Constructions and uses of laïcité (French secularism) in French public discourses

ABSTRACT Discourse analysis of six actors’ political lines, their conceptions, and their uses of French secularism (laïcité) between 2013 and 2018 shows that mobilization of laïcité as a value is correlated to the construction of Islam and Muslims as objects of security in France. Perception of military and identity insecurities goes along with mobilization of laïcité as a shield-value of the French Republic that manifests into the desire to reinterpret the French 1905 law on separation of the Churches and the State, in reaction to Muslim practices or religious symbols. Since 1989, laïcité as a value has emerged both as the socially accepted representation of French secularism and the privileged discursive response to contemporary identity and security challenges posed by Islam, while laïcité as a principle has appeared as a counter-discourse defending the liberal spirit of the 1905 law.