Citizenship, Republicanism and Multiculturalism in Contemporary France

Abstract

This article focuses on one of the central controversies in French intellectual debate since the late 1980s: the extent to which traditional republican principles might be reconciled with a recognition of ethnic and cultural diversity, particularly with relation to North African immigrant communities. After locating the debate in its historical and ideological contexts, the article traces the emergence of three types of response: a ‘traditionalist’ view, which refuses to make any concessions to the claims of multiculturalism and which reaffirms the need to uphold the orthodox republican principles of the secular state; a ‘modernizing’ republicanism, which endorses some elements of cultural pluralism while maintaining the validity of key republican concepts; and a ‘multiculturalist’ republicanism, which calls for a pluralist conception of civic identity and a recognition of the positive value of minority cultures. The article concludes with an assessment of the broader questions of political theory raised by this debate.