Official state identifications are established, among other ways, by means of legislation, the regulation of social institutions, and official ideology—whether in the concern for preserving ethnic diversity or for developing national unity. How do such official state identifications order relations among minorities, and between minorities and majority groups? How do "minorities" (ethnic, religious, racial, and national) resist, negotiate, or take advantage of such imposed identification ? And how do the frequently complex relations among minority groups (and between minorities and the majority) contribute to the shifting expressions of identifications?

Power, history, narratives of identity

The making of identity is all about history and power. To give a good first approximation of what this means would be to say that it involves tracing various strands of "power in the story", as reflected in the inherent ambivalence of the word "history" which suggests a dual participation (Trouillot 1995). In vernacular use, history means both the facts of the matter and a narrative of those facts, both "what happened" and "that which is said to have happened". The first meaning places the emphasis on the sociohistorical process, the second on our knowledge of that process or on a story about that process. But pursuing this investigation soon shows that you can’t get always very clear about the distinction between what happened and that which is said to have happened. The former and the latter turn out to be inextricably intertwined. Not only can history mean either the sociohistorical process or our knowledge of that process, but the boundary between the two meanings is often quite fluid.

History is always produced in a specific historical context. Historical actors are also narrators, and vice-versa. Moreover, it is also power-related. Likewise, identities are nothing but contextual even if they claim for eternity, relying very often on—a supposedly or not—tradition crafted in authenticity. Yet, they are neither static nor fixed but ongoing, self-recycling, multi-faceted. Then, the production of history, like the making of identity, involves in many ways the uneven contribution of competing groups and individuals who have unequal access to the means for such both production and making. It should come as no surprise that state identifications, be they imposed or not, are intimately linked to vernacular claims for the self, that individuals self-identifications cannot be separated from groups strategies to resist, negotiate or taking advantage of such official expressions of identifications. Far from being new, this process of identity formation is only getting more complicated nowadays, given the growing trend to global integration.

As both theoretical and methodological outcome, it is critical to look at the fascinating play of identifications outside the dichotomies that the prism official/vernacular tends to suggest and to reproduce, in order to focus on the conendrum of complex relations emerging precisely at the intersection of individuals and groups, elites and people, official rhetoric and vernacular practice, state identifications and local contestation, domination from whithout and resistance from within (or vice-versa).


Promoting universal rights, continuing discriminatory practices

The France and the French Atlantic World C.R.N has focused its investigations on the central category of citizenship as linked to identity-making and shifting expression of identifications, in theory and in practice, from the 18th century to the present. In its contemporary form, French citizenship is, theorically, a relationship that binds individuals to the nation-state, exchanging the protections and provisions of citizenship rights for a voice in and loyalty towards the institutions of the state. It is also supposed to give a French citizen of whatever descent a national and cultural identity by being a French citizen. Moreover, citizenship, as an inclusive ideal, was presented as a definition of the individual, never at the service of the individual (Constant, 1998). A citizen was to be free and equal with all other citizens : this doctrine rejected the rigid divisions of status that had existed under the ancien régime. The emotional and political power of these ideas remains very strong, but their application has never been well suited to former colonies—and, to a lesser extent the metropole itself - whose societies have remained greatly divided along color, culture, wealth and hierarchy of prestige.

The co-existence of Republican universalism and practices of discrimination is a common feature in the history of citizenship. Yet in France’s overseas sequence, I argue that individuals have been maintaining a set of personal competing identifications as a consequence of their persisting citizenship shortcomings and continuing denial of their status of citizen by both French officials and the white insular aristocracy. To make it short, achievement has never completely effaced ascription, civic universal egalitarianism has never been completely prevailing over civil hierarchy inherited from the colonial period. As a result, whites, mulattoes and black did not really assume to have a national and cultural identity by being French citizens. In other words, the persistence of alternative identities alongside formal citizenship is based, essentially, upon deprivation and injustice on one hand and positions of power on the other hand. This conflict between France’s pretension of universalist identity and the failure of the state to fulfill its obligations has been affecting the meaning of citizenship from the beginning. In most case studies, individuals and groups oppositions, resistance or cooperation with the metropole are closely related to the tensions between the ideal and the practice of French Republican model of citizenship.


Color-Blindness revisited

The founding myth of the Republic as "une et indivisible" emphasized the unitary, universalistic and inclusive nature of the Republic, with little if any room for the recognition of color or culture. In legal terms as well, French Revolution did establish the irrelevance of national or racial difference in the exercice of rights, despite France’s early involvement in colonial conquest and slavery. Additionally, the use of racial and racist categories by fascist groups under the Third Republic and the racist policies of Vichy regime made it virtually impossible to talk about race whithout being, more or less, associated with racists. Furthermore, the state has made it difficult for scholars to study "racial" difference, even as a socially constructed category, because since Vichy it is illegal to keep any statistic on racial or ethnic distribution of the population.

My argument is twofold : first, while French State has certainly epitomized a Color-Blind model, it has not been exactly so in the Caribbean ; second, neither France mainland nor the islands appeared to be race-neutral societies. Then, the question is : how can a Color-Blind State manage racial diversity whithout officially making any kind of difference among its citizens ? In few words, I would say by silencing the race, pretending that the surest way to becoming a color-blind society was to assume that both France mainland and the Caribbean were already one. There is nothing more remarkable than the continuing formal discursive silence about race in theory which has been constantly contradicted by race’s salience as a marker of difference in practice. The specter of color is apparent even when it goes unmentioned, and it is all too often the unseen force that influences public policy as well as private relationships. Moreover, recent investigations by social scientists have shed light on unexpected forms and expressions of racial thinking, on the arbitrariness of racialization, on race-coded phrases designed to keep minorities of color apart, challenging common views about France’s race-neutrality.

It is amazing to note how France’s official reluctance to talk about race has been endorsed and appropriated by Antilleans who usually prefer to refer to culture, even if race is still a significant social marker in the Caribbean. Here comes up the French paradox of visible minorities "tragically" invisible. By definition, a color-blind society eludes the racial prejudice any minority of color may suffer, by purely ignoring the problem, whithout providing any possibility of crafting solutions and, then, assessing their effectiveness. Therefore, state definitions of individuals as citizens appear to be a way of making them "legible" for universal administration and, at the same time, happen to be a way of depoliticizing public administration, specially in a poly-ethnic context (Janet Sturgeon, 2003).


Centering and Decentering Identity : Metropoles, Peripheries and New Spaces

Does reconfiguration of legal membership generate a new dynamic of identifications? In case studies from members of the France and French Atlantic, globalization on one hand and regionalization on the other hand, give a new impetus to the market place of identities, both at the individual and institutional levels. Here, "from without identifications" do offer new resources to individuals and groups to manage their interest within the nation-state. For instance, in the contemporary French Caribbean, there is a fascinating play of official and vernacular identifications, combining a formal assimilation into the structures of the French state, a fairly high level of integration into the European Union, with growing institutional and cultural allegiances to the Caribbean (Association of Caribbean States, in particular). Yet, this remarkable plural legal membership, located at the intersection of Europe, France and the West Indies, does not mean equal identification and similar loyalty to the respective circles of belonging mentionned. Such a geography of identifications present various degrees of involvement and obligations. Here, it is possible to distinguish at least four interacting levels of affiliation: firstly, a "citizenship of proximity", located at the sub-national level and generating the most powerful and affective bonds in daily life and political mobilization ; secondly, a "national citizenship", getting politically and emotionally weaker while being more and more presented as utilitarian ; thirdly, a "supra-national citizenship", whithout any affective appeal but highly valued for the resources it is supposed to give access to ; fourthly, a "macro-regional allegiance", politically weak but symbolically powerful.

What would be the general rough outline of such a dynamic of identifications related to poly-legal memberships? Here, I would argue that there is neither a fixed hierarchy between these multiple identifications nor coincidence between geographies of legal identity and geographies of identifications. Geographies of legal membership should not be seen as a duplicata of geographies of identifications, even if both of them do interact constantly in the making of modern identities. On the contrary, flexibility does prevail over any rigid organisation of competing circles of "citizenship". These concentric circles—mentioned above —are illustrative of a situation—at a point in time—which remains changeable. In other words, reversibility of allegiances is a common feature in such a dynamic of multiple identifications. Then, I would say that these various loyalties tend to be more perceived as complementary than conflicting and, as such, tend to be more prone to be bought into harmony than appearing irreconcilable. At last, there is no such durable and exclusive identifications—as it was once presumed to have been. On the opposite, competition between alternative identifications does prevail over loyalty to a rigid hierarchy of circles of solidarities.

In France and the Caribbean, surveys and polls (Constant, 2001) show how much such a set of multiple identifications may be changeable over time. It is possible to distinguish schematically three periods where a significant change occured in the insular public opinion. From 1946 up to the 60s, French Republican model, citizenship and culture were the indisputable center of identification among the population, in spite of the persistance of discriminatory practices. At that time, most of Antilleans tend to claim for their "Frenchness", silencing any of their would-be "cultural differences". People did feel French neither African nor Caribbean. From the 70s up to the 90s, a new figure came up. Identifications to France—while remaining dominant among the population—started to be challenged by a growing mobilization in the name of Antillanité, Caribéanité or Créolité. During this period, the people, specially the youth, began to discover their natural environment while protesting against the omnipotence of the French state in the islands, in particular at the cultural level. Then, from the 90s up to the present, European Union as a circle of legal membership happened to be less rejected than progressively accepted by the population in a system of identifications which was getting more complex and reversible than hierarchised and durable. In a word, if France and the Caribbean’s experience teaches us anything, it is that the tension between the circles of citizenship and the circles of identification is a dynamic that changes both.


Theorizing multiple identifications, tracking power

In an attempt to offer possible avenues for comparative discussion and cross-fertilization among the CRN’s regional teams, I would like now to outline a set of proposals which may be of interest, beyond the distinctiveness of the historical trajectory of the world areas concerned. In that perspective, my first proposal would be to say that identifications, defined as lived processes of identity-making, are to be related to power. They are neither mere cultural devices nor complete fictions but appear to be open claims for empowerment. Cultural identity claims are rarely limited to symbolic concessions : in most cases, they refer, sometimes implicitly, to the more controversial matter of allocating power, privileges and resources. They should be seen as claims for power-sharing. Here, it may be of interest to engage in comparative debate to check the relevancy of this viewpoint in the other world areas concerned.

My second proposal deals with the range of possible relationships among the multiple identifications individuals may maintain simultaneously. As mentioned above, citizenship as linked to the broader question of identity and identifications, is not as totalizing and exclusive it was once supposed to be. As a consequence of its failure to fulfill its promises, the—national and cultural—identity, provided by the status of citizen, is more and more challenged by a set of competing allegiances located beyond, below, alongside the national level. Therefore, the relationships among these multiple identifications should be seen as more flexible than rigid, more changeable than durable, more complementary than conflicting. Again, this assumption remains to be tested in the distinct cultural and historical contexts of the other regions concerned by the ACLS CRN project.

My third proposal is an attempt to sketch out the range of possible political uses, offered to "territorial minorities", "ethno-national groups" or "migrant-minorities", in order to get more power, recognition or resources. Relying on Hirschman’s famous paradigm ("exit", "voice", "loyalty") and documented by my fieldwork in the Caribbean, I would say firstly that the politicizing of identity claims on one hand and the strategy selected on the other hand are, in practice, the result of both evolving state structure and specific dynamics of the political process. Second, in most case studies, there is a play of strategies which are more related to a specific political context than to any formal predicament. Pragmatism tends to prevail over dogmatism. The politicizing of identifications provides an arena for the continuation of the old contest over the distribution of power, recognition and resources. Here again, it might be of interest to engage in comparative discussion.

My fourth and last proposal is related to the supposed crisis of the idea of citizenship itself. It is not the idea of citizenship itself which is so much threatened by proliferating identity claims than a fixed—supposedly "magic"—formula of nation-state's citizenship, known as color-blind, egalitarian and universal, which failed in practice to master conflict and integrate society in the long run. In this connection, it would be interesting to revisit the debate over "multiculturalism"—the seeking of recognition and equal rights for ethnically, racially or sexually defined groups—on both sides of the Atlantic in order to promote new interpretations of the politics of identity pursued by social movements that are supposed to deviate from traditional citizenship mobilization in stressing difference over inclusion. Among other possible questions which may provide comparative discussion, the following one seems to be adressed : to what extent does multiculturalism threaten citizenship as an inclusive ideal and, on the opposite, under what conditions the former could be a complement to the latter ?


References

Fred Constant, 1998. La Citoyenneté Paris : Montchrestien.

Fred Constant, 2001. "Gouverner outre-mer : communication et politique", Hermès, 32-33 : 415-423.

Albert O. Hirschman, 1970. Exit, Voice and Loyalty. Responses in Decline of Firms, Organizations and States. Havard University Press.

Janet Sturgeon, 2003. "Putting People in Place" ACLS/CRN working paper.

Michel-Rolph Trouillot, 1995. Silencing the past. Power and the production of history. Boston : Beacon Press.