2023-12-23 13:12:16
La Croix: After the vote on the immigration law, the government seeks to minimize the break it represents. Those who are outraged are accused of doing too much. What is your reading?
Olivier Abel : I don’t know if this law really represents a break. To some extent, it is the culmination of a long drift through which, little by little, the Macron governments have come to depend on the identity and security issues of the National Rally (RN). This is part of a global trend in the French political field that has been at work for several decades, even if it has accelerated considerably recently. There is a break in public consciousness today, because people are suddenly and rightly asking: “Where are we going from here?” » It is clear that this trend development prepares the flowering of the xenophobic and nationalist theses of the RN and can lead us to become a society at war.
For the government, this law was passed to “give a shield” to France, so that there would be “no more Arras”. Is this security argument entirely fictitious and exploited or is it partly sincere? But what then of this desire for security?
OA: I think our society is obsessed with evil. She no longer seeks or sees the good. And as Emerson said, “any protection against evil keeps us dependent on this evil”. We favor everything that protects us and this is a false good idea, because we never stop being protected and this demand for security becomes monstrous. The general feeling of insecurity should also be better analyzed, because I believe that it is above all a civilizational, cultural and almost spiritual insecurity.
What we need is not more security, it is more courage to face reality. And first of all the reality of what France is today. French society does not see itself as it really is, with all the mixed marriages that exist in our families and all the children who result from them.
We have become a population of people who shut themselves away, who no longer let their children out, who withdraw into themselves. We must get out of this collective madness of need for protection.
Beyond the various provisions of the law which will perhaps be invalidated by the Constitutional Council, does this text not sign the victory of xenophobic discourse?
OA: Absolutely. There is a deep distrust of foreigners, including so-called “foreigners” who are French, who were born on French soil and who have known nothing other than France. With this law, in the wake of the anti-immigration laws that preceded it, we are creating foreigners from people who are truly French. This is not the first time that the desire to come together in a unanimous way, to be all the same, all the same, in the same religion, in the same language, has been expressed in France…
Today, through suspicion, through the daily humiliation of foreigners or French people with immigrant backgrounds – who are constantly reminded of the fact that they are considered second-class citizens – we are preparing for civil war. This is also the case everywhere in Europe and it is extremely worrying.
What are we collectively losing with this inhospitable xenophobia?
OA: At Christmas, this question of hospitality takes on a very strong meaning. Because the scene of the manger has to do with hospitality, and the hospitality of “what happens”. Because this little child is coming. We didn’t choose it. However, more and more, we are unable to deal with “what happens”. We choose the “good” foreigners, and we throw away the others. But this foreshadows what we are going to do at nationals. Because among nationals too, there are those who are well integrated, good, useful, “in”, who will be chosen, and others who will gradually be excluded like undesirable foreigners. The two movements go together. I also believe that some of the people who vote RN are people who feel rejected and would like to rebuild the community “of those who are in it” against those who seek to enter the national community.
The other consequence is that France is less and less attractive even though it needs all those who want it and bring their talents. A few months ago, I met students in Kinshasa (Democratic Republic of Congo), perfectly French-speaking, of excellent level, from literary but also scientific fields, who said that they were going to go to China to continue their studies, because There is no place for them in France and in Europe.
For its defenders, the immigration law would be justified by the fact that “the French” want this firmness. What can we say about this conception of democracy?
OA: This argument carries a conception of the people which is very problematic. We make the majority into something like the voice of God, in a completely secularized and secularized theological-political vision. This conception which absolutizes and sanctifies the majority opinion is extremely dangerous. It suggests that democracy is the majority. If this were the case, Hitler’s presence in power would have been legitimate since he had the majority. We see how this reasoning can lead to disaster. It is therefore absolutely necessary to remember that democracy also rests on other pillars: international and constitutional law, major declarations, institutions such as the Constitutional Council, but also the pluralism of the press.
What can Christians bring to this difficult debate, even though some of them are seduced by the theses of the extreme right?
OA: One essential thing: it’s not about saving France, it’s about saving the world. “God so loved the world that he gave his only son”, says the Gospel of John (John 3,16). What is fragile today is the world. No one or no country can save itself. Also, these are the questions linked to globality – ecological, climatic, food, etc. – which must take precedence over questions of identity and security. Seeking to save oneself alone by isolating oneself from the rest leads to war. We saw it in history.
To Christians tempted by the extreme right, I would like to say that I do not want to throw the question of identity out the window, quite the contrary. It is because we have sufficient confidence in ourselves, in our traditions – Catholic, Christian, French (for a long time mixed with numerous contributions) – that we can encounter something other than ourselves and consider other traditions to what they can bring to the common world.
What can citizens do to avoid the “foreign factory” that you describe?
OA: We can act as mediators and this involves very concrete actions: taking an interest in our children’s friends or our neighbors who are foreigners or of foreign origin, going to meet Muslims at the mosque near you …
Through these gestures, it is a question of reuniting things which are in the process of separating, of refusing this making of the foreign in which we are caught as in a collective bewitchment. It’s an everyday job, an ordinary job of reconnecting, to create a society with those who are next to us. It is by showing our confidence that we will create confidence. Our mistrust only breeds aggression and distrust. This is our daily choice.
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