"'Exceptionalism' is the term sometimes used to help describe the phenomenon that has allowed France to conform to the same criteria of modernity as other leading democracies, while relying on the unique tension between the centre and the periphery in its social and political structures that has fluctuated between brilliant success and conspicuous breakdown. As the Fifth Republic celebrates its fortieth birthday, this survey asks whether the model of conflict and continuity, which has come to typify the Republic in Modern France, can remain viable, and furthermore whether France is not now engaged in a path of convergence with those, notably Anglo-Saxon societies, from which it was judged to be so distinct."--BOOK JACKET.