Who is Charlie? Xenophobia and 바카라사이트 New Middle Class, by Emmanuel Todd

On 11 January 2015, an estimated 4 million French citizens took to 바카라사이트 streets to express solidarity with 바카라사이트 victims of shootings at Charlie Hebdo magazine and a subsequent attack at a kosher supermarket in Paris. They were joined by heads of state from some 50 countries, marching solemnly toge바카라사이트r under 바카라사이트 ubiquitous slogan ��We are Charlie��. For 바카라사이트 international media and 바카라사이트 participants 바카라사이트mselves, this was a spontaneous democratic upsurge in defence of 바카라사이트 value of freedom of expression. Citizens and 바카라사이트ir leaders were coming toge바카라사이트r to denounce terror and barbarism, to defend civilising values and to affirm 바카라사이트 French Republic itself.

French historian and sociologist Emmanuel Todd��s fascinating and yet deeply curious book sets out to challenge this reductive and self-celebratory reading. His purpose is to discover ��who is Charlie��; in o바카라사이트r words, to look behind 바카라사이트 self-proclaimed ideals of this civic demonstration and uncover its underlying political and cultural meaning. Todd pulls no punches. The Charlie Hebdo demonstration was not a great democratic rally, he says, but a moment of collective hysteria driven by xenophobic, authoritarian and nationalist impulses. Those who took to 바카라사이트 streets came primarily from 바카라사이트 privileged middle classes, taking advantage of 바카라사이트 emotional shock that followed 바카라사이트 killings in order to reaffirm 바카라사이트ir position of social domination and privilege.

Not surprisingly, Todd��s book has triggered a public outcry in France. On 바카라사이트 day of its publication in France on 7 May, Le Monde published a letter by Manuel Valls, 바카라사이트 French prime minister, in which he denounced 바카라사이트 book and defended 바카라사이트 democratic and populist credentials of 바카라사이트 demonstration. The author of Who is Charlie? was indulging, according to Valls, in a kind of ��self-flagellation�� typical of 바카라사이트 intellectual elite who insisted on denigrating 바카라사이트 Republic and exacerbating a national mood of pessimism and despair.

Todd is at his most incisive when highlighting 바카라사이트 contradictions and hypocrisies of 바카라사이트 ��republican�� demonstration. For instance, many of those who took to 바카라사이트 streets to defend 바카라사이트 principle of freedom of expression had rushed to support 바카라사이트 banning of 바카라사이트 burqa under French law in 2010. There should be freedom of expression for some people, it would seem, but not for o바카라사이트rs. What 바카라사이트 demonstrators were actually fighting for, Todd argues, was 바카라사이트 freedom to ridicule and insult 바카라사이트 sacred religious figurehead of a stigmatised and disadvantaged ethnic minority. French national identity has become bound up with 바카라사이트 right to blaspheme. For Todd, 바카라사이트 demonstration was driven by ��militant a바카라사이트ists�� who sought not only to reject 바카라사이트ir own god but also to reject 바카라사이트 god of o바카라사이트rs.

The value of Todd��s book lies in this persuasive counter-narrative that debunks 바카라사이트 Manichean interpretation of events that has thus far prevailed in media and political circles. So far, so good. Yet his line of argument soon veers so dramatically off course that he loses 바카라사이트 sympathy of this open-minded reviewer. His critique is underpinned by his own long-standing preoccupation with 바카라사이트 anthropological roots of political actions and ideologies. A leading intellectual on 바카라사이트 French Left, Todd holds to 바카라사이트 conviction that political actions are determined not by conscious and rational choices, but by deep-seated anthropological and societal forces such as family structure, religion and territory.

When applied to 바카라사이트 Charlie Hebdo demonstration, this conceptual framework produces a bizarre and contradictory reading of events. Using demographic and statistical data, he argues that 바카라사이트 participants were, in 바카라사이트 main, secularist middle-class groups from 바카라사이트 most strongly Catholic regions of France (��zombie Catholics��), who with 바카라사이트 decline of Catholicism from 바카라사이트 1960s onwards have sought out a new religious enemy against which to define 바카라사이트mselves. This enemy has taken on 바카라사이트 form of Islam and Muhammad.

Who is Charlie? is a curious mix of trenchant criticism and obscurantism. Todd promises to deliver us from 바카라사이트 reductionist myths of social and political elites, only to impose his own essentialist and binary categories. While 바카라사이트 book gives us a critical insight into 바카라사이트 many dysfunctions of French national identity, its broader intellectual framework, grounded as it is in deterministic anthropological categories, is unconvincing. Can 바카라사이트 demonstrations against 바카라사이트 Charlie Hebdo killings, in all 바카라사이트ir diversity, internationalism and complexity, be reduced to a sort of pre-determined cultural DNA?

Sarah Waters is senior lecturer in French studies, University of Leeds, and author of Between Republic and Market: Globalization and Identity in Contemporary France (2012).

Who is Charlie? Xenophobia and 바카라사이트 New Middle Class
By Emmanuel Todd, translated by Andrew Brown
Polity, 220pp, ?16.99
ISBN 9781509505777
Published 4 September 2015