This work, which focuses on the 1989-2007 period, aims at clarifying the various meanings of "political theatre", a polysemic notion, which has been used at every turn, both in the practice and in the discourse of the various players on the theatrical stage : artists, theatre managers, programme planners, state and local authorities. Rejecting a normative, teleological approach based on the assumption that in the course of time one definition will invariably be succeeded and superseded by a better one, we started instead from our observation that in the past 20 years, the phrase "political theatre" has been subjected to a fairly large but by no mean unlimited number of simultaneous interpretations. This is why we adapted for the theatrical sphere a concept borrowed from the field of sociology, and more precisely from the works of Luc Boltanski and Laurent Thévenot, the concept of "cité." We then proceeded to define each of the "cités" of political theatre as a coherent theatrical discourse - by this word we mean not just the shows but also the public statements made by artists, critics and officials. This discourse is based on an ideology stemming from a specific conception of history and policy, and results in a legitimation of the theatre and of artists, both in the theatrical field and in society at large. We have identified four different "cités" of "political theatre" which have coexisted and achieved recognition over the past two decades, though with varying degrees : the city of postpolitcal theatre, the city of oecumenical political theatre, the city of the radical reform of the theatrical and political community, and the city of political struggle theatre.

EXPLOR_STEP=$WICRI_ROOT/Wicri/Psychologie/explor/BernheimV1/Data/Main/Exploration

HfdSelect -h $EXPLOR_STEP/biblio.hfd -nk 000374 | SxmlIndent | more

HfdSelect -h $EXPLOR_AREA/Data/Main/Exploration/biblio.hfd -nk 000374 | SxmlIndent | more

{{Explor lien
   |wiki=    Wicri/Psychologie
   |area=    BernheimV1
   |flux=    Main
   |étape=   Exploration
   |type=    RBID
   |clé=     Hal:tel-00602438
   |texte=   The "cités" or political theatre in France from 1989 to 2007. Archaeology and latest manifestations of a multi-faceted ideolocial, aesthetic and institutional notion.
}}