Defining "radicalism" to combat it more effectively

The notion of "political radicalism" is plural and open to multiple interpretations. In public debate, the term " radical " is generally applied to movements or ideas to emphasize their distance from the accepted norm, with the eventual intention of relegating them to the periphery of the political system.
Nicolas Lebourg, University of Montpellier

French frame

Under French law, political parties are non-profit associations governed by the law of July 1, 1901, whose constitutional role is recognized under the^Fifth Republic byArticle Four of the Constitution.
There are several limits to the very existence of a party. The 1901 law stipulates that associations may not have "the aim of undermining the integrity of the national territory or the republican form of government". The judiciary is empowered to dissolve an association that does not meet these criteria. The Constitution specifies that

"political parties and groupings contribute to the expression of suffrage. They form and operate freely. They must respect the principles of national sovereignty and democracy".

However, parties, like de jure and de facto associations with no electoral activity, are still subject to the law of January 10, 1936(now article L.212-1 of the Internal Security Code).
The legislative text of January 10, 1936 specified that :

"All associations or de facto groups will be dissolved by decree issued by the President of the Republic in the Council of Ministers: (1) which provoke armed demonstrations in the street; (2) or which, apart from government-approved military service preparation societies, physical education and sports societies, by their military form and organization, have the character of combat groups or private militias; (3) or whose aim is to undermine the integrity of the national territory or to violate the republican form of government by force."

Known for having been passed against the extreme right-wing leagues, this law was not aimed at regulating the electoral game, but the entire militant political field.
The ordinance of December 30, 1944 amended the law of January 10, 1936, allowing for the prosecution of groups hindering the post-war restoration of democracy. The supplementary law of January 5, 1951 went further, adding the following groups to the list of potential targets

"which are intended either to bring together individuals who have been convicted of collaborating with the enemy, or to exalt such collaboration".

Laws created in the aftermath of the Second World War

These laws were part of a democratic context traumatized and weakened by the Second World War. The development of international institutions to protect and maintain peace reinforced these measures.
Thus, the law of July 1, 1972, known as the "Pleven law", extending the 1965 United Nations International Convention, brought within the scope of the law of January 10, 1936 associations which

"provoke discrimination, hatred or violence against a person or group of persons on the grounds of their origin or their membership or non-membership of a particular ethnic group, nation, race or religion, or propagate ideas or theories tending to justify or encourage such discrimination, hatred or violence".

The law of January 10, 1936 underwent a series of adjustments in the late 1980s. In particular, the Act of September 9, 1986, following a series of terrorist attacks in France, added groups "engaged in acts of terrorism on or from French territory, whether in France or abroad".
The provisions of the January 10, 1936 law were finally incorporated into the French Internal Security Code (L. 212-1) in 2012. As part of the state of emergency, the law of November 21, 2015 added the possibility of dissolving :

"by decree of the Council of Ministers, de facto associations or groupings that participate in the commission of acts seriously prejudicial to public order, or whose activities facilitate or incite the commission of such acts".

As early as spring 2016, the provision was applied to the association running the "radical" mosque in Lagny-sur-Marne (Seine-et-Marne).
Based on the current state of the law, it is therefore possible to identify several characteristics of "political radicalism": undermining the republican form of government, undermining territorial integrity, links with the Collaboration or any attempt to rehabilitate it, incitement to hatred, discrimination or violence.
Ideological radicalism is very regularly accompanied by the use of militant violence, in forms also listed by the law: armed demonstrations, paramilitary practices, terrorism, serious breaches of public order.

The "republican form of government", as French law puts it, must therefore be understood as the democratic, representative and pluralist form of institutions.

What the frame tells us across the Rhine

These elements provide a basis for understanding radicalism and extending it internationally.
German law offers other perspectives here - noting that the concept of extremism in Germany refers to the desire to attack the representative democratic system.
In this context, "radicality" corresponds to criticisms of liberalism within the space of democracy.
German political parties are enshrined in the Basic Law, Germany's constitution since May 8, 1949 (article 21), and in the case law of the Federal Court of Karlsruhe, Germany's constitutional court, which ensures respect for fundamental rights. The Court has been called upon to clarify the role of political parties in Germany, both in terms of their constitutionality and the way they are financed.

From a legal point of view, German political parties are associations of a special category whose aim is to "protect the liberal and democratic basic order".
Beyond this article, parties are subject to the law of July 24, 1967. The 1967 Act responds to the concerns of the Court, and ensures that parties comply with Article 21, in particular paragraph 2: "Parties which, by their aims or the attitude of their members, seek to undermine the free and democratic basic order, to overthrow it or to jeopardize the existence of the Federal Republic of Germany are unconstitutional. The Federal Constitutional Court shall rule on the question of unconstitutionality." It is up to the Court to define what is meant by "free and democratic fundamental order" in its case law. In 2017, for example, it rejected a request to dissolve the National Democratic Party of Germany (NPD) on the grounds that its capacity for action did not allow it to overturn the constitutional order.

The right to democratic expression

These debates are also taking place at European level:
Thus, the case law of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), essentially formulated on the basis ofArticle 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights, has also provided a framework for the articulation between pluralist expression and the maintenance of democratic values and institutions.
The general principle is the right to democratic expression, i.e. while political groupings must be able to propose constitutional changes, such demands may not be made by violence, and may not be directed against fundamental democratic principles.

This definition is significantly different from that of French law, since, for example, the dissolution of movements wishing to attack the current integrity of a territory is considered by the Court to be a violation of Article 11, unless the claim is expressed by means of violence.
These legal elements are aimed at constituted movements - Article 11 being provided for the question of freedom of association, the ECHR having decided to include political organizations within this framework.
The ECHR also recognizes the right of States to combat violent or hate-mongering demonstrations instigated by "civil society organizations" that do not fall into the category of parties.

The advent of rigid thinking

Indeed, the notion of radicalism cannot be confined to political groupings with a legal vocation, as "radicalism" has to do with processes of "radicalization".
Radicalization is thus defined as the progressive and evolving adoption of a rigid way of thinking, an absolute and non-negotiable truth, whose logic structures the worldview of the actors, who use violent repertoires of action to make it heard, most often within clandestine, formalized or virtual structures, which isolate them from ordinary social referents and reflect back to them a grandiose projection of themselves.
Radicalization is thus based on three elements: its evolutionary dimension, the adoption of sectarian thinking, and the potential use of armed violence.
In general, radicals aim to change liberal institutions and the egalitarian humanist values on which they are built, or even to rearrange society to a greater or lesser extent in order to eliminate an "enemy", ideologically and symbolically constructed as a major figure in a world often imagined as Manichean.

This text was co-signed by Cécile Alduy, Professor, Stanford University, Associate Researcher, Cevipof, Sciences Po; Jean-Yves Camus, Director of the Observatory of Political Radicalities at the Jean Jaurès Foundation and Associate Researcher at IRIS; Sylvain Crépon, University of Tours, Laboratoire d'Etude et de Research sur l'Action Publique (LERAP) ; Xavier Crettiez, Professor of Political Science, Centre de recherches Sociologiques sur le Droit et les Institutions Pénales (Cesdip), Sciences Po Saint-Germain-en-Laye ; Romain Ducoulombier, historian, Delphine Espagno, MCF, Sciences Po Toulouse, laboratoire des sciences sociales du politique)(LaSSP) ; Stéphane François, associate researcher, Groupe Sociétés, Religions, Laïcités (GSRL) ; Joël Gombin, associate researcher, Croyance, Histoire, Espace, Régulation Politique et Administrative (CHERPA), Sciences Po Aix ; Guillaume Origoni, doctoral student in contemporary history at Université Paris Nanterre, Centre de recherches pluridisciplinaires multilingues (CRPM) ; Dominique Sistach, MCF, Université de Perpignan Via Domitia, CDED/CERTAP.
Nicolas LebourgAssociate Researcher at CEPEL (Centre d'Etudes Politiques de l'Europe Latine), University of Montpellier
Visit original version of this article was published on The Conversation.