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own supports." But this does not necessarily mean that publishers
imposed their own culture on France. Television coverage did
indeed influence the
1968
events, but does this mean that now more
than in
1933
or
1939-1945
individuals are able to escape the larger
political struggles in their personal lives, or that events replaced
work as journalists replaced authors? Even though such formula–
tions must be understood within the French context , we cannot
ignore the ideological slant. Nor can we make much sense of
Debray's cosmic leaps : from one country to another, from one disci–
pline to another, from one theory to another, from one writer to
another. But in conjunction with surveys , Debray' s affirmations
convey an air of scientism. And his scientific Marxism is more palat–
able than Althusser's, because its tone is lighter; puns and epigrams
abound. Just the same, Debray avoids talking of his former politics,
although he does suggest that sometimes terrorists may reinvent
democracy.
In his introduction to the book, Francis Mulhern does refer to
Debray's Althusserian and Leninist background. He goes on to
maintain, however, that the formulations about "mediocratic" cul–
ture describe what the Leavises referred to as "standardization and
leveling down," and what the Frankfurt scholars called" the culture
industry." Mulhern, by relating the emergence of the media to
advanced industrialization , to the introduction of research and
development-the ensuing mass market-and to changes in educa–
tion, then compares conditions in France to those in Britain and the
United States. Because France's technology and educational sys–
tems lagged far behind, he finds that "the entente between the Uni–
versity and the Third Republic was the formative experience of
intellectuals," of a "republican clergy." This
republique des professeurs
is said to have been epitomized by Sartre, whose existentialist com–
mitment allegedly had its origins in Cartesian philosophy as well as
in the" established morality." In contrast, the British intelligentsia,
educated at Oxford and Cambridge, is found to have its roots in the
hegemonic Conservative Party and to allow for inroads by a few
individuals from the newer academic institutions. The ensuing
cooptation supposedly contained Marxism within the university ; its
politics did not spread outside as it did in France.
According to Mulhern, the United States was saved from a sim–
ilar fate by its open and diversified educational system and by the
"creed of active national conformism" -derived from John
