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437
Julliard, "avec un programme obsolete,
con~u
avant la crise eco–
nomique et avant la crise theorique." They had to abandon it, and
the best replacement was a long step back into
La Ripublique
as a way
of getting a firm grip on French reality in order to leap into France's
modernity.
But at a deeper historical and cultural level , references to
La
Ripublique
are highly ambiguous for the socialists and may prove to
be a double-edged sword. The Third Republic included after all
both the left
and
the non-monarchical right, around a "centrist" line .
Thus, French liberals and Gaullists can also claim allegiance to the
republic, while pitting its traditions against those of the socialists .
Political tensions, rather than being lessened, actually can be ex–
acerbated by the republican reference.
The Third Republic , unlike the Revolution, marks a quint–
essentially
French
chapter of French history. Its revival by the social–
ists may be construed as a lowering of international sights after the
heady days of 1981, when Mitterrand sought to reshuffle the inter–
national world order. The return of
La Ripublique
marks above all a
way of giving France once more a national goal and identity while
sheltering her culturally and politically from the international mael–
stroms where, unfortunately, she must remain economically. Eco–
nomics were never central to the Republican synthesis.
La Ripublique
therefore suits perfectly a French left which claims that
both
economic
liberalism and Marxism failed as models for modernity, since they
gave too much supremacy to the economic sphere. With
La Ripub–
lique,
the road is wide open for "new" historical and humanist symbols
of progress with which to dot France's already thickly populated cul–
tural landscape .
Fran~ois
Mitterrand will thus lead France toward the bicenten–
nial of the French Revolution and the year 2000, clad in the armor of
the Third Republic , accompanied by the "living" presence of
Gambetta, Ferry, Jaures, Clemenceau, Blum, Mendes, and de
Gaulle . .. and a cortege of robots and computers.
If
one wants to
look at the future in France, one has to realize it resides in the past.
