Example French dissertation topic 6:

Fifty years on: Attitudes on slum dwelling and accommodation standards in Marseille.

Subsequent to the Second World War, and particularly during the 1960s, France witnessed a boom in the construction of high-rise apartments as planners and politicians sought to curb urban sprawl. The eradication of the slums of Marseille was part of the post-war reconstruction programme, and the slums had been described as especially bleak. The war in Algeria occurred simultaneously with the development of the high-rises, and many Algerian families were allocated housing in the former slum areas. Given the increasing ethnic diversity of the area, this is a dissertation that also addresses issues of community identity and cohesion and as such, makes a valuable contribution to understanding contemporary issues in French urban policy making and societal cohesion.

Suggested initial topic reading:

• Horne, J.R. (2002). A social laboratory for modern France: The Musée Social & the rise of the welfare state. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
• Lyons, A. (2004). Invisible immigrants: Algerian families and the French welfare state, 1947-1974. Irvine, CA: University of California Press.
• Nasiali, M. (2012). ‘Ordering the disorderly slum: “Standardizing” quality of life in Marseille tenements and Bidonvilles’. Journal of Urban History, vol. 38(6), pp. 1021-1035.