The Pink And The Black by Frédéric Martel

This book examines the development of France’s male and female homosexual communities and its gay liberation movements after 1968. The book focuses on the construction of social institutions, treating gay activist organizations and their relation to post-1968 French feminism, gay ghettos in French cities, the gay press, the impact of AIDS on political identity, and the renewed militancy of the 1990s. While acknowledging the influence of America’s gay liberation movement on the French situation, the author emphasizes the differences arising from the fact that homosexuality has not historically been criminalized in France as it has been in the United States.

The first part of the book examines the activism of the early post-1968 gay liberation movement and is preceded by a historical summary that traces French cultural, political, and social attitudes toward homosexuality. Part II describe the development of gay ghettos and the dissemination of gay institutions. The pivotal years is 1981, which saw the advent of Francois Mitterrand’s government, with its pro-gay policies. The third part deals with initial reactions in France to AIDS epidemic, reactions that included the realization of its ubiquity. The author describes the French government’s response to the epidemic, and the role of French medical researchers in searching for the causes of the infection. The last part focuses on the changing social institution of homosexuality in the 1990s, including the development of ACT-UP, based on the American model, in France. The book concludes with a thoughtful epilogue on the integration of minority communities into French society.