International Journal on Criminology Volume 7, Number 2, Spring 2020 | Page 127

International Journal on Criminology
value, “vandalism quickly becomes a means of marking out space or expressing resentment,”
and on the other hand that:
collective violence also includes vindictive mobs rising up against
anyone from outside the neighborhood, who has simply come to retrieve
a stolen good. When a wronged owner turns up, those responsible
for the offence rouse the neighborhood. No-one asks any questions
but takes their side immediately, totally, and collectively, with
neighborhood solidarity overriding all other considerations: without
concern for investigation or truth, without even taking logic or the
law into account, the entire group turns against those who are said
to be enemies. One step further and the wandering travelers are attacked
for having simply entered the territory (they force cars to stop
and strip passengers of their belongings before stealing or damaging
the vehicle) (Bui Trong 2000, 65).
This violent marking out of territory involves not only seeing these behaviors
as the impulse of victims of conditioned violence, but also as the expression
of a political incivility seeking division from another reference system that often
combines several cultural matrices, including—but not solely, contrary to certain
urban myths—radical Islam. In short, deciding to destroy a kindergarten bus or
a brand new gym can no longer be read as resulting solely from discontent. Depending
on the circumstances, it must also and above all be seen as the will in the
here and now if not to impose, then at least to live under another political order,
sometimes underpinned by true appropriation of the territory: since the way in
which this latter is organized does not meet certain expectations, why not occupy
it in a different way? This does not mean the existence of long-held strategic political
motivations, but rather demands that seek to come as close as possible to an
imaginary world, like the one glorified by parents who have come to France from
North Africa, the current decline of which is still attributed to the former colonial
power. Particularly as, since 1954, and although considered to be inferior from the
point of view of Arab-Muslim civilization, 30 the claim has been made that France
destroyed an “Algeria” that was a “superpower” before 1830:
Mouloud Kacem Naît Belkacem, a German-speaking leader of the
FLN delegation in Bonn, did not hesitate in meetings to proclaim
his cherished assertion that in 1830, Algeria was a “superpower”
(Meynier 2002, 223).
Such a claim, which spreads like wild fire, cannot help but influence the perception
of one’s own sense of belonging to French identity, since even if it reaches
a minority of people they may nevertheless play a liaison role in this symbolic
30 Gilbert Meynier 2002, 220–23.
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