François Birot
The Guardian Angels
In 1979 Curtis Sliwa, a night manager at McDonald's in the Bronx, formed a volunteer clean-up group called The Magnificent 13. The group quickly expanded and gained ambition. It was renamed The Guardian Angels and became a real unarmed community patrol devoted to fighting against violence. Although the non-profit organization attracted controversy, the Guardian Angels became popular and grew into a multi-national group.
In this essay, I’ll try to point out how such a community emerged in the USA. I’ll also attempt to explain why, according to my knowledge of French culture, the Guardian Angels organization could not exist in France.
While many Americans consider that a good husband and father has to protect his family and possibly buy a gun for it, French people rely much more on the public authority system. By analogy, Americans would easily participate in a community that aims to protect people from violence whereas French people would most likely take part in demonstrations in order to heighten the government awareness of insecurity.
Indeed most of the time French people will adopt a strategy based on discussion in order to solve problems, which is proper to polychronic cultures. At the opposite, in a monochronic culture like the USA, people will probably act to solve problems.
It is also important to notify that the French government would very likely not support any community patrol like the Guardian Angels. This would indeed lower their credibility toward the public opinion. This is a reason why I guess police would never permit such organizations to help them.
Even though to my mind the Guardian Angels could not exist as-is in France, it could certainly be adapted to French culture. It could for instance exist as an association aimed at sensitizing young people to delinquency.