ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the origins of the re-creation of the 'French nation'. The new France able to resist foreign influences, the enemy. Emile Boutmy had a project which was in line with this ambition: to found a new school, the École Libre des Sciences Politiques (School of Political Sciences) whose task was to anchor democracy and reform the minds of the citizenry. Very much in the spirit of this project for national regeneration, coupled with a scientific objective, was in diplomatic history offered by the historian Albert Sorel which he taught since the beginning of the School's existence. It is accurate to characterize this course as an amalgam of 'political realism' and patriotic optimism: realism and optimism were the hallmarks of most of the school's teaching. The patriotic concerns discussed may have touched off a reaction, and a temporary or ephemeral embracing of the nationalist Ligue de la Patrie Française at the time of the Dreyfus Affair.
