The French Way (60 page)

57
. See
Tel Quel
, nos. 71-73 (1977).

58
. “L'Américain Connection, ou un peau-rouge en France,”
Le Canard Enchaîné
, 10, 17, 24, 31 August and 6 September 1977.

59
. Even if the thesis about the shift to Americanophilia is a bit overstated, a still useful exposition is Diana Pinto, “De l'anti-américanisme à l'américanophilie: l'itinéraire de l'intelligentsia,”
French Politics and Society
9 (1985): 19-26. See also Diana Pinto, “The French Intelligentsia Rediscovers America” in Lacorne, Rupnik, and Toinet, eds.,
The Rise and Fall of Anti-Americanism
, 97-107; and Pinto, “The Left, the Intellectuals, and Culture.”

60
. Edgar Morin,
Journal de Californie
(Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1970).

61
. Jean-François Revel,
Ni Marx, ni Jésus: de la seconde révolution américaine à la seconde révolution mondiale
(Paris: Éditions Robert Laffont, 1970), translated by J. F. Bernard as
Without Marx or Jesus: The New American Revolution Has Begun
(Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1971). Thirty years later, after 9/11, Revel spoke out again, condemning anti-Americanism; see Jean-François Revel,
L'Obsession anti-américaine
(Paris: Plon, 2002).

62
. Louis Pinot,
L'Intelligence en action: le Nouvel Observateur
(Paris: Éditions A.-M. Métailié, 1984), 195-99.

63
. For the impact of American universities on the left see Jean Daniel, “Les mythes américains de la gauche française,” in
Le Reflux américain: décadence ou renouveau desEtats-Unis?
(Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1980), 111-13.

64
. Michel Crozier,
La Société bloquée
(Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1970), translated by Rupert Swyer as
The Stalled Society
(New York: Viking, 1973). Despite his sympathies for the United States, in the late 1970s Crozier found it complacent and insular; see Michel Crozier,
Le Mal américain
(Paris: Éditions Fayard, 1980), translated by Peter Heinegg as
The Trouble with America
(Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1984).

65
. Daniel, “Les mythes américains,” 109-10.

66
. Jacques Arnault, “Réalités américaines,”
L'Humanité
, 18-20, 25-28 January 1972, 2.

67
. Jacques Chirac,
Discours pour la France à l'heure du choix: la lueur de l'espérance
(Paris: Livre de Poche, 1981), 392, 398-401.

68
. As an early indicator of this trend, one of de Gaulle's former ministers, Alain Peyrefitte, published a best-seller in 1976 titled
Le Mal français
(Paris: Plon, 1976), translated by William R. Byron as
The Trouble with France
(New York: Knopf, 1981), that argued for a more open society and more competitive practices in the economy and education, which provoked some observers to suggest the Gaullists were giving in to the American model.

69
. Jean-Pierre Chevènement, “Pour l'indépendance nationale,”
Le Monde
, 11 May 1983, 2.

70
. Anicet Le Pors,
Marianne à l'encan
(Paris: Éditions Sociales, 1980), 201.

71
. Robert Solé, “M. Jean-Paul Sartre exprime…,”
Le Monde
, 24 September 1977, 4.

72
. Jacques Thibau,
La France colonisée
(Paris: Éditions Flammarion, 1980), 267.

73
. Michel Jobert,
Les Américains
(Paris: Éditions Albin Michel, 1987), 105.

74
. Jobert,
Les Américains
, 177.

75
. The essential studies are: Anne-Marie Duranton-Crabol,
Visages de la nouvelle droite: le GRECE et son histoire
(Paris: Presses de Sciences Po, 1 988) and Pierre-André Taguieff,
Sur la nouvelle droite: jalons d'une analyse critique
(Paris: Éditions Descartes et Cie, 1994).

76
. GRECE and
Le Figaro Magazine
parted ways after 1981 when the latter, directed by Louis Pauwels, embraced Reaganism and Atlanticism; see Duranton-Crabol,
Visages
, 228-29).

77
. Alain de Benoist, quoted in Taguieff,
Sur la nouvelle droite
, 57.

78
. Guillaume Faye, “La culture-gadget,”
Eléments
46 (1983): 11.

79
. Quoted by Taguieff,
Sur la nouvelle droite
, 303.

80
. Cercle Héraclite, “La France de Mickey,”
Eléments
57-58 (1986): 9.

81
. Jean-Louis Cartry, “French Culture kaput?”
Le Figaro Magazine
, 23 February 1980, 85.

82
. Cercle Héraclite, “La France de Mickey,” 8.

83
. Quoted by Taguieff
Sur la nouvelle droite
, 302.

84
. Alain de Benoist,
Europe, Tiers Monde, même combat
(Paris: Éditions Robert Laffont, 1986), 219. See also Alain de Benoist, cited in Alain Rollat, “Le GRECE prêche la ‘guerre culturelle' contre la civilisation ‘américanooccidentale,' “
Le Monde
, 20 May 1981, 10.

85
. Alain de Benoist, quoted in Duranton-Cabrol,
Visages
, 209.

86
. Cercle Héraclite, “La France de Mickey,” 8.

87
. Olivier Dard, “La nouvelle droite et la société de consommation,”
Vingtième Siècle
91 (2006): 127.

88
. Faye, “La culture-gadget,” 2, 5-12.

89
. Taguiefí,
Sur la nouvelle droite
, 302.

90
. Henri Gobard,
La Guerre culturelle, logique du désastre
(Paris: Éditions Copernic, 1979), 83.

91
. Jean-Marie Benoist,
Pavane pour une Europe défunte
(Paris: Éditions Hallier, 1976), 87-89.

92
. The quotations by Baudrillard that follow, unless otherwise noted, are from the American edition: Jean Baudrillard,
America
, trans. Chris Turner (London: Verso, 1988). The original text is
Amérique
(Paris: Éditions Bernard Grasset, 1986). Baudrillard reiterated his observations at a conference sponsored by New York University in 1991 in “L'Amérique, de l'imaginaire au virtuel,” in
L'Amérique des Français
, ed. Christine Fauré and Tom Bishop (Paris: Éditions F. Bourin, 1992), 29-36.

93
. See, for example, Robert Hughes, “Patron Saint of Neo Pop,”
New York Review of Books
, i June 1989, 29-32; and Richard Poirier, “America Deserta,”
London Review of Books
11 (1989): 3, 5, 6.

94
. Baudrillard, “L'Amérique, de l'imaginaire au virtuel,” 33. Jacques Meunier, “Le roi Baudrillard au pays des Yankees,”
Le Monde
, 28 February 1986, 13, scored
Amérique
as vain, trite, and sententious.

95
. Baudrillard, “L'Amérique, de l'imaginaire au virtuel,” 34.

96
. Ibid., 35.

97
. Julliard, “Cette souris est-elle dangereuse?” 20. What prompted this outburst was the announcement by the socialist government that Disney would construct a new theme park outside Paris, which Julliard accepted, even if he detested the park, as a repudiation ofJack Lang's earlier policies.

98
. Jacques Julliard, quoted in Régis Debray, “Confessions d'un antiaméricain,” in Fauré and Bishop, eds.,
LAmérique des Français
, 199.

99
. Guy Scarpetta, “L'Anti-américanisme primaire,”
Le Monde
, 5 November 1980, 2.

100
. See Konopnicki, “A des années-lumière,” and “Le poison français.”

101
. Nicolas Beau, “Les Français de l'Oncle Sam,”
Le Monde
, 4-5 November 1984, iii-iv.

102
. Meunier, “Le roi Baudrillard,” 13.

103
. Dominique Moïsi, “Le déclin de l'anti-américanisme,”
Le Figaro
, 11 November 1984, 14.
Le Point
, in a special issue devoted to the United States (30 June 1986), presented a flattering portrait of a tolerant, free, optimistic society represented by yuppies that included an interview with Ronald Reagan.

104
. Alain-Gérard Slama, “Anti-américanisme: la fin d'un mythe?”
Politique internationale
37 (1987): 26.

105
. See, for example, Paul Gagnon, “French Views of Postwar America, 19191932” (PhD diss., Harvard University, 1960), which he summarized in “French Views of the Second American Revolution,”
French Historical Studies
4 (1962): 431-49; and David Strauss,
Menace in the West: The Rise of French Anti-Americanism in Modern Times
(Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1978).

106
. Michel Winock, “'U.S. go Home': l'antiaméricanisme français,”
L'Histoire
50 (1982): 7-20. Winock was responding to the early anxiety about Ronald Reagan and the rise of the New Right.

107
. Collections from these colloquia are Denis Lacorne, Jacques Rupnik, and Marie-France Toinet, eds.,
L'Amérique dans les têtes: un siècle de fascinations et d'aversions
(Paris: Hachette, 1986), translated by Gerry Turner as
The Rise and Fall of Anti-Americanism: A Century of French Perception
(New York: St. Martin's, 1990); and Fauré and Bishop, eds.,
L'Amérique des Français.
Some select recent studies are Philippe Roger,
The American Enemy: The History of French Anti-Americanism
, trans. Sharon Bowman (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005); Mathy,
Extrême-Occident;
Philippe Roger,
Rêves et cauchemars américains: Les Etats-Unis au miroir de l'opinion publique française, 1945-1953
(Villeneuve d'Ascq, France: Presses universitaires du septentrion, 1996); Jacques Portes,
Fascination and Misgivings: The United States in French Opinion, 1870-1914
, trans. Elborg Forster (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000); Seth Armus,
French Anti-Americanism, 1930-1948
(Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2007); Revel,
L'Obsession anti-américaine;
Pierre Rigoulot,
LAntiaméricanisme: critique d'unprêt-à-penser rétrograde et chauvin
(Paris: Éditions Robert Laffont, 2004); Richard Kuisel, “The Gallic Rooster Crows Again: The Paradox of French Anti-Americanism,”
French Politics, Culture and Society
19 (2001): 1-16; and Sophie Meunier, “Anti-Americanism in France,”
French Politics, Culture and Society
23 (2005): 126-41.

108
. See Marie-France Toinet, “Does Anti-Americanism Exist?” in Lacorne, Rupnik, and Toinet, eds.,
The Rise and Fall of Anti-Americanism
, 219-35; and Marie-France Toinet, “French Pique and Piques Françaises,”
Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science
497 (1988): 133-41.

109
. The most forceful advocates of the psychological interpretation are André Kaspi, “By Way of Conclusion,” in Lacorne, Rupnik, and Toinet, eds.,
The Rise and Fall of Anti-Americanism
, 336-43; and Pierre Guerlain,
Miroirs transatlantiques: la France et les Etats-Unis entre passions et indifférences
(Paris: Éditions L'Harmattan, 1996).

110
. What eluded these experts, however, was identifying the sources of American images: were they the media, education, intellectuals, politicians, contacts among peoples (or their absence), or simply the
air du temps?

111
. Kaspi, “By Way of Conclusion,” 242.

112
. Jacques Rupnik and Muriel Humbertjean, “Images of the United States in Public Opinion,” in Lacorne, Rupnik, and Toinet, eds.,
The Rise and Fall of Anti-Americanism
, 79. See also Jacques Rupnik, “Anti-Americanism and the Modern: The French Image of the United States in French Public Opinion,” in
France and Modernisation
, ed. John Gaffney (Aldershot, England: Avebury, 1988), 189-205. The parlor game reference is from Pierre Guerlain, “Dead Again: Anti-Americanism in France,”
French Cultural Studies
3 (1992): 201.

113
. Michel Crozier, “Remarques sur l'antiaméricanisme des Français,” in Fauré and Bishop, eds.,
LAAmérique des Français
, 197.

114
. Franz-Olivier Giesbert and Jacques Mornand, “Pourriez-vous vivre à l'américaine?”
Le Nouvel Observateur
, 14 September 1984, 46-50.

115
. Diana Pinto introduced these categories in “De l'anti-américanisme à l'américanophilie.”

116
. Léo Sauvage,
Les Américains: enquête sur un mythe
(Paris: Bibliothèque Mazarine, 1983), 70.

117
. Suffert,
Les Nouveaux Cow-boys
, 172.

118
. Ibid., 235.

119
. Ibid., 8.

120
. Jean-Jacques Servan-Schreiber, “Défi et autre défi,”
Le Monde
, 4-5 November 1984, iv. Servan-Schreiber welcomed what he saw as a new appetite for American technology—especially computers—as a way of advancing French modernization.

121
. Alain Minc,
LAvenir en face
(Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1984).

122
. Pierre Nora, “Le Fardeau de l'histoire aux Etats-Unis,” in
Mélanges Pierre Renouvin: études d'histoire des relations internationales
(Paris: Presses universitaires de France, 1966), 51-74. For his tour ofthe U.S. see the new biography: François Dosse,
Pierre Nora: Homo historicus
(Paris: Editions Perrin, 2011): 93-97.

123
. Pierre Nora, “America and the French Intellectuals,”
Daedalus
107 (1978): 334.

124
. Ibid., 325.

125
. Pierre Nora, “La fascination de l'Amérique,”
L'Histoire
91 (1986): 5.

126
. Ibid.

127
. Jean-Marie Domenach, “Le monde des intellectuels,” in
Société et culture de la France contemporaine
, ed. Georges Santoni (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1981), 331-32.

128
. Jean-Marie Domenach,
Le Crépuscule de la culture française?
(Paris: Plon, 1995), 191.

129
. Quotes in this paragraph are from Domenach,
Le Crépuscule
, 192.

130
. Ibid., 191.

131
. Ibid., 185.