The review 'Questions internationales' publishes an issue on memory issues, between political instrument and demand for justice. This dossier arrives amid saturated memory claims in French and international news. It explores how commemoration serves national narratives and geopolitical strategies.
French and international news is saturated by memory claims that remind of regulations amid growing violations of international law, respect for persons, and democratic values. In France, the recent pantheonization of resistor Missak Manouchian and his wife Mélinée, followed by that of lawyer Robert Badinter on October 9, highlights the importance of the duty of memory. Badinter convinced public opinion and national representatives of the abolition of the death penalty. Upcoming, historian Marc Bloch will enter the Panthéon in June 2026. Emmanuel Macron will thus have pantheonized six personalities in eight years, the highest number for a head of state over two terms.
Patrick Garcia, in the article 'Le passé kidnappé ? Histoire et mémoire(s) dans les relations internationales' from issue 133 of the review, notes that commemoration remains a political instrument serving a national narrative. However, this inflationary commemoration does not foster national adhesion or the desire to 'make society.' On the contrary, the degradation of the tomb of the artisan of the decriminalization of homosexuality in 1982, hours before his entry into the Panthéon, reveals French resentments.
Internationally, Alexandre Sumpf analyzes how Vladimir Putin uses historical rewriting as a war weapon. He exalts the glorious role of Russians during World War II to strengthen internal cohesion, while pursuing vassalization of neighbors. This provokes common anti-Russian nationalism in Ukraine, Poland, and the Baltic states, as well as with Central European countries, Caucasian Republics, or Central Asian ones. The duty of memory thus oscillates between sacralization and banalization.