Bourdieu's Maieutics

In the year in which he reached conventional retirement age, Pierre Bourdieu appeared to embark on a new career. In the past he had frequently refused to "prendre position," but now he appeared to plunge into politics and to adopt the persona of a public intellectual. ² The occasion was the right-wing Juppé government's proposed reform of the public sector, which provoked a series of strikes. As one of those who signed the "Appel des intellectuels au soutien des grévistes," Bourdieu appeared in support of the strikers on 12 December 1995 outside the Gare de Lyon and said, "Je suis ici pour dire notre soutien à tous ceux qui luttent depuis trois semaines contre la destruction d'une civilisation associée à l'existence du service public, celle de l'égalité républicaine des droits, droits à l'éducation, à la santé, à la culture, à la recherche, à l'art, et, par-dessus tout, au travail." [I am here to express our support for all those who have been fighting for three weeks against the destruction of a civilisation associated with the existence of public services and of equal rights in a republican context, such as rights to education, to health care, to culture, to research, to arts and, above all, to work.] ³ His image appeared on many news bulletins where he was filmed rather in the manner of Sartre selling La Cause du peuple, but he later stated that his presence at the Gare de Lyon was to "prendre position en tant que citoyen mettant en pratique les valeurs qu'il a apprises dans son travail scientifique" [take a stand as a citizen putting into practice the values he has acquired through his research]. ⁴

In January 1996, Bourdieu appeared on the television program Arrêt sur images. The aim of this program, presented by Daniel Schneidermann, is to comment on the way television presents the issues of the day--in this case, following the strikes, "Télévision et conflits sociaux." ⁵ Discussing the subject with Bourdieu were Jean-Marie Cavada, Chairman of La Cinquième and "Producer/Presenter" of La Marche du siècle, one of the programs Bourdieu had selected for commentary, Guillaume Durand, Schneidermann himself, and his co-presenter, Pascale Clark. The precise arrangements surrounding the choice of the individuals to appear and extracts to be screened subsequently became the subject of a public disagreement between Bourdieu and Schneidermann. ⁶

Whatever the reservations he later expressed about this program, Bourdieu's appearance allowed him to make two crucial points. By pausing for what seemed an extraordinarily long time (in fact several seconds) before responding to Clark's question, "Pourquoi vous n'êtes-vous pas encore exprimé à la télévision sur la grève de décembre dernier?" [ Why have you not yet appeared on television to speak about last December's strike?], he underlined the extent to which television is ruled by the time imperative. And by examining Cavada's treatment of a trade unionist and an Acade-mician and former government minister during the episode of La Marche du siècle devoted to the strikes, he successfully demonstrated that they were not treated equally. ⁷ Although Cavada refuted Bourdieu's assertion that the trade-unionist was given less air time than the Academician, Cavada certainly appeared to be, as Bourdieu said, less respectful in his body language and his manner of speech towards the former than he did towards the latter. Commenting on this in an article he later published in Le Monde diplomatique, Bourdieu wrote :

La télévision n'est que la limite particulièrement difficile de situations de parole publique. (...) Il y a sur le plateau des gens qui ont des aptitudes inégales à prendre la parole, des probabilités inégales à prendre la parole. (...) Si on veut être égal, il faut être inégal. Il faut soutenir.

[Television is an extreme example of the difficulties that arise when people speak in public. (...) In the studio there are people who are more or less good...