Abstract

Now that public discourse ponders the « integration » of Muslims, one must be reminded that France and Islam have always maintained very close relationships, from the Middle-Ages and into the modern period, alternating between conflicts and fusions. « Integration » makes no sense, since the Muslim populations are already here. If we fail to see them, it is because Islam has long been the « unreflected » side of official French politics : Islam was the other side of the Mediterranean, and the migrants from Northern and West Africa were never perceived as Mulsims