ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to examine the complex and contradictory relationship between the anti-racist movement and Republican ideology in contemporary France, and the effect that differing organisations’ relationships with the concept have on their utilisation of the idea of ‘race’ itself. The first section of the chapter focuses on defining and analysing the central ideas of anti-racism and republicanism, and the way in which these ideas are tightly interlinked in the French context. Having examined the theoretical issues, the second section of the chapter considers how they play out in practice, via a case study based on the anti-racist organisations SOS Racisme (SOS) and the Mouvement des Indigènes de la République (MIR). This section examines these organisations’ positions on the issue of ‘race,’ the effect it has in society, and whether the acknowledgement of ethnic difference has any part in the anti-racist movement.
