Analyzes the notion of the French exception and the ways in which it has informed both academic analysis and political commentary on France today. Adopting a comparative and interdisciplinary approach it examines the resilience of the notion of French exceptionalism and evaluates its relevance in a changing domestic and global context.

Introduction; T.Chafer & E.Godin SECTION I: THE FRENCH STATE The French Exception: Rise and Fall of a Saint-Simonian Discourse; S.Collard Reviving the French Exception? Sarkozy, Authoritarian Populism and the Bonapartist Tradition; N.Hewlett Social Policy and the French 'Exceptional' Social Model; S.Milner 'L'exception Culturelle'; H.Dauncey SECTION II: CONFLICTS AND POLARIZATION The French Extreme Left and the Persistence of a Revolutionary Myth; D.Bell French Euroscepticism and the Construction of National Exceptionalism; R.Harmsen SECTION III: CITIZENSHIP AND THE REPUBLICAN MODEL French Immigration Policy in Comparative Perspective; M.A.Schain France, Islam and LaIcité: Colonial Exceptions, Contemporary Reinventions and European Convergence; N.Vince From Private Lives to Intimate Revelations: Politicians and the Media in Contemporary France; R.Kuhn SECTION IV: FRANCE AS A UNIVERSAL MODEL France in Europe, Europe in France: The Politics of Exceptionalism and their Limits; H.Drake Back to the Future? Franco-African Relations in the Shadow of France's Colonial Past; M.Majumdar & T.Chafer SECTION V: THE FRENCH EXCEPTION SEEN FROM ABROAD A View from the South: France in African Eyes: Universalism and Francophonie Reassessed; A.Gueye SECTION VI: CONCLUSION: FRENCH EXCEPTIONALISM RECONSIDERED French Exceptionalism and the Sarkozy Presidency; T.Chafer & E.Godin