In 1998, Éric Hazan founded La Fabrique editions with a few friends. Jean
Morisot, who is gradually taking over from him, with Stella Magliani-Belkacem,has agreed to talk to us about these 25 years, the 225 books published and "thecoming repression". ---- Libertarian alternative: Even if we chronicle your worksvery regularly in our columns, can you in a few lines, present to us theeditorial line of your catalog? ---- Jean Morisot: We publish at the rate of adozen titles a year essays in the human sciences, history, philosophy, includingsome translations and reprints, which have in common to put political issues inthe foreground . Over the years, the catalog has been structured around subjectsthat are dear to us (Palestine, the history of revolutions, Paris, anti-racism,psychoanalysis, feminism, decolonial struggles, etc.), authors and loyal authorswho entrust us with their manuscripts and, more generally, broaden our editorialfield of vision.We note, moreover, that this catalog has acquired a form of autonomy: certainbooks open up avenues, debates, prepare future books, others close them becausethey have, in our eyes in any case, made the rounds. 'a subject.To "committed" or "activist", we often prefer the epithet "subversive", if one isneeded, to qualify our position in the sector. Let's say more frankly that we tryto make books that aim at the heart of the established order and speak to theleft of the left, in all its components and traditions, sometimes trying to movethe lines there.On April 17, the publisher's rights manager was arrested and questioned at lengthby British police. Had certain titles already been the subject of threats,censorship, heated debates at the time of their publication ?Heated debates yes ! sometimes that is even the goal. To take just one fairlyrecent example, Houria Bouteldja's book, Les Blancs, les Juifs et nous, was thesubject of particularly dishonest and malicious criticism when it was released in2016 by people, including in our camp. , who had not even read it. It turns outthat the 2nd book of Houria which has just been published in 2023, Beaufs etbarbares, is a great success which has generated many meetings and discussions inbookstores and elsewhere. Proof that beyond certain disagreements, things haveevolved and that the ideas she defends are taken seriously.[1]Censorship is primarily economic: projects never see the light of day becausethey are deemed unprofitable or displease the owner. This is why independence (ofpublishers, booksellers, distributors-broadcasters, media) is essential fordiversity and critical production. Financial balance is a daily concern for thesestructures, which must also be able to remunerate work properly. As for thethreats, the pressure shots, they are rare but in a way latent, sometimes arisingwhen we do not expect them - we have just experienced them.Everyone remembers the Tarnac affair during which the book The ComingInsurrection was added to the investigation file. It was unprecedented, but thecrude police set-up collapsed on itself and the case ended with a collectiverelease (after all the same after years of exhausting procedures for the defendants).Another example is the criminalization of the BDS campaign against the State ofIsrael, to which we have devoted two books (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions in2010 and A Legitimate Boycott in 2016). The books are not worried as such, butthose who lead this campaign against the policy of Israeli apartheid areslandered and dragged before the courts.What can we suspect behind this arrest?That the book trade and the circulation of ideas are supervised activities thathave always preoccupied the powers that be, all the more so when they aredesperate. We can clearly see the state of panic in which the governmentcurrently finds itself, which reinforces the tendency towards the authoritarianradicalization of institutions. This episode, among many others, is part of thiscontext of the regime's crisis of legitimacy.Why do you think the government takes the risk of attacking freedom of expressionso openly today, a particularly sensitive subject in France?Freedom of expression is often brandished by people, mainly bourgeois white men,who have many spaces for speech, to continue to be able to pour out theirreactionary hodgepodge. The macronie also regularly wallows there, but clearly,we can say that defending freedom of expression is not his primary concern. Thatsaid, the freedom of expression of the far right is absolutely not threatened.For the rest, the attacks are not frontal (against freedom of expression itself),and target particular discourses that the power cannot assimilate and that itfears. And when he is afraid, he strikes. We saw it with the decision to expelImam Iquioussen; or, in another register, with the threats against the League ofHuman Rights which followed a public position taken after the surge of policeviolence in Sainte-Soline; or even with the legal and police use of "outrage"which regularly penalizes satirical, almost carnivalesque actions against power.What seems at stake is the defense of a critical voice of the State and itsapparatuses, and this is certainly an important battle in which publishers,booksellers, academics, intellectuals must engage. people and journalists, toname but a few.Interview by Ernest London (UCL Le Puy-en-Velay)To validate[1]The editorial staff plans to review the author's two books soon.https://www.unioncommunistelibertaire.org/?Entretien-Le-commerce-du-livre-et-la-circulation-des-idees-sont-des-activites_________________________________________A - I N F O S N E W S S E R V I C EBy, For, and About AnarchistsSend news reports to A-infos-en mailing listA-infos-en@ainfos.ca
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