French commemoration: The centenary effect and the (re)discovery of 14–18
A centenary effect is bringing the First World War back into the public sphere in France, even though state authorities have struggled to generate momentum around its national commemorations. First, this article synthesises France's memory of the First World War, comparing it with Australian commemoration, arguing that it is generally consensual and that, to date, there has been an absence of debate over its commemoration. Second, it examines the Mission du Centenaire, France's official board for the commemoration of the centenary of the Great War, the key commemorations announced and the articulations between local, national and international commemorative events. Finally, the article analyses the economic rationale behind the French authorities’ desire for an internationalised centenary, the political messages articulated through the memory of the conflict and the level of popular interest in the centenary commemorations since 2013. 在法国，一战的百年效应就是让一战回到公共领域，政府当局大力营造国家纪念的声势。本文首先对法国的一战记忆做了综述，并同澳大利亚的纪念活动进行比较，指出法国的特点是普遍共识，至今关于一战的纪念并无辩论。本文还研究了法国官方的大战百年纪念委员会即“百年使命”，宣布的主要纪念活动以及地方、国家、国际层面的纪念活动的结合。本文最后分析了法国当局希望百年纪念国际化背后的经济理性、通过战争的记忆所传达的信息、以及2013年以来公众对于百年纪念活动热情的程度。
IV: Political Process: Public Opinion, Attitudes, Parties, Forces, Groups and Elections/Vie Politique: Opinion Publique, Attitudes, Partis, Forces, Groupes et Élections
After Germany's anti-Semitic past, current attitudes towards refugees and immigrants are surveyed and compared with other countries. Frequent xenophobia in former East Germany, despite fewer foreigners than in West Germany, is explained by official denial of fascist legacy, in contrast to Western re-education policy of Nazism. Islamophobia and allegations of welfare tourism are a xenophobic obsession. Yet, overall attitudes towards outsiders have improved with legislative changes in immigration policy and citizenship acquisition — anti-Muslim demonstrations by PEGIDA in Dresden and arson attacks on asylum homes notwithstanding. Younger, better-educated Germans are far less xenophobic. This analysis of German public discourse provides relevant statistics on immigration, explores contested integration/asylum policies, scrutinizes implications of categories from the cultural repertoire through which migrancy is understood and assesses the contending political forces. [R, abr.]
The Generation of Memory: Reflections on the “Memory Boom” in Contemporary Historical Studies
“Whoever says memory, says Shoah.” This is the cryptic remark of one of the fathers of the “memory boom” among historians, Pierre Nora, French political scientist, publisher at the prestigious house of Gallimard, and the agent provocateur and inspiration behind one of the most influential ventures in cultural history over the last twenty years, Les lieux de mémoire. In a series of stately tomes published between 1984 and 1992, Nora solicited and reshaped essays by leading French scholars that, taken together, constitute an inventory of knowledge and conjecture about memory in the French historical context memory as frozen in statues, in objects, in street names, in ceremonies, in political parties, in legends, in myths, even in historical works. The success of this venture has been astonishing. The collection has sold over half a million copies in France alone. All