Contenu du sommaire

Darlan, an admiral between two blocks. Reflections on a recent biography, Robert O. Vaxton. Although the recent biography of Darlan by H. Coutau-Bégarie and C. Huan (Fayard, 1989) is based on substantial documentation, it is not convincing either on the supposed " double game " of Vichy, or on the idea that there is a " respectable " Vichy (that of Pétain and Darlan) and a " bad Vichy " (that of Laval). While the thesis of the neutralist strategy that Darlan is said to have implemented between the two blocks, the German and the Anglo-Saxon ones, is arresting and while the taking into account of Darlan's personality represents a major contribution, the lack of knowledge of the German, English and American archives and above ail the distorsion between the documents presented and the commentary removes much credibility from this work.

France's nuclear choice (1945-1958), Maurice Vaïsse. France did not wait for the Fifth Republic to become interested in the atomic bomb. The original features of France's atomic choice depended on both domestic factors (scientific, economic, military, political) and external ones France's atomic choice was based more on competition among allies than on enemy threat. It followed the vicissitudes of European construction and felt the weight of the cold war. The decision became clearer after the Suez affair and its consequences on international relations. But the Fourth Republic wanted to pursue simultaneously European construction, Franco-German reconciliation, French Algeria and the bomb. These were the contradictions that De Gaulle's access to power resolved ; a green light was then given to the production of the nuclear weapon.

Anti-intellectualism in French political culture, Pascal Balmand. Why would a professor of Tibetan be entitled to lecture and govern his equals ? In the midst of the Dreyfus affair, Brunetière, thus launched French anti-intellectualism, which was to have a long life in store, especially during crises. The article details the anti-intellectualism of the left and the far right, over a century and considers the causes of its virtual disappearance at present.

The Sigma festival of Bordeaux (1965-1990), Françoise Taliano-des Garets. On its creation in 1965, Sigma was a protest festival which welcomed avant-garde theater and music. Intended to shock the Bordeaux bourgeois, this yearly manifestation was also an instrument of the Bordeaux municipality's cultural policy. The rise of its mayor, Jacques Chaban-Delmas, to the position of Prime Minister, helped the festival to secure its audience and its financial solidity, but it was also the beginning of its decline. The Sigma case raises the problem of the ageing of an avant-garde festival in a municipal stronghold whose most important official was understood that culture could serve his national political image.