Morgan, Marc

Morgan, Marc

Marc Morgan

1 February 2024News

Meetings banned, peace campaigner faces charges

One worrying trend even more prevalent in France than elsewhere is the stifling of open public discourse about the situation of the Palestinians, and restrictions placed on the freedom of expression of pro-Palestinian voices and movements.

Even before 7 October, public meetings on Israel-Palestine have been prohibited by the relevant authorities (local boroughs, or departmental Préfets) on dubious public-order grounds.

Since 7 October, the trend has got worse: several…

1 February 2024News

Marc Morgan examines Emmanuel Macron's capitulation to the far-right

Emmanuel Macron was elected president of France in 2017 promising to break the mould of French politics with its see-saw left-right swings. He claimed this was the best strategy for countering the rise of Marine Le Pen’s far-right party, the Rassemblement National (‘National Rally’), formerly known as the Front National (‘National Front’).

The result has been a progressive drift towards the right, and a slow capitulation to authoritarian and nationalist policies. The…

1 June 2023Feature

Macron’s heavy-handed pensions reform is undermining democracy

France is experiencing extensive violence and a seemingly broken political system, with increasing numbers of people feeling left behind or left out. There is a lot to feel unhappy about – while also trying to look for the positive signs which can emerge from times of crisis.

The immediate cause of the current political turbulence in France has been the government’s pensions reform plans, which are being passed into law despite widespread opposition.

Such turbulence is not new…

1 October 2022Feature

A guide to peace groups across the Channel

The largest – and historically the most significant – peace group in France is undoubtedly the Mouvement de la Paix (‘Peace Movement’), whose several thousand members are organised in 150 local committees. Founded in 1948, the Mouvement de la Paix was created by Second World War Resistance movements, free thinkers and communists driven both by the struggle against fascism and a revulsion against war.

Closely linked to the Communist Party, the Mouvement de la Paix has…

1 June 2022Feature

Marc Morgan analyses the political scene across the Channel for PN  

The French peace movement is diverse, but its divisions are nowhere near as bitter or as marked as the conflicts between the three main political blocs which emerged in the presidential elections in April, and which reflect three very different broad outlooks prevalent in French society.

In French presidential elections, if no one wins an over 50 percent in the first round, the top two candidates go into a second and final vote two weeks later. The winner this spring was Emmanuel…

1 February 2022Comment

Writer and thinker on nonviolence who influenced Solidarity

It is not an exaggeration to say that there is a ‘before Jean-Marie Muller’ and an ‘after Jean-Marie Muller’ in the study and practice of nonviolence in France. Jean-Marie was also a committed internationalist who worked with thinkers on and practitioners of nonviolence in a wide range of countries, from Lebanon to the United States.

Jean-Marie Muller was working as a philosophy teacher when he staged his first major (and much-publicised) protest in 1967. Defying the authorities, he…

1 June 2016News

Marc Morgan surveys anti-nuclear fasts, past and present

The international Hiroshima-Nagasaki fast has been held for over 30 years now, as an act of sorrow and commemoration and as a form of protest against nuclear weapons. It continues to grow in support, numbers of participants, and international range from year to year. This year will be the fourth time that it is held in the UK, with a four-day fast from 6–9 August in Whitehall, central London.

Last year, about 150 people fasted in six different countries. In France, the fast is…

1 February 2015Review

Center for Global Non-Killing, 2014; 274pp; £12

Co-founder of the Mouvement pour une Alternative Non-Violente, Jean-Marie Müller is one of the leading contemporary thinkers on nonviolence. Despite authoring over 20 books on a wide range of nonviolence-related subjects, he is little known in Britain: so the recent publication in English of The Principle of Non-Violence is particularly welcome.

Originally published in 1995, it represents Jean-Marie’s most comprehensive statement of his view of nonviolence as a…

27 May 2014Blog

International fast to be held between Hiroshima and Nagasaki days (6th-9th August) in Burghfield, Paris, and Büchel.

Every year an International fast is held between Hiroshima and Nagasaki days (6th-9th August) in Burghfield, Paris, and Büchel, the last Nato base in Germany at which nuclear weapons are stationed. PN has covered the fast in both Paris and Burghfield with several articles in the past (see PN September 2012, June 2013 and September 2013).…

8 June 2013Feature

British participants invited to join a fast for Hiroshima – in Paris

Each year a fast is held in Paris (or in the Paris area) between Hiroshima and Nagasaki days (6-9 August) calling for the abolition of nuclear weapons in general, and the abolition of French nuclear weapons in particular.

The fast is organised by the Maison de Vigilance, which has been demonstrating against French nuclear weapons since 1984.

A movement, a campaign, and a spiritual home for opponents of nuclear weapons which organises monthly protests in…

26 September 2012Feature

A survey of current French campaigns against nuclear weapons.

Questioning France's nuclear arsenal is not quite taboo, but the myth that it enables the country to retain great power status is accepted slavishly by most politicians, and with resigned passivity by the majority of the press and population.

Nevertheless, there is a strong and diverse protest movement.

One strand, closest to the Green party, opposes nuclear weapons as an extension of its opposition to nuclear energy. Just as nuclear weaponry is supposed to guarantee military…