ‘analysis is no substitute for revolt’. Instead, ‘anger plays a primordial role’. The only valid reason to study household work, for example, is that millions of women really suffer from it, every day and every minute. To make this an academic problem, Delphy declares, is to deny, worse, to insult, the suffering of women. ‘Anger is at the heart of revolt’ (238–41). That is why radical action against the dominant system is required, as Delphy has emphasised from her earliest work (1998: 260), because ‘exploitation by the patriarchy constitutes the common, specific and principal oppression of women’. Common because it affects all married women (some 80 per cent of women); specific because ‘the obligation to supply free domestic services is suffered only by women’; and principal because even when women ‘work outside’, their class-affiliation, which derives from this work, is conditioned by their exploitation as women (52–3). Patriarchy is ‘The Principal Enemy’: significantly, Delphy uses the same title both for her selected early writings (subtitled ‘Political Economy of the Patriarchy’) and for those of the 1980s and 1990s (sub-


titled ‘Thinking Gender’). Hence the importance for her to demonstrate the specific character of the oppression of women (besides other forms of exploitation). It is as a materialist, she writes (2001: 294–5), that she ‘seeks the origin of the situation of women in the material conditions that are constructed for them and in particular in the conditions of production of their own lives’. From this standpoint, she distinguishes herself from orthodox Marxists precisely by insisting on women as an exploited class: the objective situation common to all women is ‘the fact that their material existence is determined by their relationship to a man. This dependence is itself the cause of their location, real and analytical, in the classes . . . where their men are, and to whom they are attached.’ Such dependence prevails over their class-affiliation within the system of capitalist production. It prevails in classification as in reality either because women have no place in capitalist production (they work at home) or because ‘this place is less important for their material existence than their patriarchal dependence, which constitutes their relation of production and their class-affiliation, both of which are non-capitalist’ (Delphy’s emphasis; 1998: 212–13). Leaving aside the orthodox Marxist rejoinder that ‘the anti-capitalist struggle is primary’ followed by Delphy’s reiteration that the women best placed to lead the struggle are ‘the victims of domestic exploitation’ (260–1), it is important, nevertheless, to consider the domestic mode of production and its social and political implications from another angle. Just as the revolutionary dogma of Marx himself has been affected by historical changes, notably the reversal of what Marx considered to be the inevitable process of polarisation between the immense majority of impoverished and desperate proletarians (joined by the economically-ruined middle classes), on the one hand, and the tiny minority of ruthless capitalists on the other. Such an apocalyptic vision of revolution (for ‘capitalist production begets, with the inexorability of a law of Nature, its own negation’: Capital, 1949: 789) has been averted in the decades following Marx’s death precisely by the ‘reformist’ establishment of the welfare state, by the countervailing pressure of trade unions and by the ‘Fordist’ evolution of capitalism itself. If the capitalist mode of production (and, indeed, modern Marxism) has had to accommodate to such striking social transformation may not the ‘domestic mode’, too, be subject to change? Now, Delphy’s privileging of patriarchy requires that a woman’s ‘material existence’ is better served by dependence on the domestic mode than by working in the capitalist system (213). But even if unpaid


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work at home is valued as if it were on the labour market (cleaning, ironing, washing-up and so on), it seems unlikely that many if not most women – even though they tend to work ‘outside’ in low-paid jobs, often on a part-time basis – would not earn more from the market economy than at home. Moreover, today’s housewives do not have to toil so hard or work such long hours as half a century ago: they have machines (refrigerators, washing-machines, hoovers) to do the job for them. Clearly they are not so dependent on the patriarchy as before. Claude Alzon, for example, correctly points to the importance of work outside the home for women’s independence and progress to economic equality (quoted by Albistur and Armogathe, 1977: 464). To some extent, Delphy acknowledges this transformation in her later writings. The exclusionary tactics of men, organised in trade unions and supported by employers and the state, she notes (2001: 299), are ‘less visible today, though they have not disappeared’. Moreover, ‘women do gain a measure of independence’ from going out to work, even if their domestic responsibilities remain disproportionately heavy (301). Finally, she recognises (314–15) that ‘economic independence’ is a major criterion of measures advancing the cause of women, precisely because ‘economic dependence and poverty form the terrain on which all other forms of oppressions can develop’. Further, there is at least the beginning of greater participation by men in household tasks. Even if France lags behind Britain in this respect, full-time employed French men in the 1980s are nonetheless estimated to have spent 16.5 hours a week on domestic tasks compared to nearly 30 hours a week for full-time employed French women. In Britain the figures are 13 hours for men and 19 for women: far from patriarchal domination. About half the men in both countries (according to their partners) do shopping; half the French and nearly three-quarters of British men do the washing up; and nearly half the Britons (37 per cent of French) do some cooking. A 1995 survey of ‘dual earner married couples with children’ in both countries shows a wide range of household activities that vary between ‘shared’ by mother and father and ‘mother more than father’, washing dishes being the most shared and washing clothes the least (Abigail Gregory and Jan Windebank, 1999: ‘France and Britain: Women’s Paid and Unpaid Work’, Conference of the Association for the Study of Modern and Contemporary France, Cardiff University. But see also Pascale Krémer on the unequal sharing of domestic tasks in Le Monde, 8 March 2001.) For women in France still spend twice as much time on domestic tasks as their partners, as Dominique Méda points out (2001: 27, 45). But she


also notes the potential for change. First, other European countries have shown that the pressure of feminist movements on trade unions, political parties and associations in civil society can produce results; not only the Nordic countries but the European Commission itself is engaged in the struggle against discrimination and inequality (12, 94, 153–9). Second, the evidence of official inquiries confirms that the better educated couples are, the more egalitarian are their conceptions in professional as well as parental matters (103). Finally, the younger generation are more open to fairer shares in domestic tasks (66, 107–8). Some changes in domestic sharing – and therefore some changes in the ‘mentality’ of men and women – are, therefore, taking place. Such is the case with ‘parity’ for men and women, which Delphy supports as an example of ‘positive action’: not a panacea, but with the potential to bring about concrete improvements in other spheres of life: ‘To finish with exclusion!’ (Delphy, 1999; but see her more sceptical assessment in the Preface to Penser le genre, 2001: 36–40.) Whatever Christine Delphy’s degree of practical support for ‘equal access’ to elected positions, she is adamant in her theoretical hostility to any form of ‘idealism’ and specifically to psychoanalytical feminism and biological ‘naturalism’, that is, the belief in a primordial distinction between men and women and not the historical and cultural ‘construction’ of gender (as seen by Beauvoir, Delphy and others). The idealists, in Delphy’s view, invert the situation: they take the symbols for the reality. She poses the example of planting crops in an African society. What is the difference between planting sweet potatoes or millet? Yet in such a society, one crop is considered high and ‘glorious’, the other low and humiliating. ‘Women plant millet, which is appropriated by men, and men plant sweet potatoes, which is appropriated by themselves. The high and the low express the reality of the social position of men and women. And more: they justify these positions’ (1998: 242). There are no transcendent values, therefore, but values that are socially created to serve a social purpose – in this case, male domination. Even the ‘revaluation of women’s body’ advocated by feminine ‘differentialists’ is extremely ambiguous, according to Delphy. It may signify women’s struggle against a real handicap by presenting the body in positive terms instead of negatively – but, if so, a ‘change of attitudes’ needs to be combined with ‘concrete changes’ in the life of women to be effective. But such a revaluation may also make these handicaps (periods, pregnancy, childcare) more palatable to women. Thus, Delphy: ‘Every move that tends to make us more easily accept social constraints


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(i.e. imposed by men) is dangerous and can in no case be qualified as “liberating” ’ (236). Delphy is at least consistent in the theoretical rigour of her denunciation of male domination. The factors she analysed in the 1970s, reinforced by economic changes (notably the triumph of neo-liberalism), operate today. Thus, in her interview with Rodgers (1998: 118–20), she insists that women are the target of both ‘capitalist mechanisms’ and the patriarchy, which bring together the exploitative instruments of the family, marriage and employment. It is one of the ‘lies of the dominant ideology’ to make us believe in continuing progress, she claims, when in fact the situation of women is getting worse. It is for this reason – the wilful evasion of social reality – that psychoanalytical feminists get short shrift. ‘The temptation is not new to wish to explain the social by the psychological’ (Delphy, 1998: 230). Feminist materialism rejects such psychoanalytic subjectivity precisely because it imputes to it a content (repression of unconscious desires) that is independent of social relations (276). For Delphy, ‘psychologism, biologism and idealism are the three teats of ideology’. For ‘the reversal of causality – the belief that the ideological superstructure: the depreciation of women – is the cause, and not the effect, of the social organisation is not just one idealist interpretation among others: it is the ideology itself’ (224–5). Indeed, it is because of its ‘religious, divinatory character’, Delphy concludes, that ‘psychoanalysis cannot be considered a science like other sciences’ (Delphy interview in Rodgers, 1998: 115). In Penser le genre (2001: 321, 327, 345, 348, 358 n. 4), Delphy is even more scathing about ‘the danger’ of psychoanalytical and literary feminists – singling out the ‘three Graces’: Kristeva, for knowing nothing about feminism, Irigaray for knowing but being only halfheartedly feminist and Cixous as an ‘anti-feminist’! Psychoanalytic feminism: the sign of Freud ‘The saturation of socialist ideology and the exhaustion of its programme for a new social contract hand them over to Freudism’, replies Julia Kristeva, brilliant and imaginative feminist, linguistics professor, cultural specialist and Freudian analyst (Kristeva, 1993: 254). Psychoanalytical feminists in France vary, however, from attachment to Freudian theory despite its misogyny (as Kristeva) to radical differentiation, affirming the ‘revaluation’ of women’s identity. Now, for Freud, the famous Oedipus complex – the ‘greatest’ of his discoveries, according to his disciple Ernest Jones (Jones, 1964: 39–40) – is the key to the formation of separate identities of boys and girls. ‘The fact which


was recognised by the Greek legend’, states Freud in his Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis, is for human beings ‘an inevitable fate’ (Freud, 1974: 244). This horrifying myth relates how the king’s son, unaware of his true identity, kills his father and weds his mother, bringing on the city divine punishment. The anger of the gods can only be purged by the discovery of the murderer. From his investigations Oedipus realises that he is responsible: he blinds himself and is led into exile by his daughter Antigone. For Freud the Oedipus complex – the son loves his mother and therefore hates (wishes to kill) his father – is an essential transition, or initiation, to sexual maturity. According to Freud, from the earliest age children’s ‘copious sexual life’ completely disregards (unlike adults) the prohibition of incest and other ‘perverse’ practices. On the contrary, ‘psychoanalytic researches have shown unmistakably that the choice of an incestuous love-object is . . . the first and invariable one, and that it is not until later that resistance sets in’ (Freud, 1974: 245–7). Indeed, a ‘boy’s mother is the first object of his love, and she remains so too during the formation of his Oedipus complex and, in essence, all through his life’ (Freud, 1973: 152). Thus, as Freud affirms in his New Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis, even though economic motives are important (referring to Marx), they cannot be the only ones that determine the behaviour of human beings in society. It is altogether incomprehensible how psychological factors can be overlooked . . . for not only were these reactions (of human beings) concerned in establishing the economic conditions, but even under the domination of these conditions men can only bring their original instinctual impulses into play – their self-preservative instinct, their aggressiveness, their need to be loved, their drive towards obtaining pleasure and avoiding unpleasure. (Freud, 1973: 215) Indeed, hunger and love are the two main ‘instincts’ or basic needs (Freud later added the destructive or ‘death instinct’). The first aims at self-preservation – the ‘ego-instinct’ – the second at preservation of the species, the sexual instinct, or libido. Freud argues that the development of the sexual instinct goes through four phases: oral, as for an infant with his or her mother; sadistic and anal (teeth and excretion: faeces also symbolise money); the phallic phase in which male (and corresponding female) organs attain importance; and finally the genital


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phase of ‘definitive sexual organisation’ established after puberty (128, 131). In the formation of the Oedipus complex, preparing the ‘decisive turning-points’ towards sexual maturity, Freud notes that ‘the development of a little girl into a normal woman’ is more difficult and more complicated than a boy’s development into manhood, even though both sexes ‘seem to pass through the early phases of libidinal development in the same manner’. There is still more agreement than difference between them in the phallic phase of penis and ‘penis-equivalent’ (clitoris). But it is in the change to ‘femininity’ that the first, real difference emerges: for the woman, the clitoris must ‘hand over’ to the vagina, while ‘the more fortunate man’ has only to continue with his active penis (150–1). But there is a second task with which a girl’s development is ‘burdened’. For a girl, like a boy, the first object of love is the mother. ‘But in the Oedipus situation the girl’s father has become her love-object’, preparing the way for ‘final choice of an object’ (her husband). How, Freud asks, does a girl pass from her mother to an attachment to her father – that is, from her ‘masculine phase’ to the feminine one ‘to which she is biologically destined’? (152). The answer lies in the nature of the girl’s libidinous relations with the mother, which are both affectionate and aggressive. The actual ‘turning away from the mother’ required for normal development ‘is accompanied by hostility; the attachment to the mother ends in hate. A hate of that kind may become very striking and last all through life.’ What then is specific to girls that so differentiates them from boys? The answer is ‘where we expected to find it . . . in the castration complex’. For ‘girls hold their mother responsible for their lack of a penis and do not forgive her for their being thus put at a disadvantage’ (155–8). While a boy also fears castration (from the father’s threats that the boy will lose his penis if he plays with it) this complex for him ‘will be the most powerful motive force in his subsequent development’, that is, his detachment from love of his father to mature heterosexual love. On the other hand, when girls compare themselves with boys they realise that they do not have a penis and ‘feel seriously wronged’. They fall a victim to penis-envy of boys’ ‘far superior equipment’, which ‘will leave ineradicable traces on their development and the formation of their character’. Freud is ‘inclined to attribute’ the greater hold of envy and jealousy on women than on men to this reason. Freud reveals ‘a few more psychical peculiarities of mature femininity’ such as the ‘physical vanity of women’ (compensating for their


original sexual inferiority, or penis-envy) and especially shame, ‘a feminine characteristic par excellence’, as a way of concealing genital deficiency. Again, the ‘fact that women must be regarded as having little sense of justice is no doubt related to the predominance of envy in their mental life . . . We also regard women as weaker in their social interests and as having less capacity for sublimating their instincts than men.’ Now, a man of about thirty (Freud concludes) appears to us as ‘somewhat unformed’, but is expected to make ‘powerful use of the possibilities for development’ opened up by analysis. On the other hand, a woman of the same age ‘often frightens us by her psychical rigidity and unchangeability . . . There are no paths open to future development; it is as though . . . the difficult development to femininity had exhausted the possibilities of the person concerned’ (166–9). It is no wonder that feminine militants, as Kristeva puts it, reject the troublesome ‘phallocrat’ from ‘decadent’ Vienna! Nevertheless, the question for Freudian feminists remains: to what extent do Freud’s unacceptable conclusions jeopardise the theoretical apparatus as such? The same question can be put to Marxists in regard to Marx’s apocalyptic, but historically unfounded, conviction as to the imminent destruction of capitalism as a result of its own internal contradictions. Which ‘Marx’ is to be chosen, the sociologist or the metaphysician? Whereas neo-Marxist feminists, like Delphy, ‘improve’ orthodox Marxism by articulating the capitalist mode of production with the domestic mode (although still convinced of the need for ‘revolution’), psychoanalytic feminists, like Kristeva, creatively develop (so to speak) Freudian orthodoxy by insisting on the ‘symbolic’ dimensions of the Oedipus situation, the castration complex and penis-envy. Kristeva has also elaborated the articulation of semiotic (pre-verbal emotions, linked to femininity) and symbolic (linguistic and normative, linked to masculinity) processes but has also hypothesised – as did Freud – the bisexual character of men and women. The obscure realm of the unconscious, with the repression of ‘unacceptable’ sexual urges, emerging in distorted forms to consciousness, lend themselves (as Freud recognised) to peculiar difficulties in interpretation. For example, on the interpretation of dreams: ‘The stricter the censorship (by the psychic agency), the more far-reaching will be the disguise and the more ingenious too may be the means employed’ to discover ‘the true meaning’ of the dream. ‘The unconscious is the true psychical reality; in its innermost nature it is as much unknown to us as the reality of the external world, and it is as incompletely pre-


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sented by the data of consciousness as is the external world by the communications of our sense organs’ (Freud, 1954: 142, 613). In this context, an element in the dream ‘which is capable of having a contrary may equally well be expressing itself or its contrary or both together: only the sense can decide which translation is to be chosen’ (Freud, 1974: 213). Now, it is precisely the ‘sense’ – here, the historical and social context – that convincingly reveals a very different interpretation of the famous Oedipus complex from that of Freud and Freudians. Such is the ‘Oedipus without the Complex’ of the classical historian Jean-Pierre Vernant. To the Greeks, Vernant points out, dreams of union with one’s mother – that is, with the earth from which everything is born and to which everything returns – means sometimes death, sometimes taking power of the land (Vernant and Vidal-Naquet, 1981: 86). Vernant situates the tragedy of Oedipus between ‘mythos’ (legend or story, emotions) and ‘logos’ (the word, reason) – similar to Kristeva’s semiotic and symbolic – that is, between the archaic period of sacred, but ambivalent, power of the gods and the new period of law and justice created by human beings. It is in this shifting context that ‘tragic guilt thus takes shape in the constant clash between the ancient religious conception of the misdeed as a defilement attached to an entire race [such as the doomed house of Atreus] and inexorably transmitted from one generation to the next in the form of an ate or madness sent by the gods, and the new concept adopted in law’ of private individuals deliberately choosing to commit a crime (3, 56). Above all, Oedipus is a ‘double’: a saviour king, at the beginning of the play, and an abominable defilement, the concentration of evil in the world, at the end. The proud Oedipus is the one who solves riddles (the answer to the Sphinx) but not his own (his true identity). He is the opposite of what he thinks himself to be: the purveyor of justice is also the assassin. From the human point of view, Oedipus is the leader with second sight, equal of the gods; from the gods’ point of view, he is blind, equal to nothing: the duality of the human condition (81, 91, 93). The Oedipus myth, central to Freudian theory, provides the opportunity to ‘situate’ Kristeva between mythos and logos. But it is the Oedipus of human duality – reason and emotion – not the Oedipus of the complex, believed to be an essential stage in the formation of identity. It is the ambivalent and not the assertive Freud – the searcher who recognises that elements in dreams may represent themselves or their contrary, or both. It is the Freud of the imaginaire, or imagined situation, dear to Kristeva.


Note, in this respect, the sceptical views of Paul Ricoeur, who points out that Freud never quite succeeded in stating how his interpretations are authenticated, how his theory is verified. To Ricoeur (as, perhaps, for Kristeva in practice) the ultimate truth claims of psychoanalysis reside in individual case histories. (Ricoeur, 1981: 247–8, 268–9). Even more critical is the philosopher of science, Joelle Proust: ‘Contemporary discoveries on the brain and on psychopathology leave hardly any place for Freudian hypotheses as to the major stages of development, nor to such fundamental Freudian concepts as the Oedipus complex.’ Responding, the psychoanalyst Pierre Fédida, while not defending Freudian theories in terms of verification by the neurosciences, argues that concepts like repression ‘have a utility in psychoanalytic practice’. He adds, persuasively, that ‘the models on which Freudian psychoanalysis is built are effectively models of fictive apparatuses, whose fictionality is most productive’ (Le Monde des Débats, September 1999). It is in this fictive sense that Julia Kristeva relates to the early Greek myth, or dream, of union with the mother – the earth – which may mean either death or possession of the land, that is, power. What Kristeva establishes is the role of the mother, in this case the female contribution to civilisation in contrast to male destruction (the death instinct) and possession of power. ‘It is difficult to understand culture’, Kristeva affirms, ‘without the civilising role of women: there is no language, no maternal tongue, without a transmission of culture between the mother and her children . . . I insist on the cultural role of maternity, which seems to be completely under-estimated’ (interview with Rodgers, 1998: 198). Kristeva’s analytic practice, too, emphasises ‘feminine’ pleasure and ‘resurrection’ along with ‘masculine’ science (‘the dead father of knowledge’). The pleasure of the analyst, she writes, is revealed under cover of the ‘truth’ of his or her interpretive construction. No other discourse, in the history of Western rationality, can attain this aspiration to balance truth and pleasure, authority and transgression: a balance that guarantees its vitality, that is, the immanence of death (discourse of knowledge) and of resurrection (discourse of desire) . . . Because it is not content to be the dead father of knowledge, but – without avoiding such a trial – also shows itself to be the subject of affect, desire or pleasure, it is in this way that the analyst . . . produces restructuring effects in the psychism of the other (the patient). (Kristeva, 1993: 49–50)


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The ‘balance’ of male and female informs Kristeva’s theory – and analytic practice – linking the semiotic (the primary instincts and affects expressed, for example, in sound, colour and smell) with the symbolic (linguistic signs and syntactic and logical order). A triad is formed by the addition of the ‘imaginary’, such as works of imagination and fiction proceeding from the symbolic, which represents strategies of identification, constituting the ‘image of the subject in process of formation’ (127–8). Male/female, symbolic/semiotic, linear time and affective time: these differences, which have to be taken into account, are not so much dichotomous for Julia Kristeva as dialectical. ‘I remain Freudian, believing there is only one subject, the speaking subject . . . But from there, from the unconscious, the configuration of subjectivity is different, and feminine configuration brings another relationship to the pre-language, to the instinctual, another relationship to the emotions, the gestures, smells, everything that is anterior to language’ (interview with Rodgers, 1998: 201, 207–8). Indeed, it is in their relation to the ‘male configuration’ of linear time that Kristeva regards the ‘first generation’ of feminists, following the dramatic events of May 1968. For theirs was a ‘logic of identification’ with the rationality of nation and state – and the possession or contestation of power. In contrast, the second generation, distrustful of politics, have rejected linear time. They are ‘interested essentially in the specificity of feminine psychology and its symbolic realisations, seeking to give a language to the experiences of the body and of intersubjectivity, which were silenced by the previous culture’. Now, Kristeva is critical of so-called literary feminists, or those who claim an aesthetic quality for feminine productions (see below): ‘a more or less euphoric or depressed romanticism’ (Kristeva, 1993: 250–1, 258). Instead, Kristeva demands – imagines – a third generation of feminists, which does not consider men and women to be eternal rivals. This does not mean reconciliation – for feminism has shown what is irreducible and even murderous in the social contract – but rather the ‘dedramatisation’ of the ‘struggle to death’ between the two sexes. It means ‘an internalisation of the separation on which the social and symbolic contract is based. Henceforth, the other is not an evil that is foreign to me, an external scapegoat: other sex, class, race, nation. I am the victim and the executioner, the same and the other, identical and stranger’. We need to bring out, along with each person’s singularity, the multiplicity of our identifications, the relativity of our symbolic and biological existences (268–70). One must admit, adds Kristeva (interview with


Rodgers: 211), that the feminine, as ‘passive’ or ‘second’ as much as second sex, may be distributed among both sexes . . . The philosopher Sarah Kofman is equally convinced that ‘psychoanalytical categories are indispensable for everything related to the two sexes’. Unlike Kristeva, however, she suggests that ‘another psychoanalysis than that of Freud, with different categories’ may be needed to understand the problems of present-day youth – even though the primary relationship with the mother cannot be changed (interview with Rodgers, 1998: 179). In her L’Enigme de la femme, Kofman goes further by deconstructing Freud’s theory of penis-envy: ‘The theory of “penis-envy” is a panic reaction, a fiction of a dream-like type forged to transform the woman – a great criminal who is unbearable because too fascinating – into a sick hysteric who can be more easily manipulated and mastered.’ (quoted by Rodgers, 1998: 167–8). There is no point, she adds, in giving a phallus to women; what is needed is to think of it in different terms, neither masculine nor feminine. Unfortunately, ever since Aristotle, what is different between them has been regarded as castration, because all ideology makes man the model; therefore those who do not possess a phallus become inferior. Above all, this ‘difference’ is posed as an opposition and is not accepted for what it is, a necessary complement (Rodgers, 1998: 179–80). Women, according to Kofman, have actually more inner strength than men – and more libido. But they have to hide it and arrange things differently, otherwise men would not support such a state of affairs. ‘There is a fantasmic strength in women, because of the image of the mother, which cannot be effaced. Men need to compensate for this strength and accordingly have appropriated political power and law-making’ (178). A neat, if simplistic, inversion of the masculinedomination thesis! Nevertheless, like Kristeva, Kofman argues for an ‘original bisexuality’. Every human being is capable of all the potentialities of the other sex. ‘In the interior of each category, man or woman, there are different types of sex, different ways of living their sexuality. Categorisation in two sexes is purely social’ (169, 186). Yet another interpretation: to reclaim sexual differences as well as economic, political, cultural and symbolic equality, argues Antoinette Fouque (founder of the Psych et Po group and, for Delphy, the very ‘enemy’ of feminism), is to confront at all levels theory-political machines that neutralise the sexed experience of women in the name of the dogma of ‘phallic monism’. This dogma legitimises under the


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‘economy of the phallus’ all enjoyment and desire. Hence the urgent need, in Fouque’s view, to democratise Freudian psychoanalysis. Going well beyond Kofman’s proposals, she speaks of the ‘place of the mother in the house of the father’ and the emancipation of women from pregenitality and infantile dependence. This new feminism is to think of maternal responsibility and ‘post-patriarchy’, to experience pregnancy as the ‘model of all thinking of the other’, to value tolerance, hospitality and a promise to keep (Fouque, 1995: 61, 66, 89). Women do not experience penis-envy, Fouque adds, men suffer from uterus-envy instead. Rather than Delphy’s domestic model of production, Fouque presents the ‘uterine model’ – ‘a new ethic of procreation’ – to reintegrate women in their identity, escaping the logic of phallic monism. Accordingly, Fouque urges a ‘new social contract of the body’ (rather than free association of the mind), a reformulation of sexual relations, body and mind, articulated in the cultural order: ‘the sex which enjoys, the body at work, the thinking flesh’. This is creation and procreation, geniality and genitality. Such wordplay foreshadows the next section (62, 66, 76–9).

Postmodern feminists: affirmation of identity: the sign of Joyce The Subject: ‘Life as a Work of Art’. It is the subject, knowledge and power – located historically and analysed through discourse and practice – that constitute the ‘genealogy of the modern subject’, according to Michel Foucault (Rabinow, 1984: 7). Now, the problematic of the subject is central to feminism. This can be seen in Foucault’s elaboration of his ‘genealogy’. First, he writes, there is ‘a historical ontology of ourselves in relation to truth through which we constitute ourselves as subjects of knowledge’; second, ‘in relation to a field of power through which we constitute ourselves as subjects acting on others’; and third ‘in relation to ethics through which we constitute ourselves as moral agents’ (interview with Foucault, Rabinow, 1984: 151). Truth as the subject of knowledge is the (psychoanalytical) field of Julia Kristeva; power in the (patriarchal) relationship of men and women is the field of Christine Delphy; and ethics, or ‘life as a work of art’ as Foucault affirms, is the field of literary or postmodern feminists. Foucault himself is the pivotal figure between modernity – neither for nor against, the Enlightenment as he explains his ‘historico-critical attitude’ in ‘What is Enlightenment?’ (45–9) – and the postmodern: ‘a sense of the increasing vulnerability to criticism of things, institutions,


discourses, practices. A certain fragility has been discovered in the very bedrock of existence’ (Foucault, 1980: 80). And again: As to the problem of fiction . . . I am well aware that I have never written anything but fictions . . . It seems to me that the possibility exists for fiction to function in truth, for a fictional discourse to induce effects of truth, and for bringing it about that a true discourse engenders or ‘manufactures’ something that does not as yet exist, that is, ‘fictions’ it. One ‘fictions’ history on the basis of a political reality that makes it true, one ‘fictions’ a politics not yet in existence on the basis of a historical truth. (193) Truth, power and ethics are central to the ‘fictions’ of three important feminist writers: Annie Leclerc, Luce Irigaray and Hélène Cixous – novelists, poets and philosophers. ‘Genuine poetry can communicate before it is understood’, said T.S. Eliot of his own most allusive (elusive) and erudite work. ‘Fictions’ render the social world intelligible, but in a metaphorical (Plato’s imagery of the cave, taken up magnificently by Irigaray) and in a symbolic idiom. Indeed, ‘it is as poets rather than doctrinaires’ that writers such as Irigaray and Cixous express themselves, according to Albistur and Armogathe (1977: 468): ‘when they speak of their intervention to subvert male language, at the same time they subvert it’. As writers, Irigaray declares, ‘we work and we write with the aim of transforming the relationship of women to words and to writing, and to combat the economic and phallocratic oppression which weighs on the language of women’ (quoted, 469). As against the deadening ‘rationality’ of masculine modernity – the abstract universalism of ‘Republican’ uniformity imposed on a pluralist society – Leclerc, for example, lyrically appeals for an ‘affirmation of life’, the ‘jubilation of the body, thrown at the world’. For there is only one word, that of love. ‘Love is what the word means, the tangible deployment, the happy flesh, evidence of inner strength.’ But (male) power cannot tolerate the ‘living word’. The word of love has no right to public existence: Power willingly consents to science, philosophy, concept and theory . . . to suck, pump and abuse for its profit. On condition that these speak always of the non-place of abstraction which the flesh disdains. On condition that the text hides absolutely the place from which it proceeds, the land of love and openness, as


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well as its deepest force, the subversion of power . . . For power is the first lie. Power can do nothing. Only turn aside, prevent and usurp . . . Wherever one may be it is always within the enclosures of power: the family, the school, the workplace, the state. One cannot escape. (Leclerc, 1976: 9, 11) To continue with the ‘word of love’ – no less relevant to Irigaray’s devastating deconstruction/destruction of Freud’s fantasy of women (discussed below) – consider Cixous’ Freudian-Joycean interpretation of the fabulous Finnegans Wake. Quoting from Joyce’s ‘misterpiece’ on a ‘female to focus’, M or Marge (Mage) ‘my true Bdur’, Cixous interprets the text (1986: 80–4): M wakes appetites of introjection (in Joyce, or his characters), inviting the production of artistic objects, accelerating the process of transformation, displacement and sublimation. Here transformation, culture and fabulation meet and interrogate each other, exchanging political economy, libidinal economy and biological economy, all the proof of ‘éconhommie masculine’. To analyse M (Marge) is the task of ‘doctor Jones’ (Ernest Jones, biographer of Freud) who undertakes to understand his patient by painting her portrait, cutting her in little bits, ‘faire sauter au beurre et au fromage’, adding virgin choices of mental spices from the ‘dark continent’ (unknown woman). One part of doctor Jones’s sexual drives is sublimated, one part of his excitation is placed within brackets, while another is sent off on a cultural (cul-turelle) mission in M’s erogenous zones. M’s status puts us in relation, Cixous points out, with the operation of the text in general, where it is not possible to stop the multiple meanings of words. Indeed, it is femininity: ‘The femininity of the text of FW (Finnegans Wake), the text enigmatic as femininity . . . that every Jones hides his head trying to describe . . . the incessant work of the text.’ What Jones tries to ‘show’ is that between all these histories – of family, culture and symbolic systems, including psychoanalysis – and this outpouring, there is an essential relation: if a text, which is this text, cannot write itself like that, these histories would not write themselves: it is because in the language things happen like that that these histories are produced. Thus, in the production of histories – his stories – Dedalus recalls Joyce, ‘labyrinth’ Borges, ‘time’ Proust, and ‘tropism’ (her story) novelist and critic Sarraute. As Hector Bianciotti writes (Le Monde, 21 October 1999), ‘She found from the first “her” word and put it in the plural as title of her first book – “tropismes” being for her these inde-


finable movements which slide very rapidly at the limits of our consciousness, at the origin of our gestures, of our speech, feelings that we believe we experience and which it is “impossible” to define.’ Assembling words – such was the persevering, meticulous, ceaseless labour of Nathalie Sarraute. ‘A whole life in the depths of life, holding poetry out of the waters.’ Words, poetry, life, love: they are the text – like femininity itself – that is to be interpreted. But femininity is also difference. In the beginning was the Word . . . But who cuts off the word? Who installs the divorce between speech and silence, between man and woman, if it is not the only word that remains, that of man? . . . Speech of power, reducing the infinity of the Word, relegating woman into silence, speech as the statement of property . . . Man, appropriating speech, establishes difference. In doing so, he seizes the logos from the intimacy of loving bodies, and he makes of it discourse and dialectic . . . He makes (of logos) the mechanics of knowledge, of what is explicit and controlled, proper to the mastery of things . . . Power constitutes the definition and distinction of man in relation to woman, who is always separated from the exercise of power. (Leclerc, 1976: ‘Ecrire, encore’) In her poem, ‘Prologue’ to Etre Deux, Luce Irigaray in turn declaims: ‘How, without our difference, can we give ourselves grace, regard ourselves one in the other?’ It is necessary, she goes on, to be faithful to this crossroads between body and speech – ‘Not simply body or language, but incarnation between us: the word become flesh and the flesh word . . . Speaking and constituting each one his and her subjectivity . . . and our alliance will always be a mystery.’ The feminine subject, according to Irigaray, almost always privileges a relation between subjects, with the other gender, ‘a relation of two’; men, however, prefer the subject-object relationship, which is instrumental, they use the other as an object. Men live their exteriority, women their interiority. To escape this ‘infernal circle’, (men’s) logic imagined the original cause, philosophy, the univocal character of truth, the religious tradition, the authority of God-the-Father. But causality cannot be reduced to a unique authority external to me; it is equally one of interiority constituted from the/some difference(s). We do not belong only to family, people, nation, culture. ‘There exists for me, for us and between us, singular and multiple origins, diverse genealogies.’ Thus, while men seek one thing (civilisation, religion, civil authority)


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women seek two: relationship with the other, founded on mutual respect. Women are more gifted for such relations (Irigaray, 1997: 35–6, 102–5). In her essay ‘La Venue à l’Ecriture’ Hélène Cixous writes (admirably!) of the ‘strange force’ that throws one into the work of writing, obliging one to care for the mystery of the other, ‘this sort of love for the secret face of the Other’. (I leave the passage in French to appreciate the meaning of the sound, the sound of the meaning): Du point de vue de l’oeil d’âme. L’oeil dame . . . Ecrire pour toucher des lettres, les lèvres, du souffle, pour caresser de la langue, lécher de l’âme, gouter le sang du corps aimé; de la vie éloignée. (Cixous, 1986: 12) To write, to dream, to give birth, to affirm an internal force capable of facing life without dying of fear, to regard oneself, as if one were at the same time the other, indispensable for love. ‘And why does this question of “why am I?” never leave me in peace? . . . You also juifemme, tiny, a mouse among the people of mice, assigned to the fear of the big bad cat’ (14–15). The first knowledge: to love one must first struggle. ‘Life is fragile and death holds power.’ But for Cixous there is the inner strength of femininity: ‘it is watching giving birth (her mother, German, was a midwife) that I learned to love women’. ‘In German I weep, in English I play’ – wordplay – ‘in French I steal. I am a thief.’ She means stealing signifiers . . . ‘Pas d’hommicile fixe’. ‘And yet she writes! First she dies. Then she loves’ (34–5, 41, 46). What impels her to write is analogous to what makes the mother describe the universe so that her child can grasp it and name it. ‘Life makes text from my body. I am already the text. History, love, violence, time, work . . .’ Cutting, shaping, filtering the text is a hard trial: it is man’s hour as distinct from the ‘singular feminine unconscious’ that constitutes the ‘magic book’: And all the women feel, in darkness as in light, what no man can experience in their place, the incisions, the births, the explosions in the libido, the ruptures, losses and sensual enjoyment . . . The femininity of a text can scarcely be left to assembly or modification . . . We in our writing are like fish in water, like meaning in our tongues and transformation in our unconscious. (62–3, 65, 67, 69)


Yet does not such overpowering emphasis of feminist writers on love, life and the pursuit of happiness – on the interior world of women and not (man’s) external world of economy, politics and society – does not such exclusion and self-preoccupation serve the interests of the patriarchy? Such is the accusation of ‘materialist’ feminists, like Christine Delphy and Monique Wittig. They insist, as Renate Gunther points out, that sexual difference is a social construct, founded upon and used to justify the oppression of women by men. In Delphy’s view, the notion of sexual difference can only be understood as the basis of the hierarchical relationship between the sexes and therefore any egalitarian concept of ‘difference’ (favoured by Irigaray) is a contradiction in terms. Similarly, Wittig argues that the perception of anatomical sex differences is itself a product of patriarchy and not the consequence of the ‘natural’ biological existence of two distinct sexes (Gunther, 1998: 179). There are two answers to these objections. First, feminist writers are well aware of the oppression of women by men (evident in all the works quoted above). And second they affirm (which is surely contestable) that women’s life and labour, to which they have been ‘relegated’, is actually more rewarding, more self-fulfilling, than that of men. Thus, for Annie Leclerc the ‘valorisation’ of the masculine is only a myth, elaborated by society, to counterbalance the true superiority of women (Rodgers, 1998, preface to interview with Leclerc: 215). Irigaray, in her extraordinary Speculum de l’autre femme – jagged, broken, disruptive, kaleidoscopic – not only annihilates Freud’s childish, indeed infantile, pretensions but also, in a tour de force, stages an ‘imaginary’ space-time: the world of Plato’s cave (the uterus) from which men, over the centuries, groping for the light, speculate on their cosmic (comic?) role. In her ironic scrutiny of Freud (men procreate while women are the passive receptacle) she records the social/sexual consequences: Matrix – land, factory, bank – to which will be entrusted the seedcapital from which it germinates, fabricates, fructifies without the women being able to claim the ownership or even the usufruct, because only ‘passively’ submitted to reproduction . . . And on Freud’s ‘phallocentric’ dialectic: ‘If something contradicted it – such as pleasures of the little girl – ’, she observes, ‘the whole economy of sexual affects and affectations would have to be reinterpreted.’ As for the superego – identified with the paternal prototype and derived from


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the Oedipus complex – in Freud’s own estimation it fulfils ‘all the conditions which should satisfy the superior essence of man’! (Irigaray, 1974: 16, 67, 103–6). Clearly it is by such means that propertied regimes, philosophical systems, religious mythologies and psychoanalytical theories define the destiny of women (161). Metaphorically, Plato’s cave – and the passages in and out – sustain all the dichotomies, the categoric differences, the world within and without, man outside and prisoner within, truth and shade, reality and dream, good and evil, one and multiple (305–6). For ‘truth’ is accredited by men to justify order, regulation and arbitration, especially by theorising the relations among men (in the polis as in the cave). Such an ideal of truth is also necessary to sustain and legitimate the metaphors and figures, representing the intervention of women, without voice, without presence (329). The inverse reality, Irigaray strikingly concludes (appropriately summming up this discussion of feminism), is that men, striving for allpowerful intelligibility (unlike the femininity of feeling), are in fact cut off from the earth, from the mother, from every ‘other’, which they cannot recognise or evaluate, and which may be only a shadow. In living an illusion, everything is upside down. ‘From the night – at least for a mortal – now comes illumination . . .’

5 Conclusion

1. Economics, politics and civil society Women are half of a social world that is itself divided by the practices and representations of economics, politics and civil society. Not one of these exists in a vacuum. It is for purposes of analysis that each can be treated separately, that is, abstracted from its environment. But in real life they are intricately related and it is important, in conclusion, to recognise this: to show how the parts relate to one another and to the whole. Consider, for example, how a large enterprise contributes funds (openly or surreptitiously) to a major political party for its electoral campaigns. The party, in turn, targets various constituencies – the youth vote, or that of women, trade unions, professionals and so on, in other words, civil society. But the funding enterprise, like any well-run business, expects to get a satisfactory return on its expenditure. This may be either in terms of general policy promoting economic development, or one that favours a particular industry: ‘What is good for General Motors is good for America’ is one memorable attempt at justification. Evidently the policy of a major political party is thus being influenced in the interest of one of its constituencies (business) at the expense of others: first, because public money is limited; and second, because the others do not have the same clout as business, even when they are a majority in society. This is a serious matter even for a developed country where there are sufficient resources to be distributed throughout society and where capitalism is to some extent regulated. It is serious because public policy is distorted by powerful economic interests (national and global) at the expense of ordinary people. 135


That is why a civil society is needed which is strong enough to stand up to economic demands and to bolster political resistance. The latter is especially important because without pressures from civil society politicians succumb only too easily to economic inducements. The relationship between civil society and political institutions – in the context of economic development – is therefore a key factor in determining the success or failure of responsible modernisation. Yet another interrelated factor is important. For it is customary, especially since the end of the cold war, to claim that the market economy and democratic politics are the two essential conditions of a modern developed nation. In each case there is freedom of choice – as customers or as voters. Moreover it is freedom with equality: each political ‘unit’, whether male or female, rich or poor, young or old is equal to all the others. Similarly, each economic unit is equal: the dollar owned by a poor person is worth neither more nor less than the dollar owned by a rich person. Yet, as the eminent sociologist Max Weber, who can by no means be accused of radicalism, long ago pointed out: It is the most elemental economic fact that the way in which the disposition over material property is distributed among a plurality of people, meeting competitively in the market for the purpose of exchange, in itself creates specific life chances [that is, for supply of goods, living conditions and personal life experiences, ‘determined by the amount and kind of power, or lack of such, to dispose of goods or skills for the sake of income in a given economic order’]. It is a ‘mode of distribution’, Weber goes on, that favours the owners over the non-owners of economic power. ‘It increases, at least generally, their (owners’) power in price wars with those who, being propertyless, have nothing to offer but their services . . . in order barely to subsist.’ Thus, ‘the kind of chance in the market is the decisive moment . . . for the individual’s fate’ (Weber’s emphasis: ‘Class, Status, Party’, Weber, 1970: 181–2). It is, of course, another ‘elemental economic fact’ that the equal unit (money) is essential for the exchange of goods and services in the market. But the economic reality of market transactions obscures the social reality that those who ‘transact’ – that is, people – are not equal. And it is this that matters, and not abstract equality, in determining people’s fate. Here again, the missing factor – civil society – is essential to improve the balance of power (economy, politics, society) in favour of ordinary people.

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Triangular balance In conceptualising this triangular balance, three theorists of civil society are particularly important. First, Antonio Gramsci, who envisaged civil society as the creation of citizens demanding a voice in the formulation of public policy affecting their lives – and livelihood. Second, as noted above, Alain Touraine, who focuses on specific elements of civil society – such as trade unions, environmentalists and the women’s movement – considered as social movements. Each unites particular interests with a universal culture; but to be effective each must cooperate with as well as contest the power of state and economy. And finally Pierre Bourdieu, with his radical theory of symbolic power. For example: when male values determine the inferior status of women and this is so deeply internalised by women that their subordination appears to be ‘natural’ then this is the effect of symbolic power. Each theorist privileges one side of the triangular balance. Gramsci emphasises the autonomy of politics, aiming at the establishment of ‘hegemony’ (government by consent) through civil society. Bourdieu, on the other hand, considers the economy (‘economic capital’) to be the major factor in the division of labour in society between the dominant and the dominated classes. Touraine, in turn, champions civil society, in the form of social movements, as the only way to regain true modernity (and rationality) in a society threatened by the abuse of power by the state and the economic system. Touraine’s argument arises out of a distinctive political philosophy of ‘modernity’, considered as the unity of reason and identity, collective action and individuality, economy and culture. But this unity no longer exists. It has disintegrated into four main fragments: free sexual behaviour (permissive society, divorce, cohabitation); new economic strategies, including global operations, emphasis on finance rather than productive capital, especially short-term speculative investment; consumerism that is not so much a matter of individual choice but one that is conditioned by advertising, media images and fashion; and finally, in reaction to widespread feelings of rootlessness, disorientation and alienation, the obsessive search for identity, either in particular communities (ethnic, sexual, religious and so on) or in exaggerated forms of nationalism. The rupture between economic system and cultural values is the distinguishing feature of the decomposition of modernity. Touraine’s objective is the ‘recomposition’ of modernity through social movements, motivated by the creative action of ‘subjects’. Cultural orientation, pluralism and contestation define the social move-


ment. For culture in the broad sense, as a way of life, is the central feature of the present era, where mass production and diffusion of cultural goods has priority over the production of material goods. Cultural production, modifying opinions, attitudes and behaviour, enters directly into the world of values – instead of being limited to material utility. Such new and insidious forms of control, Touraine believes, can be resisted only by defence of the subject and his or her freedom. The dilemma is that state power and economic power have to be contested so as to preserve the freedom of individuals; yet, at the same time, a measure of state control is needed to maintain order. Moreover, without economic growth (facilitated by the political system) there is little possibility of improving health, education and social security: that is, the welfare of citizens which social movements aim to achieve. Culture as a way of life, whether determined by dominant economic and political forces in society or, as Touraine would have it, by the free expression of individual choice, is also central to Pierre Bourdieu’s concept of symbolic power. According to Bourdieu, the dominant classes in society, with their superior economic, political or cultural ‘capitals’ (resources for the appropriation of scarce goods and values) impose their norms, rules and standards of behaviour on the dominated classes, who have inferior capitals, in a division of labour. This may be economic, political, social, educational or according to gender. Such a division of labour, corresponding to the division between dominant and dominated, is internalised (in Bourdieu’s view) by the dominated classes. This division (or vision) is accepted, largely unconsciously, as the natural order of things: thus, it is not only unchallenged, it is unquestioned. It is in this way, Bourdieu argues, that the dominated contribute to their own domination – through the expression of symbolic power, when the ‘social order’, as he puts it, ‘is progressively inscribed in the mind’. Test case: rights of women The paradigm is the male domination of women, when women accept the role assigned to them by dominant males. Accordingly, the sphere of women is the private sphere of family, household and caring activities. The sphere of men, to the contrary, is the public sphere of political and economic action, with its power of decision over society. The maintenance of such an unequal division of labour is the product of the incessant work of reproduction of the social order, that is, the work of particular agents: men, with such weapons as physical and symbolic violence, including families, church, school and the state. Thus, by exer-

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cising symbolic power, Bourdieu states in La domination masculine, ‘men are able to carry out acts indiscriminately, without even questioning them, which exclude women from positions of authority . . . indicated by the very feeble representation of women in positions of power, notably economic and political’. Now, it is precisely in combating such forms of discrimination that the women’s movement – contrary to Bourdieu’s deterministic view of male domination – has achieved such highly ‘symbolic’ results as the legalisation of parity between men and women. Nevertheless, progress in overcoming discrimination in practice – especially at higher institutional levels – is evidently hampered, not only by male resistance, but also by the disunity of leading feminists, indicated by the refusal of particular streams, whether neo-Marxist, psychoanalytical or postmodernist, to recognise the validity of ‘rival’ theories. To be sure, the male world is equally divided among these and other persuasions. But there is one crucial distinction: men are in power and whatever their political or economic differences these do not affect this central issue. Should women, then, in their struggle to attain equality, continue to be divided? It is hardly a convincing argument to claim, with Annie Leclerc, that women in their private sphere are emotionally and intellectually so superior to men that they can ‘afford’ to let men dominate the public sphere. It is simply not the case, in most countries, that the status of women is so satisfactory – rather the contrary. Even in developed countries, most women are not as privileged as postmodernists would like to believe. If such is the case, does the abundant evidence of discrimination against women – with its serious implications for society – does this mean that ‘patriarchy’ is so deeply entrenched that it cannot effectively be reformed by legal means, but (as neo-Marxists insist) must instead be overthrown? Indeed, Christine Delphy argues that reforms simply make the patriarchal system more palatable to its victims and thus undermine the urge for revolution. But such a deterministic approach – although Delphy in practice has supported reforms – ignores the historical evidence. For evolutionary reforms have usually been more effective than violent revolutions – with a few spectacular exceptions – in ensuring the transition from despotism to democracy. (It is where civil society plays a crucial role.) And yet the centralised authoritarian regimes of seventeenth and eighteenth-century Europe must have seemed just as unchangeable and immovable to contemporaries as the patriarchy may seem to be today. As for the capitalist system, it, too, has been modified by the counter-


vailing power of the state and civil society. Thus, if transformation of political and economic power is possible, why not social power? Indeed, the successful struggle of the suffragettes in early twentieth-century Britain, for example, surely represents a major breach in the patriarchal system. But does the very fact of participation in the struggle for reform – in a man’s world – entail the loss of feminine qualities? What is the worth of material success if it means losing one’s soul? But this argument, too, ‘misrecognises’ the situation. For patriarchal values are in decline – consider the weakening of paternal authority in the family as well as the alternatives to marriage – even if they are still at work in politics and the economy. But positions of power are not male occupations of necessity, that is, requiring (supposedly) male characteristics, but rather require professional skills. Women are no more excluded than men from learning such skills. It is not a question, therefore, of women having to become more like men if they are to compete in a ‘man’s world’ – for that world is changing all the time. Notable aspects of change, such as the establishment of the welfare state, are not just creations by and for men; nor is the advent of mass education; nor the autonomy of certain professions, the judiciary in particular. Such institutions and even the last male bastion (politics) are undoubtedly becoming feminised. Thus, it is not a matter of ‘all or nothing’, patriarchy or revolution. Already we live in a mixed, pluralist society, not governed by ‘eternal’, abstract-universalist principles, whether Republican, revolutionary or patriarchal. There is room for ‘difference’. In this public space, pragmatic feminists are correct to struggle as a social movement for equality. But there is also a need for symbolic power and this is expressed, often very movingly, by the ‘differentialists’. The two are not mutually exclusive. The intellectual dimension of the personality is exemplified by reformers pursuing concrete results; but there is also an affective dimension: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness – for both men and women.

2. Democratic deficit Why, then, given the real achievements of women over recent years in developed countries – control over one’s body, economic independence and entry into the professions – is there such a sense of malaise, of being in an impasse? As Christine Delphy explains (interview, Paris, 28 April 2003) Western women are certainly more independent financially and

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therefore freer to chose their own lifestyle, but at the same time there are considerably more women than men in lower-paid jobs, working part-time and on fixed contracts. Women are more subject to unemployment than men. Women bringing up children on their own often live an impoverished, marginal existence. Even those with professional careers usually face a glass ceiling when it comes to promotion. Moreover, while French women have attained parity with men in politics – the very heart of the democratic system – the results have been derisory: less than 12 per cent of parliamentarians are women. Thus, progress seems to be blocked. What can be done? Compared with the spectacular challenges of the past, it is more difficult to mobilise around workaday issues. Gradual improvements are probably the best hope. This is not an inspiring prospect when so many obstacles need to be overcome. How is such a situation possible in an economically developed country? Why are social movements – the mobilising force for change – so often frustrated? How can the symbolic and institutional power of dominant classes still be so pervasive? The condition of women is the social paradigm par excellence: politically free, but economically constrained. It is the other side of the coin. While the potential for progress has been clearly established (in part 1 of the Conclusion) here it is the ‘deficit’ of democracy that demands attention. Such a contradiction is inherent in the social construction of democracy. Four main factors are involved. The first two are, substantively, the values of democracy and, procedurally, the means to realise these values. The values or ‘inspiration’ of democracy can be divided into two main types: the individualist notion of democracy, derived from Locke and reformulated by John Stuart Mill, centring around personal liberty and the protection of property; and the collectivist notion of the ‘general will’, proclaimed by Rousseau, presuming the distinction between the sovereign will of the people, which is always directed towards the common good, and the partial wills of individuals or associations, which are deviant and self-interested. Such are the two contrary strands of modern democracy: the more individualist or pluralist Anglo-American type and the more collectively-oriented or social-democratic type. The second issue is one of procedures, that is, the means by which substantive values are to be realised. Both pluralist and social-democratic conceptions require an elected assembly ‘representing’ the popular will (in practice, the will of the majority). The prerequisite of the democratic system, therefore, is freedom of thought, speech and association for the system to be truly representative of popular opinion. The latter,


in turn, is expressed by regular, free and fair elections based on universal adult suffrage. Importantly, the ‘rule of law’ – an impartial, independent system of justice – is required to sustain these functions. Now, values themselves may be contradictory (Weber’s ‘warring gods’), such as freedom versus equality, liberty versus solidarity, justice versus order. Institutional procedures, on the other hand, may become ossified over time or be considered as an end in themselves, usurping the place of values. The collectivist tradition errs on the side of values, the pluralist tradition on procedures. Yet procedures without values are sterile; values without procedures (to realise them) are futile. The two remaining factors are of a different though related order, that is, a realistic assessment of what democracy can do and what it cannot do. Perhaps the major achievement of the democratic system is that both substantive values – conceived as the ‘common good’ – and institutional procedures provide an essential mechanism (which may or may not be used) for peacefully resolving social conflicts. The will of the majority, in effect, adjudicates contentious issues; the minority accepts the majority verdict in the expectation (or hope) that it will be able in time to persuade most citizens that its views are justified. Further, the crucial problem of succession from one leadership to another, which bedevils authoritarian systems, is resolved by parliamentary vote or by general elections, and not by coup or on the battleground. Such, to repeat, is the major virtue of democracies. It follows that only under liberal or social democracy can human rights be most secured, by definition: for every citizen must be free from arbitrary arrest or intimidation to express his or her will in free elections. The final problem is what democracy cannot do. Here there are two related aspects. The first is that democracy is representative and not direct (as in ancient Greece). Yet in practice ordinary citizens cannot choose precisely who will ‘represent’ them; for they cannot select the person they most prefer, if they are to have any chance of success, but only those who have already been made available by organised political parties or interest groups. The practical result is the formation of a ‘political class’ of more or less professional politicians, whether in government or in opposition, with interests that increasingly diverge from those who ‘elect’ them. (Bourdieu’s analysis of democracy is an excellent critique; see Chapter 2 above.) This divergence of interests is one of the reasons for the ‘democratic deficit’. The second limitation of democracy is the overconcentration of democratic theorising on politics – in part due to its historic origins – and consequent neglect of economics. Democracy emerged in the

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course of political struggle against absolutism, at a time when economic concerns were subsidiary. The situation is very different today. As a result, democratic theorists and practitioners find great difficulty in coping with the economic system. Moreover, in theory the two systems are mutually exclusive: democracy, the sovereign ‘will of the people’, is all-powerful, indeed absolute. In practice it tends to be the other way round. To adapt Orwell: all interest groups are equal – in democratic pluralist theory – but some are more equal than others. For the evidence is abundant that democratically elected governments are obliged to defer in important respects to business interests (national or international) simply to keep the system going. The resulting contradiction between electoral pledges and government practices – in order to maintain business ‘confidence’ and ensure international ‘competitiveness’, often at the expense of citizens’ interests – is a second, major reason for the democratic deficit. It follows that in any realistic assessment of democracy both the ‘assets’ – its reconciling social mechanism and its guarantee of individual rights – as well as the ‘deficits’ (largely in the economic field) have to be taken into account (see Girling, 1997: 156–9; also 173). A promising new social movement that does take both factors into account is Attac, proposing concrete economic reforms as an ‘alternative’ to neoliberalism, but without indulging, as the far Left does, in unrealistic rhetoric. Nevertheless, the latter is a symptom of the wider, social malaise. The democratic deficit, then, can be defined as the gap between legitimate expectations (democracy as the sovereignty of the popular will or ‘government of the people, by the people, and for the people’) and social realities. On one side of the divide there are disillusioned citizens who feel neglected, abandoned, excluded. They resent what they see on the other side of the divide: arrogant, detached, self-interested political and economic elites. As an example, consider the socialist and communist ‘Left’, which in theory represents the ‘popular classes’; yet less than half the workers and employees (43 per cent) voted for the Left at the 2002 presidential election, compared with 70 per cent twenty-five years ago. As many as 44 per cent of workers and 40 per cent of employees abstained from voting in the 2002 legislative elections. The polling expert, Jérôme Jaffré, notes that more than 8 out of 10 French people ‘have the feeling that politicians are not concerned or very little concerned with what people like us think’ – also an increase of 24 per cent over that period. As Jaffré puts it: ‘Citizens do not accept the denial of


reality so often practised by governments of all types, which they consider indifferent to daily problems, always satisfied with themselves.’ Nearly 6 out of every 10 believe that politicians in general are corrupt (only 30 per cent consider their re-elected president to be ‘honest’). Only one-tenth of those polled believe that the political class responds to the two elementary requirements of democracy: ‘to be at once honest and preoccupied with what ordinary people think’ (‘The crisis of French politics’, Le Monde, 23 April 2003). In addition, wherever there is a marked dichotomy between elites and citizens – engendered by the social structure of democracy – it usually takes the form of elite rationality on the one hand versus popular feeling on the other. It has been memorably inscribed by Gramsci: The popular element ‘feels’ but does not always know or understand; the intellectual element ‘knows’ but does not always understand and in particular does not always feel. The two extremes are therefore pedantry and philistinism on the one hand and blind passion and sectarianism on the other . . . The intellectual’s error consists in believing that one can know . . . distinct and separate from the people-nation, that is, without feeling the elementary passions of the people, understanding them and therefore explaining and justifying them in the particular historical situation . . . One cannot make politics-history without this passion, without this sentimental connection between intellectuals and people-nation. In the absence of such a nexus the relations . . . are, or are reduced to, [those] of a purely bureaucratic or formal order . . . If [however] the relationship . . . between the leadership and the led, the rulers and the ruled, is provided by an organic cohesion in which feeling-compassion becomes understanding and thence knowledge (not mechanically, but in a way that is alive) then and only then is the relationship one of representation. Only then can there take place an exchange of individual elements between the rulers and the ruled, leaders and led, and can the shared life be realized which alone is a social force. (Gramsci, 1971: 418) Precisely such a deficit or ‘disconnection’ between elites and citizens has been demonstrated in the insensitive ‘rationality’ of governmentproposed reforms (urgently needed, it is true) and the frustrated ‘sectarianism’ of social movements voicing the feelings of those believed to be adversely affected by these reforms. The contention, in 2003, especially over education, retirement pensions and the performing arts took

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the form, for once, of the spectacle of society rather than Debord’s ‘society of spectacle’. On all these issues, extending to decentralisation, state reform, social security deficit, environmental degradation and labour market flexibility, the government set out rational procedures required to ‘unblock’ existing social and economic constraints. All the actors were aware, for example, that the system of government pensions would be unable to cope in coming decades with the ever-increasing number of ‘seniors’ (often requiring increasingly expensive medical care) ‘supported’ by a diminishing workforce. Either pensions would have to be reduced, or taxation or other contributions increased, or workers would have to work longer. Yet France, as one economist points out, is the ‘champion of inactivity’: only 15 per cent of those over 60 are still at work, compared with 70 per cent in 1970. ‘It is the most serious problem in the national economy’, writes Eric Le Boucher (Le Monde, 8–9 December 2002). ‘One can denounce the charges [on industry], taxation, the archaic state, or anything else, but they are nothing compared to this terrible reality: a country in which fewer and fewer people work can never claim to get richer.’ Similarly, the educational system, as the minister, Luc Ferry, observed (Le Monde, 28 March 2003) is no longer capable of responding to the expectations of families, pupils and teaching staff. More and more it gives the impression of ponderousness, of inability to take particular situations into account, of lack of transparency . . . Families sometimes get the impression of not being welcome or not being listened to . . . Pupils, too, often have the feeling that their particular situations and their need for guidance and advice are not considered . . . Finally, teachers state that their efforts to show initiative, to develop their courses individually and work out plans with the rest of the staff or educational authorities are frustrated by the narrow room for manoeuvre, an inability to change the centrally fixed schedule, and insufficient financial means. For all these reasons, ‘one must decentralise’. The proposed changes in the pension system to make it viable (accepted by the centrist CFDT but opposed by the more radical CGT unions) in addition to the relatively minor attempt at decentralisation raised a storm of protest. Days of strikes and demonstrations succeeded one another relentlessly. After three months of activity, the government deferred its decentralisation project but insisted on carrying out the pension reform by vote of parliament. For the social movements, the


result was a defeat, admitted one member of the important teachers’ union, but it showed that ‘a majority of the population was against the retirement reform’ (Martine Laronche and others, Le Monde, 27 June 2003). The intensity of the teachers’ struggle surprised both senior staff members as well as school inspectors. As one of them explained, ‘young teachers behave very differently from the old trade union practice. Sometimes they tend to extremes, without understanding how negotiations should be carried on, the fact that one should seek a compromise’ (Luc Bronner, same issue of Le Monde). Why should teachers, and especially the younger ones, react so negatively to proposals that were rationally established and, in effect, negotiable? My explanation is that teachers were not so much responding to the proposals as such but were acting out of a growing sense of frustration at their inability to get attention from the authorities – indeed, a feeling of neglect, even of abandonment, at a time when teaching is increasingly stressful, when violence by pupils (or family members) is more and more prevalent, and when the educational system fails to provide a satisfactory future for a substantial number of youths. A survey of secondary school teachers (also reported in Le Monde) appears to support my suggestion. The principal motivation of teachers is still love of their subject, contact with pupils and transmission of knowledge. But younger teachers, in particular, feel that their profession is insufficiently recognised by society. And of all the difficulties they experience, it is the ‘indiscipline’ of pupils that affects them most strongly. Frustration is acted out on the streets, when massive demonstrations express the ‘symbolic power’ of anxiety, anger and distrust. Opposition to change – however reasonable the proposals – takes the form of solidarity with others, replacing individual isolation and helplessness. Mass action by social movements is more inspiring than passive acceptance of dictates from above. Indeed, the extreme limit of confrontation was reached in the ‘suicidal’ movement of artistic performers and technicians (‘intermittents’) forcing the cancellation of world-famous festivals. After years of protest at their precarious status, without effect, there was no other way, they felt, to gain attention. Nevertheless, on other even more basic issues – the condition of women, the environment and, to some extent, problems of work – the situation seems to be reversed. Rational arguments for reform (discussed in previous chapters) are emotionally ‘repressed’ by powerful and wealthy forces in society: namely, economic elites in the case of the environment, even if it leads to planetary disaster, and patriarchal elites

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refusing women’s advancement, contrary to the most elementary precepts of social justice. For, as Gramsci recognises, only when feeling becomes understanding is the relationship between elites and citizens one of democratic representation. Thus, whether reason and emotion are mainly involved on one side or the other, without this ‘organic’ relationship the divorce between values and procedures, or between feelings and rationality, aggravates the democratic deficit. The solution is not, as dominant classes would have it, more neoliberalism, but more democracy. This is so because the stronger and more closely knit the collusive circle of economic and political elites – reflecting the imperatives of capitalism, expressed by the need for economic growth in an internationally competitive environment – the greater is the distance from the concerns of ordinary people. The elites are acting according to market forces, not democratic values. Only the regeneration of these values, with renewed integrity of professional standards, can re-establish the autonomy of political and social spheres, making them more resistant to the encroachment of market forces and restoring democracy’s vital representative function.

Appendix: Structure/Action Theories of Bourdieu, Touraine, Giddens and Archer: a Comparison

I shall start by considering the relationship between theories and the society they seek to explain; and then, analysing these theories, examine different perspectives on structure and agency. Bourdieu, as noted above, privileges structural constraints on actors, while Touraine to the contrary emphasises the voluntarism of social movements in a loosely structured (fragmented) context. Both theorists are transformatively engaged in the societies they write about: Bourdieu scrutinises the social institutions of domination: the economic system and the role of education, including the strategic grandes écoles, on the one hand, and poverty among the dominated, on the other, while Touraine advocates social change through the free and creative action of existing or emerging social movements. This concrete engagement of Bourdieu and Touraine at the level both of theory and ‘social reality’ is in marked contrast to the highly abstract theorising of Margaret Archer and Anthony Giddens. I will come back to this point later.

Giddens: structuration theory Giddens – to consider his work first of all – nevertheless shares with Bourdieu and Touraine his concern for the issues of social theory: issues that ‘are to do with the nature of human action and the acting self; with how interaction should be conceptualized and its relation to institutions; and with grasping the practical connotations of social analysis’ (Giddens, 1986: xvii). These practical connotations, for Giddens, evidently concern the problem of action, which is traditionally understood in terms of the dichotomy between objectivism and subjectivism. In Giddens’ interpretation (1987, 1997: 59–60) Bourdieu’s perspective is objectivist: ‘the social object (society) has some sort of priority over the individual agent’ and ‘social institutions are regarded as the core concern of social analysis’. Subjectivism (Touraine) essentially means the opposite. ‘The human agent is treated as the prime focus of social analysis’; the ‘main concern of the social sciences is held to be the purposeful, reasoning actor’. For Giddens, each of these perspectives has its attractions. The objectivists, he writes, have surely been correct in arguing that society or social institutions have structural properties stretching ‘beyond’ the activities of individual members of society. Yet those who veer towards subjectivism ‘have quite rightly seen us as beings capable of understanding the conditions of our own action, as acting intentionally and having reasons for what we do’. 149

150 Social Movements and Symbolic Power But each perspective also has its shortcomings. Objectivists typically are not adept at capturing qualities that have to be attributed to human agents, such as self-understanding and intentionality. Conversely, the focus of subjectivists tends to lead them away from study of long-term processes of change and large-scale organisation of institutions. Giddens’ alternative approach – ‘structuration theory’ – considers (as I do) that the ‘seeming opposition of perspectives’ actually disguises a complementarity. ‘This dualism should actually be represented as a duality, the duality of structure’: According to the notion of the duality of structure, by contrast, structure is not as such external to human action, and is not identified solely with constraint. Structure is both the medium and the outcome of the human activities which it recursively organizes. Institutions, or large-scale societies, have structured properties in virtue of the continuity of the actions of their component members. But those members of society are only able to carry out their day-to-day activities in virtue of their capability of instantiating those structural properties. (61) On the one hand, from the point of view of agency, ‘the context of activities in which human agents are implicated’ forms part of ‘the practical mastery of social relations which human agents display’: a ‘complex relation’ between ‘the individual as an agent and the institutions which the individual constitutes and reconstitutes in the course of the duration of day-to-day activity’ (62–3). On the other hand, when structure is understood as ‘rules and resources implicated in the “form” of collectivities of social systems, reproduced across space and time’, then structure is the ‘very medium’ of the ‘human’ element of human agency. (For ‘rules’ comprise both normative elements and ‘codes of signification’, while ‘resources’ are ‘authoritative’ – coordinating human agents – as well as ‘allocative’, stemming from ‘control of material products’: 1986: xxxi, 18, 32–3; in other words, issues of political power and economic system.) Yet, at the same time, agency is the medium of structure, which individuals routinely reproduce. ‘All social life has a recursive quality to it, derived from the fact that actors reproduce the conditions of their social existence by means of the very activities that – in the contexts of time-space – constitute that existence’ (1987, 1997: 220–1). Giddens’ structuration theory is close to Bourdieu’s notion of ‘habitus’, which is both structured (by the ideas and practices of the dominant classes) and structuring (when internalised by the dominated classes and thus conditioning their appropriate behaviour). But whereas Bourdieu tends to a deterministic outcome – reproducing domination – even if modified by relations with ‘fields’ and ‘capitals’, Giddens is open-minded. Thus, power, in his view, may be constraining, but it may also be ‘enabling’ (1984, 1999: 25) – that is, providing the liberating capacity to overcome repression. (Giddens, with reference to Touraine’s work, indeed supports the role of social movements: 203–6.) For power is at the very origin of the capabilities of agents to bring about change. Thus, ‘whether mainly as a result of conscious planning or in a fashion more or less unintended by any of those involved, actors modify their conduct and that of others in such a way as to reshape modes of authority relations’ (173, 178).

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‘Domination’ and ‘power’, Giddens insists, cannot be thought of only in terms of asymmetries of distribution, but have to be recognised as inherent in human action as such. Signification (symbolic orders or modes of discourse), domination (political and economic institutions) and legitimation (legal institutions, norms) are the three structural dimensions of social systems (30–2). Hence (unlike Bourdieu) agency is important in Giddens’ structuration theory. At the same time, he warns, it is necessary to avoid the tendency (as with Touraine) to ‘regard society as the plastic creation of human subjects’, deriving from the failure adequately to conceptualise the duality of structure. ‘Structure has no existence independent of the knowledge that agents have about what they do in their day-to-day activity’, while social systems comprise the ‘situated activities’ of human agents, reproduced across time and space (25–7). In other words, ‘human practices, fashioning and fashioned by structural properties’ (220). Significantly, however, there is one major difference in theoretical/practical approach between Giddens, on the one hand, and Bourdieu and Touraine, on the other. The latter two, whatever their ‘objectivist’ and ‘subjectivist’ opposition, agree on an ‘intensive’ examination of society, each from a limited, partial, but by the same token, powerfully-charged, engagement. Giddens, by contrast, is ‘extensive’, even eclectic, in the wide theoretical scope of his work. Giddens rejects any single-factor explanation. Indeed, he goes to the other extreme by taking into consideration – with great skill – a multiplicity of relevant factors. The result is to leave the reader lost in admiration at his erudition but confused by the ‘embarrassment of choice’. Thus, Giddens takes into account geography and history, time and space, the body and ‘ontologogical trust’, Freudian psychoanalysis and slips of the tongue, linguistic theories and hermeneutics. ‘Knowledgeability embedded in practical consciousness’, he writes about social actors, ‘exhibits an extraordinary complexity’ (281). Indeed, social change itself ‘depends upon conjunctions of circumstances and events that may differ in nature according to variations of context, where context (as always) involves the reflexive monitoring by the agents involved of the conditions in which they “make history” ’ (245). It is hardly surprising that half way through ‘The Constitution of Society’ the author should seek ‘to ensure that the main threads of the discussion do not become too disaggregated in the reader’s mind’ (162). So far from trying to bring these disparate elements into a unified theoretical scheme (such as a Habermasian ‘life-world’ threatened by economic and political ‘systemic imperatives’) Giddens (rightly, in my view) rejects the notion of ‘universal laws’: There are no universal laws in the social sciences, and there will not be any – not, first and foremost, because methods of empirical testing and validation are somehow inadequate but because, as I have pointed out, the causal conditions involved in generalizations about human social conduct are inherently unstable in respect of the very knowledge (or beliefs) that actors have about the circumstances of their own action. (Introduction, xxxii) Hence Giddens’ ‘double hermeneutic’, that is, ‘the reflexive relation in which the social sciences stand to the human activities they analyse’ (1987, 1997: 43).

152 Social Movements and Symbolic Power Unlike the ‘single hermeneutic’ of the natural sciences, the social sciences operate within a double hermeneutic, involving two-way ties with the actions and institutions of those they study. ‘Sociological observers depend upon lay concepts to generate accurate descriptions of social processes; and agents regularly appropriate theories and concepts of social science within their behaviour, thus potentially changing its character. This introduces an instability into sociological theorizing.’ Moreover, the social world is an internally contested one, in which dissensus between actors and groups of actors – in relation to divergent worldviews or clashes of interest – is pervasive (30–1). Above all, human history is ‘created by intentional activities but it is not an intended project; it persistently eludes efforts to bring it under conscious direction’ (27). Under these circumstances of complexity and instability, ‘every research investigation’ in the social sciences or history is involved in relating action to structure, in tracing conjunctions or disjunctions of intended and unintended consequences of actions and how these affect the fate of individuals. ‘No amount of juggling with abstract consequences’, Giddens rightly emphasises, ‘could substitute for the direct study of such problems in the actual contexts of interaction.’ For the permutations of influences are endless, and there is no sense in which structure ‘determines’ action or vice-versa. ‘The nature of the constraints to which individuals are subject, the uses to which they put the capacities they have and the forms of knowledgeability they display are all themselves manifestly historically variable’ (219). Giddens, then, is very much aware of the ‘main empirical emphases’ (287) which ‘connect with the major tenets of structuration theory’. How, he asks, should we empirically analyse structural constraint? How might we give empirical flesh to the notion of structural contradiction? And what type of research is appropriate to the study of the longue durée (the term used by the French historian Fernand Braudel) of institutional change? The result, in the case of empirical work referred to by Giddens (not, significantly, his own), cannot however be considered to ‘connect’ adequately with structuration theory; nor does it illuminate the structural problems of the educational system in the way that research by Bourdieu and Touraine and their followers has done (see Chapter 3). Admittedly, the empirical report quoted by Giddens is an ‘ethnographic study’ of one school, in Birmingham, and of working-class pupils within it; a great work of its kind, which does not attempt to analyse the system. Yet Giddens claims that the study ‘conforms closely to the main empirical implications of structuration theory’ (289), which if this is the case does little to enhance the reputation of that theory. (Giddens is too modest, however, in arguing that the concepts of structuration theory, for many research purposes, should be regarded as ‘sensitizing devices, nothing more’: 326.) What the matter does show, to the contrary, is the difficulty faced by a highly abstract theorist in ‘connecting’ what I believe is an important theory to what is certainly an important suject (education): precisely in terms of the structural dimensions – signification, domination and legitimacy – that Giddens himself adduces.

Archer: the morphogenetic approach Margaret Archer, too, admits the ‘high level of abstraction’ of her work, but insists (as does Giddens) that ‘all concepts have their referents’ – features belonging to

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social reality. The point of theory, she writes (1995: 12–13), is practical. ‘It is never an end in itself but a tool for the working social analyst which gives explanatory purchase on substantive social problems, through supplying the terms or framework for their investigation.’ Archer’s work is illuminating and ingenious. Her model of investigation is brilliantly presented in Culture and Agency (1988, revised 1996). In this work she provides ‘an utterly basic account of the linkage between culture and agency’ or structure and agency, which is not just a technical problem of study, but ‘the most pressing social problem of the human condition’. For it is part of our daily existence ‘to feel both free and enchained, capable of shaping our own future and yet confronted by towering, seemingly impersonal constraints’ (Preface, xii–xiii). Archer’s approach, capable of linking structure (or culture) and agency, is based on ‘analytical dualism’, between the cultural system, on the one hand, and sociocultural interaction, on the other. Drawing on the ‘seminal’ work of David Lockwood, she distinguishes between logical consistency or inconsistency at the systemic level (ideas about society are consistent with one another, or not) and high or low integration at the socio-cultural level (where causal relations among people – actors or groups of actors – are either orderly or conflictual). The systemic level is concerned with the consistency or otherwise of our attempts ‘to impose ideational order on experiential chaos’, while the sociocultural level is concerned with causal relations: that is, the success or failure of attempts to order other people. ‘Logical consistency is a property of the world of ideas; causal consensus is a property of people.’ The connection between the two levels (which are analytically distinct) is established by ‘the degree of social uniformity produced by the imposition of culture’ by one set of people on another (4). In other words (28), where there is a high degree of ‘logical consistency’ in the cultural system this is a necessary but insufficient condition for socio-cultural integration; conversely, extensive contradictions in the cultural system encourage but do not determine socio-cultural conflict. In brief (xxii), logical ‘contradictions mould problem-ridden situations for actors’, whose difficulties they must confront in one way or another. By contrast, logical ‘complementarities’ (the internal consistency of ideas) ‘mould problemfree situations for agents’, who are now in a position to (although they may not) build up an ‘elaborate conspectus’ of mutually consistent and reinforcing ideas: ‘a situational logic of reproduction’ of integration. Such ‘subsequent interaction’ is different from earlier action, precisely because it is conditioned by the ‘elaborated consequences’ of that prior action: this is ‘morphogenesis’, the ‘complex interchanges that produce change’ in a system’s form, structure or state (morphostasis is the reverse). The morphogenetic perspective is not only dualistic (structure and agent) but also sequential: ‘endless three-part cycles of Structural Conditioning -/ Social interaction -/ Cultural Elaboration’ operating over time. According to Archer, the ‘crucial’ difference between morphogenesis and ‘conflationist’ theories (discussed below), such as Giddens’ structuration, is that ‘culture and agency operate over different time periods’, because the cultural system logically predates the sociocultural activities transforming it; and ‘cultural elaboration’ logically postdates such interaction (xxiv–xxv). Utilising such a theoretical framework, Archer explains, makes it easier to see how structure and culture intersect. For example, ‘structural interest-groups’

154 Social Movements and Symbolic Power endorse ‘some corpus of ideas’ in order to advance their material concerns, but then become enmeshed in the situational logic of that part of the cultural domain; conversely, ‘ideal-interest groups’ seek powerful sponsors to promote their ideas, but their cultural discourse is then immediately embroiled in powerplay within the structural domain. The final step is to answer the question: ‘when does structure exert more influence over culture and vice versa?’ (xxviii). Theories that ‘conflate’ structure (or culture) and agents, on the contrary, either privilege one level or the other, preventing the autonomy of duality; or if they accept duality (as in Giddens’ structuration) it is in the form of ‘mutual constitution’ of structure and agency which, according to Archer, is equally unacceptable. Conflation, then, is either ‘downwards’ (structure or cultural system dominates actors) or ‘upwards’ (powerful groups dominate the rest through the ‘manipulated consensus’ of ideas, as in Marx’s notion that the ruling ideas about society are those of the ruling class); or conflation may be ‘central’, which is the most insidious form because it appears to allow autonomy to both structure and agents. But this cannot be so (according to Archer), since for Giddens structure is simultaneously both ‘medium and outcome’ of agency, thus preventing their analytical distinction. Downwards conflation, where action is treated as fundamentally epiphenomenal to structure or cultural system is ‘encountered today in any uncompromising version of technical determinism, economism, structuralism or normative functionalism’ (1995: 81). In Culture and Agency, Archer notably criticises Parsonian functionalism and the structural anthropology of Lévy–Strauss. For Parsons, systemic values, necessary for the functioning of social systems, shape role activities leading to social integration (Archer, 1996: 32–7). In the words of Lévy-Strauss, however, cultural phenomena are those ‘whose inmost nature is the same as language’, where the hidden structure takes the form of a code (ignoring the empirical referent). As Archer puts it, ‘the purposive human subject, his practical discourse and consciousness, his promotive interaction with others, are all absent in this theory’. Both functionalism and structuralism, Archer concludes, ‘elaborate on the theme of society predominating over the individual’ (38–42). Conversely, upwards conflation is from the bottom up, ‘since it is SocioCultural conflict which generates a common Cultural system – usually represented as “the dominant ideology” ’ or ‘manipulated consensus’ shaped by those in power (47). But direction upwards, so far from being the monopoly of dominant groups at the level of socio-cultural interaction (as in the case of Bourdieu’s theory of habitus) could equally be attributed, in my view, to Touraine’s ‘active subject’. For the subject, grouped with others in social movements, acts both in cooperation and contestation with political institutions, which themselves mediate between the state and the citizen. Here, the active subject, putting pressure on the political system, shapes the social structure. In this way – escaping Archer’s strictures – Touraine maintains the analytical duality of structure and agency. On the other hand, Touraine also privileges the actor over the structure, which is ‘fragmented’ (subjectively) into consumerism and search for identity and (objectively) into the power of production and state power. Archer’s upwards conflation would seem to be an unsatisfactory category, if it could include such contrary theorists as Bourdieu and Touraine, both of whom

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are moving from social interaction upwards; and even more so, if Touraine’s conceptual framework is both conflated and analytically dualistic. (Perhaps the best way to resolve the conflationary problematic is to adopt Giddens’ theory of ‘mutual constitution’.) Is Archer’s critique of central conflation more coherent, admitting that Giddens’ eclecticism is also open to the charge of incoherence? For, to add to the ambiguity, Bourdieu’s habitus theory (as noted above) is close to Giddens’ structuration: the habitus is structured (by dominant ideas and activities) and in turn structures the behaviour of dominant and dominated alike. Now, Bourdieu’s theory can be interpreted in a way that allows autonomy (like Giddens) to both agency and structure, precisely by putting greater emphasis on the ‘indeterminate’ components of the theory, that is, the role of fields and capitals. In other words, Bourdieu’s theory can be considered to be both upwards and centrally conflated. As for the centrist Giddens, Archer reserves her most stringent criticism for his ‘elisionism’, namely, ‘transcending the dualism between individual and society’ by eliding the two, through insistence on mutual constitution. Elisionism (contrary to morphogenetics) denies the separability of structure and agency, because every aspect of structure is held to be activity-dependent in the present tense; indeed, any causal efficacy of structure is dependent upon evocation by agency (1995: 60). Archer accordingly claims that from Giddens’ elisionist standpoint ‘it becomes impossible to talk about the stringency of structural constraints versus degrees of personal freedom, for in theories based upon central conflation, causation is always the joint and equal responsibility of structure and agency and nothing is ever more attributable to one rather than the other’ (64). This is a very serious charge, for it directly concerns the ‘most pressing social problem of the human condition’ (previously cited), that is, to feel free and yet to be constrained. But is Giddens guilty? In my reading, he is saying something different to ‘every aspect of structure’ being ‘activity-dependent’, that is, conflating the two. He writes of a ‘complex relation’ between the individual as an agent and the institutions he constitutes and reconstitutes; and that when structure is understood as rules and resources (authoritative and allocative) then it is the ‘very medium’ of human agency (Giddens, as cited above, in relation to the theories of Bourdieu and Touraine). But there is no sense in which structure determines action or vice-versa, Giddens declares: the nature of constraints, the uses to which individuals put their capacities and their forms of knowledgeability are ‘manifestly historically variable’. It would, indeed, be possible to countercharge Archer with conflationary tendencies. Proposition (ii) of her ‘four propositions’, elaborated throughout Culture and Agency, represents downwards conditioning, that is: (i) ‘There are logical relationships between components of the Cultural System (CS)’; (ii) ‘There are causal influences exerted by the CS on the Socio-Cultural (S-C) level’; while (iii) and (iv) refer to causal relationships, such as conflict or cooperation, at the S-C level; and ‘elaboration’ of the CS due to S-C modifying current logical relationships and introducing new ones (1996: 106). In the second place, why should only logical relationships – consistency or inconsistency – be taken into account at the crucial systemic level? The ‘prime concern’, Archer writes (106), is to establish the existence of objective contra-

156 Social Movements and Symbolic Power dictions and complementarities within a cultural system, independent of any reference to the socio-cultural level. She admits (228) that analytical dualism – including the decision to consider exclusively logical relations at the systemic level and causal relations at the level of agents – ‘is an artifice of methodological convenience for the components which it disentangles overlap and intertwine in reality’; but it is ‘only the use of this perspective which has permitted the main phases of cultural morphogenesis to be disengaged . . . and the whole process of cultural dynamics to be given some shape’. This is disarming, but hardly convincing. To exclude substantive issues from the cultural system may promote (or preserve) the theory, but it is at the cost of removing any meaning from culture as derived from beliefs and activities at the socio-cultural level, which is that of ‘people’. Yet it is the ‘relational property of people’, significantly, that inspires Archer’s most interesting work, notably in the excellent chapter, ‘The morphogenesis of agency’ in Realist Social Theory. Here she elaborates on the distinction between ‘Primary agents’ (atomistic, unsystematic, lacking a say in structural or cultural moulding) and ‘Corporate agents’ (controlling resources, articulating ideas and creating organisations), and their interaction, in an analysis of educational development, with examples from England and France. She concludes (274): ‘Structure is the conditioning medium and elaborated outcome of interaction: agency is shaped by and reshapes structure while reshaping itself in the process.’ In case this looks too much like structuration theory, she has to distance herself from the ‘vagaries of mutual constitution’, by insisting (and who would disagree?) that the complexity of the process ‘remains hopelessly indefinite unless the interplay between them is unravelled over time to specify the where, when, who and how’. Nevertheless, Archer’s own ‘vagaries’, in particular the ambiguities of ‘conflation’, do create problems for the practical application of theory which, as Archer rightly points out, is a tool for understanding ‘substantive social problems’. For ‘what social reality is held to be cannot but influence how society is studied’ (1995: 12–13). To conclude: Giddens’ and (for the most part) Archer’s highly abstract studies connect only with difficulty to the social reality they seek to explain. Conversely, despite theoretical weaknesses, it is the empirical engagement of Bourdieu and Touraine that enables them to grapple more effectively with people’s representations and practices. Indeed, the striking contrast between their perspectives (radical and reformist), explored in the third chapter, provides the opportunity for others to contest, modify or confirm their findings.

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Index Note: an explanation of certain themes has been added – see capitalism, civil society and democracy – while for other themes brief notes indicate alternative readings (values). This is an early warning system designed to cope with the empirical confusion of opinions and events. abandonment, feeling of 2, 13, 25–6, 48, 143, 146; see also alienation abstention, from voting 1, 12, 15, 38, 143 actor, agent 3, 4, 32–4, 37, 40–1, 43–6, 53–4, 80, 86, 138, 149–56 Adam, B. 66–7 administration see State Africa, 118 Agacinski, S. 109 ageing population 24; see also retirement Albistur, M. 91, 93–4, 97, 111, 117, 128 Algeria 5, 6, 15 alienation 5, 12, 15, 25, 137, 143 Allègre, C. 12 Allwood, G. 91, 93, 103, 106–8, 111 Alzon, C. 117 America (USA) 85, 105, 111, 135, 141 apathy 15, 77 Arab 2, 25 Archer, M. 149, 152–6 Armogathe, D. 91, 93–4, 97, 111, 117, 128 artisans 19, 72 Attac (Association for the Taxation of Financial Transactions – ‘Tobin tax’ – and Aid to Citizens) 143 Aubry, M. 11, 19 authoritarian 20, 32, 101, 139, 142–3 autonomy 36, 44, 49, 78, 80–1, 83, 99, 111, 140, 147, 154 Bachman, C. 25 Badinter, E. 109

Badinter, R. 109 banlieues, suburbs 22, 25–6 Bard, C. 91, 98 Barthe, Y. 69 Baudelot, C. 103–4 Baverez, N. 17, 28 Beauvoir, S. de 89, 94, 97–8, 101–2, 106, 111–12, 118 Bechtel, M.-F. 42 Becker, J.-J. 13, 74, 106 behaviour 4–6, 38, 40, 43–4, 84, 89, 120, 150, 154–5 Bell, L. 85 Benton, T. 66, 68 Bérégovoy, P. 11 Bergounioux, A. 16 Berstein, S. 74 Bianciotti, H. 129–30 biological difference see women’s movement Blanchard, S. 22, 74, 76 Borges, J.L. 129 Boulongne, C. 19 bourgeoisie 7, 8, 27, 32, 73, 78–9, 107 Bourdieu, P. analysis and critique: 31–2, 38–51, 53–6, 78–81, 149–51, 154–6; see also 1–6, 13, 16–17, 21, 22–3, 26, 28, 66, 71–3, 76, 78–81, 84–90, 137–9 Braudel, F. 152 Bronner, L. 76, 146 Cadis (Centre for Sociological Analysis and Intervention) 5, 17, 75 cadres see executives Calamard, A. 96

163

164 Index capitalism: economy, politics and civil society are basic to this study. Their role, however, is ambiguous. Capitalism produces wealth; but it distributes wealth according to its own rules and not those of society – unless, of course, society has become so materialistic that it makes no difference. Capitalism is omnipresent: specific instances follow: 2, 3, 5, 7–10, 12–14, 16, 18, 23–4, 29, 31–2, 37, 39–47, 50, 53–4, 56–7, 59–61, 64–6, 68–70, 75, 77–81, 84, 88–9, 91, 97–8, 100–3, 108–9, 111, 113, 116–17, 119, 122, 128, 132, 135–43, 146–7, 149–50, 154; see also global economy; neo-liberalism capitals 2, 5, 22, 40–6, 48–9, 55, 62, 72, 78, 80, 87, 137–8, 150, 155; see also Bourdieu Caramel, L. 24 carbon dioxide see environment Carlander, I. 104 CFDT see trade unions CGT see trade unions Chaperon, S. 97 Chemin, A. 15 Chirac, J. 1, 9, 11–12, 15, 17, 26, 58, 144 Cixous, H. 111, 119, 128–9, 131–2 citizens 12, 14, 16–17, 21, 22, 26, 32, 36–7, 48, 80, 83, 96, 108–9, 142–4, 147, 154 civil society: defined as individuals and associations acting independently of state and economic system: such as schools, universities, media, religious bodies, professionals, intellectuals, etc. Trade unions are included, because they contest as well as participate in the economic system. Civil society members demand a voice in the formation of public policy affecting their lives – and livelihood. ‘Social movements’ are activist elements in civil society: 3, 32, 50, 59, 62, 70, 85, 118, 135–7, 139–40. class see bourgeoisie; middle class; professionals; elites

classe dirigeante see elites climatic change see global warming Cohen, D. 25 Cohn-Bendit, D. 64, 69–71 Collège de France 5, 16 Colmoo, A.-M. 105 Commoner, B. 65–6 communication 35, 37, 57, 77 Communist Party, communism 6, 8, 11, 16, 28, 45, 49, 61–2, 65, 69, 88 community 32, 34–5, 54–5, 64–5, 67, 69, 87, 109, 137 competition, economic 16, 19, 24, 136, 143, 147 conceptual: scheme, classification, categories see habitus conservative 10, 16, 25; see also Right consumerism 3, 7, 8, 10, 17–18, 26, 33–4, 37, 65, 68, 78–9, 137, 154 contraception 10, 20, 84, 86, 91, 106 corporatism 16, 27, 36, 57, 62, 81 corruption 1, 6, 9–10, 11, 17, 27, 107 Courtois, G. 105 Cresson, E. 11 crisis 5, 11, 14, 23, 27, 29, 33–4, 49–51, 60, 66, 78, 144 culture 2–4, 23, 29, 32, 33–8, 39–46, 59, 61, 64, 66, 72, 77, 79, 87, 93–4, 102, 110, 119, 124, 126–7, 129–30, 137–8, 153–6 cumul: accumulation of elected positions 106–7, 111 Dauphin, S. 107 Davis, H. 19–20 Debord, G. 145 debt 20 decentralisation 11–12, 15 Déchaux, J.-H. 74 delinquency 11, 17, 25, 27, 76–7 Delphy, C. 89, 93–4, 104, 111, 112–19, 122, 126–7, 132, 139–40 democracy: government by consent of the governed, through universal suffrage, free elections, rule of law, etc. Democracy is not abstract perfection:

Index 165 democracy – continued it is socially and historically constituted: Bourdieu’s critique: 44, 47–51; Touraine’s critique: 36–8; democratic deficit: 1–5, 14–15, 17, 18, 27, 28–9, 140–7; see also 33–4, 36, 58–60, 72–4, 76, 79, 85–6, 95–6, 99, 107, 109–10, 136, 139 demonstrations 25, 31, 59–60, 91, 145 deprivation see poverty deregulation 7, 54 Derrida, J. 60 determinism 4, 45, 48, 50, 53, 60, 62–3, 139, 150, 154 differentialist (feminists) 4, 84, 86–7, 90, 93–4, 109–12, 118, 126, 130, 132, 140 Dine, P. 28 disaffection 12, 17 discrimination 2, 17–18, 20–1, 31, 41, 81, 84, 94–5, 99, 102, 104, 106, 118, 139 disillusionment 1, 16, 27, 143 disorientation 22, 77, 137 disposition see habitus division of labour 38–41, 43–4, 46–8, 85–6, 100, 103, 111, 114, 137–8 divorce 10, 28, 91, 137 doctrinaire see determinism domestic mode of production 94, 112–18, 122, 127 domestic work 4, 20, 84–5, 95, 100, 111, 115–17, 138 domination 2–3, 4, 5, 6, 20, 31–2, 38–47, 49–50, 53–6, 59–60, 62–4, 66, 72, 78–9, 83–5, 87–9, 92, 94, 107, 110–11, 113, 115, 117, 119, 126, 137–9, 141, 147, 149–52, 154–5; see also power structure drugs 11, 25, 70 Dubet, F. 25, 75 Duhamel, A. 29 Dupin, E. 16 Ecole nationale d’administration (ENA) 7, 9, 22, 42, 48, 55, 75, 104, 107 ecology see environment economic development see capitalism

education: prime instrument of socialisation – but according to whose model of society? Meritocracy, responsible citizenship or reproducing the dominant order? 2, 3, 5, 10–12, 15–16, 19, 21–4, 26, 28, 33, 36, 41–2, 46–8, 53–5, 57–8, 60, 62, 71–6, 80, 81, 83–4, 88, 91, 94–5, 99, 103–4, 118, 129, 136, 138, 140, 144–5, 149, 152, 156 election campaigns 1, 4, 9, 11, 12, 15, 38, 58, 107, 110–11, 135, 142–3 Eliot, T.S. 128 elites 1–2, 5–7, 9, 10, 14, 16–17, 21–3, 27, 31, 38, 48, 54–5, 60, 71–2, 75, 77, 80, 107, 143–4, 146–7 emancipation 10, 33, 46–7, 79, 84, 86, 88, 95, 108, 112–14, 119 employees: white-collar workers 14–16, 19, 24–5, 72, 99–100, 143 Enlightenment 33, 127 enterprise see capitalism environment: fundamental contradiction between economic imperatives and need for material sacrifices to prevent disaster: 3, 5, 11, 12, 15, 38, 50, 53, 61–2, 63–71, 81, 83, 99, 137, 145–6 equality 2, 4, 14, 37–8, 60–1, 71–4, 84, 86, 89, 93, 95–6, 99, 101–2, 106–7, 109, 112, 118, 126, 136, 139–40, 142; see also values essentialism see feminism Establet, R. 103–4 ethnic minorities 1–2, 4, 7, 61, 109, 137 Europe 1, 12, 55, 58, 65, 67–8, 103, 105, 118, 139 exclusion 3, 5, 11, 13–14, 17, 19, 26–8, 31–2, 38, 41, 51, 59, 77, 107, 110, 118, 140, 143 executives: cadres 4, 14, 16, 19, 21, 22, 24, 38, 54, 74–5, 99, 100, 103–5 Fabius, L. 11–12, 56–8 family 3, 13, 20, 23, 24, 26, 28, 36, 41, 48, 53–5, 72, 74–5, 79, 84, 86, 90, 99–101, 104, 106, 112–13, 117–18, 120–1, 127, 129–30, 138, 140, 145–6

166 Index Fauroux, R. 9, 22–3, 42, 57 Fédida, P. 124 feminism see women’s movement Ferry, L. 145 fields 5, 43–6, 55, 62, 78, 80, 150, 155; see also habitus; Bourdieu Fifth Republic 67 Fillon, F. 14 Flandrin, P. 101–3 Foucault, M. 127–8 Fouque, A. 111, 126–7 Fraisse, G. 84–5, 110–11 freedom 2, 10, 14, 33–7, 47, 51, 54, 61, 76, 86, 95–6, 98, 102, 136, 138, 141–2, 153, 155 French Revolution 20, 95 Freud, S. 91, 93, 119–24, 125–7, 129, 132–3, 151 Gaspard, F. 20, 92–3, 96, 106, 108–10 Gaulle, C. de 6–7, 96–7 Gaullist 6, 8, 11, 28 gay see homosexual gender 47, 76, 86, 89–90, 109, 114–16, 118–19, 138 general interest 27, 33, 81; see also values general will 32, 141 Genisson, C. 99–100 Giddens, A. 149–52, 154–6 Giscard d’Estaing, V. 7, 106 global economy 5, 11, 14, 16, 23, 33, 54–6, 58, 80–1, 135, 137, 143; see also capitalism global warming: greenhouse effect 63–9 Godino, R. 24 Gouges, O. de 96 Goux, D. 22, 74 Gramsci, A. 50, 85, 137, 144, 147 grandes écoles 5, 7, 22–3, 41–2, 75, 104, 107, 149 Great Britain 84, 105, 111, 117, 140–1, 156 Greeks 120, 123–4, 142 Greens, les verts 11, 61, 64, 69–71; see also environment Gregory, A. 117 Guibert, N. 23, 76

Guigou, E. 11–12, 95–6, 101, 106–8 Gunther, R. 132 Habermas, J. 151 habitus 5, 40, 41, 44–7, 55, 60–3, 78, 150, 154–5; see also field; Bourdieu Halimi, G. 92, 101, 106, 108, 110–11 Hantrais, L. 24 Harismendy, P. 28 hegemony 85, 137; see also Gramsci Heinich, N. 99 Hewlett, N. 29 hierarchical structure 18, 31, 38, 45–7, 49, 71, 73, 93, 115, 132; see also Bourdieu Holland, A. 21 Hollande, F. 15 homeless 3, 13, 19, 59 homosexual: gay 38, 61, 70, 89 Hulot, N. 70 human rights see values identity 4, 20–1, 28, 33–7, 54–5, 76–7, 86, 89, 107, 110, 119, 123, 125, 127, 137, 154 ideology 8, 16, 28, 36, 39, 44, 69, 77, 91–3, 114, 119, 126, 154; see also values imaginaire 123, 125 immigrant 1, 3, 5, 9, 10, 16, 23, 25, 60–1, 70; see also ethnic minority individualism, personal lifestyle 3, 16, 20, 24, 26, 28, 32–4, 40, 45, 62, 72, 75, 77, 87, 137–8, 141, 143, 146, 150, 152, 155 industry, -ial see capitalism inequality 2, 3, 4, 5, 14, 15–19, 24, 28, 31, 37, 47, 53, 58–9, 72–3, 75, 86, 88, 92, 94–5, 97–8, 100, 103–5, 109–110, 112, 114, 118, 138 inferiority 20, 40, 46, 54, 72, 76, 97–8, 109, 112, 126, 137–8 information (technology) revolution 24, 28, 33, 37, 74 insecurity 5, 11, 12, 15, 18, 25–7 institution, -al 3–4, 14, 17, 20, 26, 32, 35, 37, 41–2, 49, 63, 84, 86–7, 92, 106, 111, 127, 139–42, 149–50, 152, 155

Index 167 integration, social (or lack) 23, 25, 26, 32–6, 40, 54, 61, 84, 91, 93, 98, 153–4 intellectuals 14, 29, 37, 39, 44, 50, 59–60, 79, 80, 112, 140, 144 internalisation, of dominant discourse 38–9, 44, 46, 48, 53–4, 62, 125, 137–8, 150 Irigaray, L. 111, 119, 128, 130–3 Jacobs, M. 68 Jaffré, J. 14, 71, 143–4 Japan, 65 Jones, E. 119–20, 129 Jospin, L. 9, 11–12, 15, 22, 26, 56, 64, 70, 75, 99, 105–6 journalism 9 Joyce, J. 93, 127, 129 judiciary, law 9, 11, 33, 36–7, 39, 43, 70, 75, 85, 87, 91, 98, 100, 106, 108–10, 123, 126, 139–40, 142 Julliard, J. 27, 69–70 Juppé, A. 11, 58–9 knowledge, production of 22–3, 38, 40, 42–3, 46, 51, 74, 75–6, 84, 111, 124, 127, 130, 144, 146, 151–2 Kofman, S. 126–7 Krémer, P. 92, 100–1, 117 Kriegel, B. 110 Kristeva, J. 111, 119, 122–7 Kyoto (environment) 65, 70 labour see work Lallemont, M. 74–5 Lane, J. 45, 80–1 Lang, J. 12 Lascoumes, P. 69 Laronche, M. 146 law see judiciary Le Boucher, E. 145 Leclerc, A. 128–30, 132, 139 Le Doeuff, M. 110 Le Gall, A. 108–9 Le Gendre, B. 97 Le Pen, J.-M. 1, 9, 12, 15; see also far Right; National Front Left (socialism, communism, Greens) 9, 11–12, 14, 16, 31, 49, 58, 61, 63, 70, 108, 110, 143; extreme Left 2, 15, 16, 143

legitimacy 31, 40, 42, 44, 50–1, 69, 71–2, 80, 86, 110, 126, 133, 143, 151–2; see also values leisure 10, 79 lesbians 89 Lévy-Strauss, C. 154 Liberatore, A. 67–8 liberty see freedom libido 120–1, 126, 131 Lipietz, A. 69, 110 Lipovetsky, G. 76–7, 79–80 literature, literary 47, 89, 93–4, 104, 111, 125, 127, 129 living standards 7, 10, 13–14, 23, 66, 79, 136 Locke, J. 83, 85, 141 Lockwood, D. 153 Loiseaux, D. 103 Louis, M.-V. 91 love 120–1, 128–32 Maire, E. 101–2 Maire, J. 70–1 male, masculine 20–1, 32, 41, 46, 84, 86–92, 96–8, 101, 103, 105, 107, 109–12, 117–19, 122, 124, 126, 128, 130–4, 137–40 managers see executives marginal, -ised 3, 8, 22, 31–2, 38, 59, 61, 90, 95, 141 market forces see capitalism Maruani, M. 100–1, 105 Marx, Marxism, neo-Marxist 89, 91, 93, 111–19, 120, 122, 139, 154 maternity 91, 103, 111, 124, 127 Mathieu, N.-C. 89–90, 92–3 Mattei, B. 71 Mauduit, L. 18 Maurin, E. 22, 74 Maurois, P. 11 McCarthy, M. 64 Méda, D. 100, 103, 111, 117–18 media 14, 16, 17, 37, 48, 61–2, 78–9, 106, 137 Mégie, G. 65 Mény, Y. 1–2 middle class 7, 10, 19, 22, 46–7, 75, 116 Mill, J.S. 141 Miné, M. 101

168 Index misrecognition 43–4, 78, 80, 86, 92, 140; see also Bourdieu Mitterrand, F. 8, 11, 15 mobilisation 35, 43, 44, 47, 50, 56, 60, 70, 78, 84–5, 92, 99, 141 modernisation, modernity 2, 5, 32–4, 54, 70, 72, 77, 79, 87, 128, 136–7 moral discourse see values Mouvement de libération des femmes (MLF) see women’s movement Mucchielli, L. 26 myth 39, 41, 123–4, 132 National Front 9, 25; see also Le Pen nationalism 1, 9, 17, 33–5, 37, 51, 54–5, 89, 125, 130, 137 natural order 20, 40, 43, 95, 111, 133, 137–8; see also Bourdieu neo-liberalism 5, 7, 14, 28, 31, 54–6, 58–60, 62–3, 81, 119, 143, 147; see also capitalism Notat, N. 101–3 Nouvelles Questions Féministes see women’s movement objectivism see Bourdieu Oedipus complex 119–24, 133; see also Freud officials see State oppression 37, 88, 90, 92–4, 109, 113–17, 128, 132 Ory, P. 28 Orwell, G. 143 ozone layer 65–7; see also environment parity (parité) 4, 11, 38, 86–7, 92–4, 107–11, 118, 139, 141; see also women’s movement; politics Parsons, T. 154 Pascal, B. 46 Passeron, J.-G. 72 patriarchy 84, 91–2, 95–6, 111–17, 119, 127, 132, 139–40, 146 perception, categorisation 31, 39–40, 47–8, 78; see also Bourdieu permissive behaviour 3, 10, 33, 53, 62, 76–80, 137

Perrot, M. 96–7, 109 personality, personal behaviour 10, 34–6, 77, 140; see also individualism Péry, N. 92 petty bourgeoisie 10, 19, 38, 45, 54, 79 phallus, phallocrat 120–2, 126–8, 132 Picq, F. 92–3, 111–12 Pisier, E. 109 pluralist Left 11, 15, 16, 64; see also Left politics, political parties: Politics as mediation between citizens’ desires and business demands: 1–3, 5, 7–10, 14–17, 20, 21, 26–9, 33–4, 36–8, 41, 44, 46–9, 54–6, 61, 64, 66, 69, 71, 73, 77–81, 85–6, 88, 93–4, 96–9, 101, 104, 105–8, 109–12, 114–15, 118, 125, 128, 132–3, 135–8, 140–4, 154 pollution 65, 68–70 Pompidou, G. 7 ‘popular classes’, ‘ordinary people’ 10, 14, 26–8, 53, 59, 73, 75–6, 84, 102, 143–4, 147, 156 Portelli, H. 69–70 postmodern 28, 76–7, 80, 111–12, 127–8, 139 poverty, deprivation 5, 13, 15–19, 22, 24, 25, 27–8, 31, 42, 44–5, 51, 58, 74, 96, 105, 117, 136, 141 power structure 2–3, 18, 21, 27, 33–6, 41, 43, 47–50, 53, 55, 62, 78, 80, 84–5, 90, 93, 96, 107, 109, 111, 114, 124–6, 127–30, 137–40, 149–51, 154; see also domination practice 39–40, 45, 48, 63, 93, 127–8, 139, 142, 151, 153, 156; see also Bourdieu pragmatism 85–6, 93, 102, 111, 140 ‘precarious’ work see work private sector 7, 9, 21, 55, 57, 60 private sphere 20, 41, 47, 54, 77, 86, 138–9 privatisation 11, 54 professions, liberal 4, 10, 19, 38, 46–7, 54, 74, 88, 94, 97, 99, 101, 104, 135, 140–1

Index 169 profit see capitalism promotion, ‘glass ceiling’ 4, 84, 99, 103–5, 141, 147 property 96, 128, 136, 141 protectionism, economic 23, 31, 56 protests, acts of see demonstrations Proust, J. 124 Proust, M. 129 psychoanalysis 89, 111–12, 118–22, 124, 126–7, 129, 133, 139, 151; see also Freud; Kristeva public opinion 14, 35, 48–9, 61–2, 69, 107–8, 181 public sector 7, 9, 21, 54, 60 public service see State Rabinow, P. 127 racism 26, 51; see also Right, extreme radicalism 2, 5, 10, 32, 47, 50, 56, 60, 64, 66, 83–7, 90–4, 114–15, 136–7, 156 Raffarin, J.-P. 12, 14, 27, 58, 70 Ramonet, I. 103 rape 91 reason, rationality 32, 33–5, 54, 64, 72, 95, 123–5, 128, 137, 144–7, 149 Redclift, R. 66, 68 reforms, reformism 2, 4, 5–6, 10–12, 16, 31–2, 47, 50, 53, 56–9, 60, 63–4, 66, 80, 83–7, 90–4, 105, 107, 110, 114, 116, 139–40, 144–6, 156 religion 17, 28, 29, 37, 41, 43, 78, 109, 119, 123, 130, 133, 137–8 Rémond, R. 14 representation see democracy repression 27, 51, 92–3 reproduction, of social order 41, 43, 48, 62, 72, 79, 92, 107, 138, 150–1, 153; see also Bourdieu Republican model 2, 13–14, 21–2, 25–7, 37, 56, 71–3, 80–1, 86, 95, 108–9, 11, 128, 140 retirement (pensions) 10, 12, 58–60, 144–5 revolt 26, 55–6, 59–60, 98, 113–15; see also demonstrations

revolution, -ary 3, 10, 31–2, 36, 47, 49–51, 53, 76–7, 83–5, 92–3, 95–7, 102, 112–14, 116, 122, 139–40 Ricoeur, P. 124 Right 5, 8, 9, 11–12, 14, 16, 31, 49, 58, 70, 108, 110; see also conservative; Gaullist; extreme Right 2, 15, 17, 25; see also Le Pen; National Front ‘Rights of Man’ 86, 95–6; equal rights see equality Rioux, J.-P. 73–4 Rocard, P. 11, 24 Rochefort, R. 27 Rodgers, C. 20, 106, 110–11, 119, 124–6, 132 Rosanvallon, P. 16, 29 Roudinescu, E. 109 Roudy, Y. 100 Rousseau, J.-J. 32, 95, 141 rural society, farmers 7, 19, 29, 38, 54, 72–3, 102 Saglietti, C. 24 salaries, wages 4, 21, 99–100, 102, 104–5; see also work sans-papiers 3, 16, 38, 61, 99 Sarkozi, N. 27 Sarraute, N. 129–30 Sartre, J.-P. 29, 32 Schmid, L. 55 school see education security see insecurity Servan-Schreiber, C. 108–9 sex, sexuality 10, 33–4, 41, 44, 77, 79, 84, 87, 89–91, 93–5, 100, 102–3, 106, 108–10, 114–15, 120–2, 125–7, 132, 137 Sieyès, abbé 95–6 social change 2–4, 10, 16, 34–5, 38, 42, 46, 53, 55, 59, 62–4, 66, 84–5, 114–15, 118, 140–1, 149–51 ‘social fracture’ 2, 5, 14, 15, 17, 18, 27–9, 38 social justice 27, 35, 61, 85; see also values

170 Index social movements: the ‘activist’ element of civil society, uniting specific demands with universal values: 1–2, 4–6, 31–2, 35–8, 50, 53, 56, 59–62, 64, 78, 80, 85, 87, 89–90, 92, 94, 95, 102, 105, 119, 137–8, 140–1, 144–6, 149–50, 154; see also Touraine social order, established order 5, 39, 95 social security see welfare state social structure 39, 51, 54, 66, 71, 80 socialisation 23, 87 Socialist Party, social democracy 8, 11, 15, 16, 25, 62–3, 67, 69, 99, 108–10, 119, 141 society, ‘social link’ 1–2, 23, 26, 28, 33, 35–7, 39, 44, 49–51, 60, 70, 72, 76–7, 83–5, 87–8, 90–1, 96–8, 106, 109, 115, 118, 132, 137, 139, 145–7, 149–52, 154–6 solidarity 14, 35, 37, 60, 64, 86, 89, 102, 112, 142, 146 Solidarnosc (Solidarity) 37, 50 Spitz, B. 58 State: instrument of elitist domination or protector of the people: 3–5, 7–9, 12, 23, 27–8, 31, 33, 35–7, 41, 48, 54–8, 60, 69, 70, 80–1, 84–5, 88, 101, 105, 117, 129, 137–8, 140, 145, 154 status 20, 28 Strauss-Kahn, D. 11 stress 54, 146 strikes 11, 31, 59–60, 62, 145 struggle 4, 21, 35, 43–5, 49–50, 55, 61, 80, 84–5, 87, 91, 97–9, 102, 113, 118, 131, 139–40, 146; see also protests students 37, 59–60, 75; and ‘events’, 1968 10, 15, 37, 92, 102, 106, 125 subject, the 3, 5–6, 31, 34–5, 54, 72, 78, 81, 86, 89, 98, 101, 125, 127, 137, 154; see also Touraine subjectivism 17, 39–40, 77, 111, 149–50; see also Bourdieu suburbs, poor see banlieues subversion 44, 47, 49–50, 60, 112, 128–9

Surdut, M. 101 sustainable development see environment symbolic power: dominant vision of the world, internalised by the dominated, conditioning their behaviour: 1, 3–6, 21, 31–2, 38–9, 41, 43, 45–7, 51, 53, 59, 61–4, 78, 80, 84, 86, 88–90, 92–6, 112, 122, 125, 128–9, 137–41, 146, 151; ‘reverse’ symbolic power: largely unrecognised by Bourdieu, becomes possible when ‘utopias’ – alternative visions of society – mobilise the dominated to challenge the established order: 4, 45, 50–1, 62–4, 84, 88–9, 112, 128, 139–40, 146; see also Bourdieu tactics, re. feminism 90–1 Tchernia, J.-F. 10 teachers 16, 21, 59, 74, 102, 104–5, 145–6 technocrats 9, 14, 16, 38, 44, 51, 54, 56, 60, 66, 72, 80; see also elites Tenzer, N. 16 terrorism 64 Third Republic 6, 9, 21 Thompson, J. 39 Tocqueville, A. de 32 tolerance see values Topfer, K. 66 Touraine, A. analysis and critique: 31–8, 50–1, 53–64, 77–81, 149–51, 154–6; see also 1–6, 13, 17, 23, 29, 66, 69, 71–3, 75, 77–9, 81, 84–90, 105, 137–8 trade unions 3, 5, 8, 20, 26, 35–6, 38, 50, 53, 57, 59, 61–2, 81, 101–3, 116–17, 135, 137, 145–6 Trannoy, A. 19 Tratt, J. 110 trente glorieuses 7, 13, 17, 73 Tricot, B. 96 unconscious, the 3, 40–1, 44, 47, 53, 61, 64, 87–8, 122–3, 125, 131, 138 unemployment 3, 5, 8, 10, 11, 13, 15–20, 23–5, 27, 28, 38, 54, 59–60, 76, 88, 100, 107, 141

Index 171 universality 4, 6, 17, 21, 33–4, 38, 44, 45, 61, 72, 77, 80–1, 84, 86–7, 109–12, 128, 137, 140, 151 unskilled see work utopia 49–51, 59, 66, 69, 81, 83–4, 86–7 Vallet, L.-A. 22 values: justification of the established order or inspiration of the common good: 2, 17, 21, 23, 25, 28, 32–7, 40, 43–4, 46, 49–50, 66, 71, 77, 79, 80–1, 83–5, 87–8, 97–8, 110, 112, 118, 127, 132, 140–2, 147 Varikas, E. 110 Veil, S. 106 Vernant, J.-P. 123–4 Vichy 6 Viennot, E. 110 violence 11, 15, 18, 25–6, 41, 51, 76, 91–2, 106, 114, 138, 146 Voynet, D. 11, 71 Wacquant, L. 40, 43, 45–6 Wadia, K. 93, 103, 106–7 wealth 10, 17, 18–20, 22, 42, 57, 107, 113, 136, 146 Weber, M. 136, 142

Weill, N. 15 welfare state 3, 5, 7, 10, 12, 23, 24, 29, 33, 36, 53, 56, 58–60, 83, 85, 116, 138, 140, 145 Wieviorka, M. 17, 26 Windebank, G. 117 Wittig, M. 132 women, condition of 4, 5, 11, 14, 16, 18, 20–1, 24, 28, 29, 32, 41, 46–7, 53–4, 60, 81, 83–94, 95–112, 121–2, 124–6, 127–32, 135, 138–41, 146–7 women and politics 2, 4, 86–7, 105–11 women’s movement 3, 4, 10, 32, 35–6, 38, 47, 50, 53, 61–2, 64, 84–94, 95–112, 125, 127, 137, 139 work, workers; commodity or value: 2–4, 7, 10–11, 14–16, 19–20, 21–3, 26, 36–8, 45, 50, 53–4, 57, 60–1, 69, 70, 72–6, 81, 83–4, 88, 92, 94, 97–9, 100–4, 109, 116–17, 129, 132, 141, 143–4, 146 youth 3, 10, 12, 14–17, 19, 24–7, 37, 57, 60, 73, 76–8, 100, 118, 126, 135, 146 Zappi, S.

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Social Movements and Symbolic Power: Radicalism, Reform, and the Trial of Democracy in France

Democracy in Social Movements

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