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France’s reaction to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was initially conciliatory. However, the current French President’ statements, Macron, gradually changed, suggesting a potential shift in France's stance. The French president recently suggested troops could be sent to Ukraine to fight the Russians, a move that could significantly impact the course of the war. Our paper aims to address this possibility. How feasible would this be from a military perspective? Second, are there any other relevant political actors that will support it? Third, why has Paris changed its position to such a radical stance? We start from the theoretical design of realist constructivism. Postcolonial theories and the concept of locked-in path dependence supported this research. The methods follow the path of historical synthesis, discourse analysis of key political actors, and text analysis of defense white papers. Quantitative military variables are used to understand France’s and the EU’s military-industrial complex capabilities and assess its potential. The collapse of France’s neocolonial empire in Africa and Russia’s growing influence in the region partially explains Macron’s discourse change. This is correlated with the need to follow a more independent European security policy and the worsening military situation in Ukraine. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates how political challengers articulate new political divides in European political party systems and with what implications for representative democracy. Focusing on the case of France and the discourse and practices of Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen, the paper identifies three strategies these actors have used to articulate a new political division beyond Left and Right: the discursive rejection of traditional Left/Right politics, the combination of elements from across the Left/Right divide and the identification of each other as opposite sides on a new cleavage. Our analysis also suggests that rather than addressing the democratic pathologies associated with the traditional Left/Right party system, this new divide has largely contributed to deepen them. Specifically, the new dichotomy carries risks in terms of representative deficits, electoral demobilisation and the further legitimation of illiberal politics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Russian invasion of Ukraine and the recognition of the rising challenge from China have resulted in a closer alignment of American, British and French strategic interests. This policy paper explores how the strategic relationship between the United States, the United Kingdom and France has evolved amid this changed threat environment. The Russia–Ukraine war exposed the limitations of France's policy of 'strategic autonomy' and reasserted the importance of an American role in European security. The war has re-focused attention upon the Lancaster House framework in which the UK and France have the potential to enhance their contribution to European defence. The UK still regards its 'special relationship' with the US as being of critical importance to its foreign policy. But the UK's diminishing military power makes it a less valuable ally to the US whose attention is increasingly upon the Indo-Pacific region. The paper argues that the alignment between the three countries has been closer over the Russian war in Ukraine compared to attitudes towards China, where tensions between France and the 'Anglo-Saxons' persist. France has been unwilling to adopt the American approach towards China and has stuck to its vision of a multipolar world. The AUKUS deal arranged between the US, UK and Australia had the effect of alienating France. The policy paper contends that the temporary alignment between US, UK and French interests will erode as long-standing conflicts of interest re-emerge. In particular, the unpredictability of US leadership will damage the trilateral relationship if Donald Trump regains the presidency in November 2024. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the distinctiveness of French and francophone approaches to environmental justice. While off to a slow start, environmental justice research has received increased attention in France in the last 15 years. But there has been little to no attention to the French debates and movements in the English-language academic literature, with both bodies of knowledge largely evolving in parallel, conceptually and politically. This article attends to this gap by first taking stock of the empirical evidence of environmental injustices and inequalities in France. We then introduce some of the theoretical origins and discuss some of the main insights from the French literature in light of contemporary environmental justice scholarship. In so doing, our aim with this paper is to contribute to current scholarly efforts on diversifying the meanings and understandings of environmental justice in different academic and political contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses the potential impacts of a hypothetical implementation of the Income Stabilisation Tool (IST) in France for the field crops sector. The IST is a risk management tool available within the 2014–2020 Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) to support farmers facing a severe drop in their incomes. This analysis was conducted using a farm‐level model relying on expected utility theory and based on positive mathematical programming with risk. The model was applied to a sample of 1375 field crop farms in France derived from Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN) data. Simulation results show that the uptake rate of the tool is relatively low, less than 37% in all scenarios. It is strongly dependent on CAP public support and on how much premium farmers have to pay. Highest uptake rates are observed in farms specialising in Other Field Crops, such as potatoes, pulses and sugar beet, and farms located in regions highly exposed to climatic risks. Previous experience with insurance favours the acceptance of the IST. Model results also show that the IST improves adopters' income and reduces income inequality. However, its impacts on crop diversity, measured by the Shannon index, are negative. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rise of exclusionary populism is widely regarded as one of the most significant phenomena in today's political world. Despite this, the relationship between populism and security remains under-explored in the literature, including the affective power of populist security narratives. Against this background, this paper conducts a comparative analysis of radical right populist discourse in response to two recent shocking crimes in France and Ireland. The different expression given to security concerns in the two countries, such as a much less antagonistic 'flaunting of the low' in France, is suggestive of a more contingent and institutionally mediated relationship between security and populism than the existing literature would suggest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to analyse how State policies, on the book and in practice, shape family reunification. It focuses on child migration under constraint in France, by analysing the timing and factors of (non-)reunification among foreign immigrants, whose legal conditions for family reunification are much more restrictive than for those who obtained the French citizenship. Using a quantitative approach with a nationally representative survey, the article analyses to what extent and in what circumstances migrants took one or the other of three paths during the 1973–2009 period: bringing their children in France through the administrative channel of family reunification (de jure reunification), turning to an alternative channel of child migration (de facto reunification), or leaving their child behind in their birth country. Results show that de jure reunification is not the predominant option and strongly suggest that this pathway is impaired both by an official state selection based on socioeconomic criteria enshrined in law, and by an unofficial state selection in policy implementation due to discriminatory treatments and regional inequalities in administration resources. In response to these restrictions, families adapt either by turning to de facto reunification or by maintaining transnational ways of life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Paris-Lyon line is the busiest High-Speed Line in Europe and has been open to competition in open access since December 18, 2021. The main objective of the paper is to explore the effects for users with respect to price and frequency compare with the existing literature. The analysis is based on a large database (n = 1243) collected by web scraping from September 2019 to October 2022. The method relies on a descriptive analysis with a similar route without competition (Paris-Bordeaux) in the comparison group. The results highlight an increase of frequency by 15% and a decrease in price by 23%. The prices charged by the newcomer are lower than those of the incumbent (−30% to −50%). The comparison with the control route suggests a positive effect on price that moderates the economic catch-up effect following the COVID-19 pandemic in an inflationary context. More specifically, SNCF appears to take a wait and see attitude to competitive pressure from Trenitalia. It has moderated its prices since the new offer was introduced and has maintained its trains. • Competition have a positive effect on user welfare. • Barriers to competition underscore the importance of public regulation for success. • Incumbent adopts a wait and see attitude in response to competitive pressure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It has recently been observed, that a change in the crop spectrum happened during the so-called Middle Neolithic in France at ca. 4000 BC. An agricultural system based on free-threshing cereals (naked wheat and naked barley) seems to shift to one based on glume wheats. This is a major change for traditional farmers and this paper aims to shed light on its possible causes. Here we describe the results of new investigations in a key area for the understanding of this process: the NW Mediterranean arch, where free-threshing cereals are the main cultivars since ca. 5100 BC. New data confirm that the shift towards glume wheats is also observed in some sites of the NE of the Iberian Peninsula and that among the glume wheats that spread at ca. 4000 BC we should not only consider emmer and einkorn but also Timopheevi's wheat. Stable isotope analyses indicate no major decrease in soil fertility or alterations in local precipitation regimes. The agricultural change may be the result of a combination of the spread of damaging pests for free-threshing cereals and presumably new networks being developed with the North-eastern part of Italy and the Balkans. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The subsistence strategies of early farming communities have been highlighted since the beginning of the Neolithic, thanks to numerous studies on lipid residues from ceramic vessels conducted in various parts of continental Europe. However, after the Early Neolithic, evidence of subsistence strategies along the northern Atlantic coast are still lacking, especially for island contexts. This paper presents the results of lipid residue analysis of 129 potsherds from Beg ar Loued (Molène, France), an island site dating primarily to the Early Bronze Age (c. 2700-2600 to 1800 BCE). Aiming to understand the use of vessels, vessel treatment and culinary practices on the settlement, analyses of visible charred residues, sherds and ceramic surfaces/coating layers were carried out using chromatographic (n = 174) and isotopic techniques (n = 24) after lipid extraction by solvent (n = 174) or acid methanolysis (n = 31). The results demonstrate the extensive use of terrestrial products (ruminant carcass and dairy) in pottery, including occasional plant products (with possible mixtures of different waxes), while the detection of aquatic products is limited. Thus, combined with evidence from faunal remains at the site, the results indicate that terrestrial resources like ruminant meat and dairy products were preferentially processed in vessels, and aquatic products mostly without the use of ceramics. These findings demonstrate the significance of lipid residue analysis for studying the role of pottery in food production and consumption at sites along the Atlantic coast. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Economic inequality, in terms of income or wealth, is one of the most complex and perplexing challenges of our current capitalist economic system. While the dynamic relationship between income inequality and economic growth has been extensively investigated (since the beginning of the last century), the dynamic link between wealth inequality (or wealth concentration) and economic growth has been largely ignored in the literature, taking more attention in recent years. This paper asserts that the accumulation of non-productive assets/luxury goods is an important determinant of wealth inequality, as well as a determinant of the relationship between wealth inequality and economic growth. In this paper our aim is to show that an increase in wealth inequality is associated with a slowdown in economic growth. In particular, the paper shows that there is a negative relationship between wealth inequality and economic growth in France because poor households own a relatively large fraction of non-productive luxury goods. Nevertheless, this is not the case in the US, which is what explains that such negative relationship is not observed there. We conclude that a redistribution of wealth (from the rich to the poor) is important for attaining a sustained economic growth performance. • This paper contributes to the analysis of economic growth and wealth inequality in France and the United States. • We propose a macroeconomic model that includes both productive and non-productive assets. • Economic growth slows as the aggregate stock of non-productive assets increases as wealth inequality increases. • Redistribution will enrich the poorest households and therefore decrease their propensity to own unproductive assets. • Wealth inequality and economic growth may have a non-linear relationship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

France is one of the countries that have made commendable progress towards accomplishing sustainable development goals but still struggles with combating environmental challenges. Decarbonizing the energy sector by deploying clean energy and reducing fossil fuels in the energy mix are essential steps. The study uses annual time series data from 1980 to 2021 and employs the ridge regression estimation technique to estimate a twice-differentiable transcendental production function, which approximates the second-order Taylor series to explore the potential for such decarbonization for France. The study finds that substitution possibilities exist between clean energy and fossil fuels, with substantial substitution possibilities coming from nuclear energy. Nuclear energy and renewables are found to be complements that can be deployed concurrently, but since nuclear energy already constitutes a significant proportion of clean energy for France, the study recommends increasing the proportion of renewable energy in the overall energy mix as the most plausible path to decarbonization. Other complementary sustainable energy policies are recommended in the body of the paper. • The substitution elasticities between clean energy and fossil fuels were estimated. • A second-order Taylor series trans-log production function was specified. • Substitutability is found between clean energy and fossil fuels. • Nuclear energy currently dominates France's clean energy mix. • Increasing renewables in the clean energy mix is recommended. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Transmasculine people (TM) constitute an invisibilized group within the transgender population. Little is known about their relationship to sexuality in transgender medicine. Their presence and needs are still unacknowledged within HIV prevention research and services. Pre-exposure prophylaxis (or PrEP) is an oral medication that prevents HIV in HIV-negative individuals at risk of infection with the virus. This paper proposes to bring TM back into the focus of PrEP research by questioning how they navigate and situate themselves in relation to existing PrEP categorization and services, and how they think about and (re)shape the meanings of PrEP. It is based on the "interpretative descriptive" method and a transfeminist theoretical framework applied to the analysis of ten semi-structured interviews with TM conducted in France between 2019 and 2023. Findings show that PrEP is gendered. We identify specific barriers to getting PrEP as well as to access healthcare and we show that a cisnormative and homonormative approach to prevention generates them. PrEP use and PrEP disclosure are embedded in structural and symbolic power relations between cisgender and transgender MSM that are reflected in the intimate sphere. TM use PrEP to prevent sexual assault and to alleviate the difficulty of condom negotiation. PrEP comes into play following major changes in TM's sexualities and is integrated post-exposure. • Transgender men are excluded from the MSM populations targeted by PrEP. • The uses and non-uses of PrEP by transgender men reveal that PrEP is gendered. • PrEP for HIV reveals unequal power relations between trans and cisgender MSM. • PrEP is embedded in unique temporalities inherent in transgender men's transitions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a pressing need for a fast and efficient satellite remote sensing tool to estimate coastal bathymetry for any coastline in the world. To date, satellite methods for deriving bathymetry have mainly focused on linking the radiometric response to a known water depth, as with SPOT, Landsat and Sentinel. Here, wave properties (static and dynamic) are approximated using the small time delay between the different color bands of Sentinel-2 to then calculate a depth using wave linear dispersion theory. In this paper, we present a spatial correlation method within the S2Shores (Satellites to Shores) Python toolbox: a processing chain/toolbox of coastal observations using methods applied to optical satellites. The resulting individual bathymetries are finally qualified according to the standards of the International Hydrographic Organization, anticipating their operational use. • S2Shores spatial-correlation method for optical satellite coastal observations. • Bathymetry qualified with the International Hydrographic Organization standards. • Wave characteristics from the time delay between spectral bands of Sentinel-2. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]