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Abstract
The apparent French embrace of neoliberal reforms in the 1980s resulted in a series of scandals and bitter contention. The criminal trials over the failure to prevent the spread of AIDS through the blood supply uniquely resulted in the prosecution of a former prime minister. AIDS activists overcame many of their differences in targeting this top official responsible for the initial turn to neoliberalism and austerity in 1984, accusing him of homicide for delays in AIDS prevention measures. The government's unwillingness to fund new programs became a metaphor for what activists claim was a dysfunctional state elite, with governments of the left and right said to be preoccupied with neoliberal financial concerns that represented the official abandonment of a French Republican emphasis on equality, integration, and social solidarity, and the state's response to this global epidemic stands in for a succession of failures in the era of globalization.
Notes
64 Pamphlet “Nous Sommes la Gauche,” Act Up, 1997.
63 Pamphlet “Nous Sommes la Gauche,” Act Up, 1997.
62 Interview, November 27, 2001.
61 Act Up, CR de la RH, 1992–1994.
60 Author's interview, October 27, 2001.
59 Author's interview with Jacques Vergès, December 6, 2001.
58 Jean-Michel Dumay, “Ce n'est pas une faute politique, c'est un crime,” témoigne une femme contaminée, Le Monde, February 19, 1999. Dossier de presse, “Sida post transfusionnel, affaire du sang contaminé en France”, centre de documentation contemporaine, Fondation national des sciences politiques. Original page number unavailable.
57 Author's interview, December 4, 2001.
56 Author's interviews.
55 Author's interviews.
54 Act Up Paris, Le Sida: Combien de divisions (Paris: Dagorno, 1994); “Pour un Nuremberg du Sida” (no date), “Dossier Transfusion” (no date).
53 Cour de Justice de la République, Commission d'instruction, procès verbal d'interrogatoire de première comparution de M. Hervé, September 29, 1994.
52 Dufoix coined the well known “Responsible, but not guilty” that has been quoted throughout the affair. The Association française des hémophile directly responded to her claim that she was unaware of the issues in its Mémoire on Dufoix dated October 5, 1992.
51 Complaint filed by Jacques Vergès on behalf of Patrice and Agnès Gaudin, May 2, 1995, Cour de Justice de la République.
50 Author's interview.
49 Author's interview, December 14, 2001.
48 Christophe Martet, Les Combattants du Sida (Paris: Seuil, 1993), p. 61.
47 Christophe Martet, Les Combattants du Sida (Paris: Seuil, 1993), p. 33.
46 Christophe Martet, Les Combattants du Sida (Paris: Seuil, 1993), p. 61.
45 Interview, November 17, 2001.
44 “La Famille Choisie,” Act Up, 1989.
43 I know many at Act Up would disagree with Lestrade's categories. However, I will borrow them because they do reflect a fundamental ideological division. Didier Lestrade, Act Up (Paris: Denoël, 2000).
42 Interview, December 21, 2001.
41 Act Up has used this phrase in new member orientation materials since just after its founding.
40 I borrow these words from an Act Up member who used them in another context. Act Up Paris, Compte Rendu de la Réunion Hebdomadaire, November 18, 1997.
39 Investigatory Commission of the National Assembly, meeting of January 7, 1993, Bernard Derosier, President.
38 Deposition of Daniel Denfert, Cour de Justice de La République, September 13, 1996.
37 Letter from Bruno Payet, President of the Languedoc-Roussillon Committee of the AFH, to Bruno de Langres, President of the AFH, September 9, 1991. Archives of the AFH.
36 Letter from Jean-François Girard, General Director of Health, for the Minister of Solidarity, Health, and Social Protection, recipient's name blank, March 30, 1990. Archives of the AFH.
35 Letter from James Mauvillain dated October 3, 1989. Archives of the AFH.
34 Author's interviews, 2001.
33 Association française des hémophiles (AFH), memo dated June 1989.
32 Motion voted by the Administrative Council of the AFH, October 15, 1988. Archives of the AFH.
31 Franck Nouchi, “L'affaire du sang contaminé En janvier 1988, le gouvernement Chirac avait refusé l'indemnisation des hémophiles,” Le Monde, November 17, 1992. Dossier de presse, “Sida post transfusionnel, affaire du sang contaminé en France”, centre de documentation contemporaine, Fondation national des sciences politiques. Original page number unavailable.
30 François Graeve, note transmitted to Professor Varet, Office of the Minister of Solidarity, Health, and Social Protection, with letter dated August 23, 1988. Archives of the AFH.
29 Author's interviews, 2001.
28 Letter from Lionèl Karchen to André Leroux, President of the AFH, May 21, 1988. Archives of the AFH.
27 This testimony is contained in Le livre blanc des états généraux du 17 et 18 mars 1990 à Paris: Vivre Le Sida (Paris: Les éditions du CERF, 1992).
26 Claude Dubois, Histoire d'une contamination: Leur sang et mes larmes (Paris: le cherche midi éditeur, 1999), p. 21.
25 Draft of a 1988 report to elected officials produced by the AFH. Archives of the AFH.
24 Renaud Leblond, “Les oubliés du sida,” L'Express, December 8, 1989. Dossier de presse, “Sida post transfusionnel, affaire du sang contaminé en France”, centre de documentation contemporaine, Fondation national des sciences politiques. Original page number unavailable.
23 Beatrice Bantmain, “Après l'attentat contre la voiture du directeur du CNTS, le désarroi des hémophiles victimes du sida,” Le Monde, November 2, 1989. Dossier de presse, “Sida post transfusionnel, affaire du sang contaminé en France”, centre de documentation contemporaine, Fondation national des sciences politiques. Original page number unavailable.
22 Letter from the Association des Polytransfusés dated April 18, 1988. Archives of the CJR.
21 Letter from Claude Demange to the AFH, January 3, 1988. Archives of the AFH.
20 James Mauvillain, memo dated August, 1989. Archives of the AFH.
19 Similar statements color many early documents for the AFH. This one appears in a memo dated December 12, 1988. Archives of the Association Française des hémophiles.
18 Announcement from the Association des Polytransfusés, June 9, 1995. Archives of the Cour de Justice de la République.
17 Letter from Christian Garvanoff to Michel Reynaud, public prosecutor, December 4, 1987. Archives of the Cour de Justice de la République.
16 Henry used the word “étranger,” which means foreign, though Henry juxtaposes the term with Leibowitch's title, which in fact uses “étrange” (strange) and not étranger, suggesting that Henry is emphasizing something foreign. Edmond Luc Henry, De L'hémophile en général et du crime en particulier (Belfond: Le Pré aux Clercs, 1992), p. 78.
15 Marie S., interviewed by Lionel Bret and Olivier Michel, “Mes enfants ignorent ma maladie,” Le Figaro Magazine, June 20, 1992. Dossier de presse, “Le Sida en France”, centre de documentation contemporaine, Fondation national des sciences politiques. Original page number unavailable.
14 Author's interview, December 20, 2001.
13 Author's interview, November 14, 2001.
12 Joëlle Bouchet, J'Accuse: Médecins et Politiques (Paris: Éditions de Magrie, 1992), p. 27.
11 Joëlle Bouchet, J'Accuse: Médecins et Politiques (Paris: Éditions de Magrie, 1992), p. 34.
10 There is a rare form, linked to a different gene, that strikes women.
9 Early reporting in the press and among scientists repeatedly emphasized that the majority of French gay men with AIDS had visited New York shortly before their diagnosis. This association of the disease with an American city would continue throughout the next two decades.
8 I explore the relationship between homosexuality, anti-Semitism, anti-immigrant prejudice, and AIDS in my dissertation, “Blood Ties: Citizenship, Identity, and the Politics of AIDS” (Northwestern University, Department of Political Science, 2005). Similarly, David Caron examines the question of AIDS and foreignness in France in AIDS in French Culture: Social Ills, Literary Causes (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2001).
7 Hoffman, “Paradoxes of the French Political Community,” p. 42.
6 Stanley Hoffman, “Paradoxes of the French Political Community,” in Stanley Hoffman (ed.), In Search of France (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1963). In L'Etat en France, Rosanvallon agrees that the failures of the pre-war social leadership led to an increased valuation of the administration as a democratic alternative in that it was meritocratic. Birnbaum demonstrates the continuity of bureaucratic elites under successive republics, and their primacy in many ways during the post-war Fourth Republic that led to the “30 Glorious Years” of economic growth and modernization. He notes that it was not until the Fifth Republic that the institutions of government matched these ethical principles with administrators at the center of power above politicians, parties and factions. See Birnbaum, The Heights of Power and The Idea of France.
5 Ezra Suleiman, Elites in French Society (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1978); Pierre Birnbaum, The Heights of Power (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981), quoted in Pierre Birbaum, The Idea of France (New York: Hill and Wang, 1998), p. 167.
4 Quoted in Pierre Rosanvallon, L'Etat en France de 1789 à nos jours (Paris: Seiul, 1990), quote from p. 132.
3 Quoted in Pierre Rosanvallon, L'Etat en France de 1789 à nos jours (Paris: Seiul, 1990), p. 41.
2 Michael Loriaux, “The Developmental State as Myth and Moral Ambition,” in Meredith Woo-Cumings (ed.), The Developmental State (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1999).
1 National Blood Transfusion Center.