Modern French Politics: Analysing Conflict and Consensus Since 1945

Acknowledgements.

Abbreviations.

Part I. Introduction. .

Part II: A History of Conflict and Revolt. .

France and modernity.

Domestic conflict and international relations.

Political ideology and political parties.

The polarization of the labour movement and the patronat.

Republicanism and manifestations of a more moderate history.

An exceptional history?.

Part III: Political Exceptionalism, 1945-1981.

Consensus politics in Western Europe since 1945.

French politics in the post-war era.

The persistence of radicalism and the absence of Fordist compromise.

Part IV: The End of Exceptionalism? The 1980s and 1990s.

The decline of overt conflict.

Explaining consensus: the 1980s as a moment of tripartite harmony.

Consensus beyond tripartism.

Part V: Social Democracy and the Left. .

The history of social democracy.

The nature of the left in France.

Characterizing the Socialist Party.

A crisis of social democracy?.

Part VI: The Paradoxes of Gaullist Modernization. .

Authoritarian aspects of de Gaulle's rule.

The progress of political stability and democracy.

De Gaulle's foreign policy and the uses of grandeur. .

De Gaulle and the economy: modernization from above.

The unevenness of socio-economic change.

Part VII: The Historical Significance of May 1968. .

Régis Debray and Gilles Lipovestsky: the ruse of reason.

The results of May.

The spirit of May and the Socialist years.

Locating May historically.

Part VIII: The Waning of Intellectual Commitment.

The place of intellectuals in post-war political life.

The decline of the left intellectual.

The re-emergence of liberal political thought.

Part IX: Conclusions.

The end of history.

Fordism and post-Fordism: the regulation school.

Theorizing change.

Appendices.

Bibliography.

Index.