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Rousso, Henry
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2 articles of this author have been cited in the European Press Review so far.
Henry Rousso deplores the exploitation of History
On February 13th, the French president Nicolas Sarkozy proposed that every child in the last year of primary school should honour the memory of one of the 11,000 Jewish school children deported during the Second World War. "This new initiative appears incongruous, suddenly thrown into the public sphere like other presidential announcements. Once again, media noise is disturbing the respect and silence due to History's dead", regrets Henry Rousso. "Once again, only a morbid memory emerges form the past, only criminal history deserves to be commemorated with a bang. These days only utilitarian use is made of history, its complexity and its depth. The past has become a warehouse storing nationalistic political resources, into which anyone can dip and help themselves to whatever serves their immediate interests. It is worrying to see that, once again, the -bad- example has been set at the highest level (...) ."
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More from the press review on the subject » History, » France
The death of Maurice Papon, symbol of the "dark years" of French History
Maurice Papon, former high-ranking civil servant under the Vichy regime, condemned in 1998 for "complicity in crimes against humanity", due to the role he played in the deportation of Jews, died on February 17th. The French historian Henri Rousso considers, in an interview with Annette Lévy-Willard, the magnitude of the former prefect's trial. "I think that the Papon trial was of more use to the future than to History or memory. On a historical level I do not think that it was of any educational use to young people. It did not permit a better understanding of Vichy. ... It was mainly France that was put on trial, dealing with the problems it has with its past. It was also hoped that the trial would mark the end of what is known as the 'Vichy syndrome', but this was not the case. The very next day the question of compensation was raised and new complaints have now been filed, like those against the SNCF [French national railway system], forgetting the context of the Occupation. In this respect, France is far from finished with its dark years."
» full article (external link, French)
More from the press review on the subject » History, » France
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