France in the World: The Career of André Siegfried . By Sean Kennedy

Sean Kennedy devotes a well-documented book to André Siegfried (1875–1959), a central figure in the intellectual and academic world of the first five decades of the twentieth century. After several unsuccessful elections, Siegfried became a major figure at the École libre des sciences politiques, the school that would become the Institut d’études politiques de Paris after the Second World War and went on to a brilliant career as an academician and professor at the prestigious Collège de France. With his Tableau politique de la France de l’Ouest sous la Troisième République (1913), he was considered the founder of electoral sociology. He may have seemed a well-known figure. His students and colleagues at the Fondation nationale des sciences politiques have already recalled his professional and intellectual career. Colloquia have been devoted to him at commemorative events, and he has been at the heart of works tracing the history of political science in France. He has also been the subject of more critical readings, revealing his adherence to the psychology of peoples, as well as to profound stereotypes and hierarchical racialism. Finally, in 2018, a thesis was devoted to him.