France Versus the World

First broadcast April 2007

The French maintain that they - their culture, their social model and their foreign policy - are exceptional. But for how much longer?

In this four-part series, Lucy Ash takes a forensic look at the position France occupies on the world stage, how it defines citizenship and the way globalisation is threatening to undermine its cultural heritage.

Part Two: Citizenship

France prides itself on its Republican model of citizenship. The words "liberte, egalite, fraternite" (liberty, equality, fraternity) are carved into public buildings across the country.

Its secular schools were supposed to be the machines to integrate its citizens, wherever their families may have come from originally, into being French first and foremost.

But the widespread riots of 2005 across France's suburbs showed that a huge swathe of the population - particularly the immigrant population - felt excluded and disenfranchised. Those riots also put the question of identity at the top of the political agenda.

In this second programme of the series "France versus the World" Lucy Ash asks if the Republican model of citizenship is working.

Series Producer: John Murphy

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