page_title: GRECE
section_title: Growth and opposition: 1978–1993
hierarchical_section_title: GRECE / History / Growth and opposition: 1978–1993
caption_attribution_description: Guillaume Faye, né le 7 novembre 1949 à Angoulême, est un journaliste et écrivain français d'extrême droite.
context_page_description: The Groupement de recherche et d'études pour la civilisation européenne, better known as GRECE, is an ethno-nationalist think tank founded in 1968 to promote the ideas of the Nouvelle Droite. GRECE founding member Alain de Benoist has been described as its leader and "most authoritative spokesman". Prominent former members include Guillaume Faye and Jean-Yves Le Gallou.
  GRECE is deeply opposed to multiculturalism, liberal democracy, capitalism, and distinguishes itself from other national-conservative organizations in its specific rejection of Christianity and endorsement of neopaganism. The group defends a non-reactionary "conservative revolution" aiming at the rejuvenation of pan-European identity and nationalism, while supporting the preservation and separation of ethnic groups and cultures. GRECE members have created and promoted the concepts of "ethnopluralism" and "archeofuturism".
context_section_description: Building of the structure of influence they had established in the early 1970s – including reviews, conferences, publishing houses, and cercles –, GRECE members began to get public attention and influence from the late 1970s onward. After his nomination as the cultural director of Le Figaro in 1977, Louis Pauwels decided to found the weekly Figaro Magazine, recruiting many GRECE members to the project: Alain de Benoist, Patrice de Plunkett – chosen as the assistant chief editor–, Jean-Claude Valla, Yves Christen, Christian Durante, Michel Marmin or Grégory Pons. Although they were not able to gain enough control to transform the Figaro Magazine into a real organ of propaganda, the ethno-nationalist think tank conserved a large influence on the magazine until 1981. According to political scientist Harvey Simmons, "from the early 1970s to the early 1980s, the doctrine of GRECE had a major impact on the ideology of the entire right" in France. 
  However, the growth of GRECE and the Nouvelle Droite was raising concerns in many liberal and leftist intellectual circles, which led to a violent media campaign against the Nouvelle Droite and Le Figaro in 1979, the year ending with a fight between the Jewish Defence Organization (OJD) and GRECE members in December. Pauwels began to distance himself from the movement and Le Figaro withdrew its patronage. From 1982 to 1992, de Benoist was confined to the redaction of the Figaro Magazine 'videos' section. Now deprived of a popular platform, the Nouvelle Droite accelerated away from biological racism and toward the concept of "ethnopluralism", that is the claim that different ethno-cultural groups should be kept separate in order to preserve their historical and cultural differences.
  In 1980, Pierre Krebs established the Thule-Seminar to operate as a branch of GRECE in Germany. The same year, a group of scholars linked with GRECE, Jean Varenne, Jean Haudry and Jean-Paul Allard, founded the "Institute of Indo-European Studies" (IEIE) at the Jean Moulin University Lyon 3 in Lyon. In 1988 Pierre Vial obtained a teaching position at the same university, as did Bernard Notin and Jacques Marlau, leading to the emergence of a GRECE "nucleus" exerting a certain influence in Lyon 3 during the 1980–1990s.
  Le Gallou grew in importance and served as a link between GRECE ideas and Front National (FN) after he joined the FN in 1985. The party was influenced by GRECE's ideas and slogans, adopting the same emphasis on "ethno-cultural differentialism", although the Catholic faction in the FN rejected GRECE for their support of paganism. Since the years 1979–1980, however, the Club de l'Horloge has distanced itself from GRECE's anti-Christian, anti-American and anti-capitalist positions, promoting instead an "integral neo-Darwinist" philosophy characterized by a form of economic liberalism strongly tainted with ethnic nationalism. GRECE and European New Right activists have criticized the Club de l'Horloge for simultaneously promoting economic neoliberalism and cultural conservatism, which are in their views contradictory positions.
caption: Guillaume Faye in 2015.
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