La politique du dehors avec les raisons du - European University ...

as being a provider for alternative policy agendas to official EU policies as they
are pursued by the EU executive.” 39 Stetter’s explanation for the uncanny
convergence of decision rules on interior and foreign policy by the EU’s three
principal agents was not causality but cross-fertilization. At the EU level of
governance, it appears that Stetter’s findings highlight the congruence between
la politique du dehors avec les raisons du dedans. Can we go further and
discover whether under certain conditions a state’s foreign policy may be
dictated by religious and ethnic fears at home?
The internal logic of French foreign policy
For Jocelyn Evans, who employed the French expression above in his
study of the influence of the Front National on France’s foreign policy, right-
wing movements may target scapegoats who are simultaneously found abroad
and at home. Muslim migrants and minorities at home are viewed by many FN
supporters as mere extensions of Muslim states in the international arena.
They are therefore seen as posing an equal threat to national cohesion,
national security, and the national interest. 40
Of course the opposite perspective—of a natural coalescing of interests
found at home and abroad—is just as plausible. Jacques Attali, special adviser
to President Mitterand, remarked that “France may be Christian, Atlantic, and
European, but it is also Muslim, Mediterranean and African. And its future—
like that of every great power—resides in the multiplicity of its connections, in
the resolute acceptance of its ambiguities.” 41 France’s special interest in the
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