Girardet was born on 6 October 1917. His father, grandfather, uncle and cousin were career officers, and he was named after an uncle killed in action in September 1914 during
World War I. He attended the école Levert in
Belleville and then the
Lycée Voltaire in the
11th arrondissement of Paris. He was influenced by the work of
Péguy. In the 1930s he was involved in the right-wing
Action Française. During
World War II he studied at the
Sorbonne, where he was taught by
Pierre Renouvin and
Jérôme Carcopino. He passed his
agrégation in History, qualifying as a teacher. He did not share the antisemitism of some followers of Maurras and eventually joined the resistance, like many other Action Française sympathizers. He was later awarded the
Croix de Guerre 1939–1945 and was made an officer of the
Legion of Honour. At the start of the German occupation of France
Roland Laudenbach co-edited the literary review
Prétexte with Jean Turlais and François Sentein, and was associated with the theater company "Le Rideau des jeunes" led by Pierre Franck, whom he had met through
Jean Cocteau.
Prétexte was replaced by
Cahiers de la génération in 1941, and its team became the core of the
Cahiers français published by the Vichy youth organization. The
Cahiers français attracted nonconformists of the 1930s such as
Louis Salleron,
Jean de Fabrègues,
René Vincent and
Pierre Andreu, and followers of
Charles Maurras such as Raoul Girardet,
Antoine Blondin and Jean Turlais. Raoul Girardet specialized as a historian in military societies, the colonial concept and French nationalism. In 1953, as a teacher at the
Lycée Lakanal, he published
La Société militaire, which attracted much attention. He was appointed assistant and then assistant master at the Sorbonne. During the
Algerian War he remained faithful to the idea of French Algeria, and thought that General
Charles de Gaulle had betrayed the people. To some extent he participated in the activities of the OAS in the "Action politique et propagande" branch, along with intellectuals such as François Bluche, Jules Monnerot and
Jacques Laurent. He wrote for ''L'Esprit public'', and signed a manifesto affirming the "civilizing mission" of the army in Algeria, along with writers such as
Roger Nimier and
Henri Massis. In 1961 he was arrested for his activism in favour of the
OAS, which resisted giving Algeria independence. His involvement with the OAS earned him an arrest and time in jail. After this he mainly devoted himself to work on the major themes of nationalism, colonialism and the military question. He became a lecturer and then a professor at the
Institut d'études politiques de Paris (IEP) in Paris. In the 1960s he taught a course at the IEP on "The Movement of Political Ideas in Contemporary France" with
René Rémond and Jean Touchard, Secretary General of the National Foundation for Political Science. He published reference works on The Military Society in France, French Nationalism and The Colonial Idea in France, And an essay on Myths and Political Mythologies. In 1990 in
Singulièrement libre, a book of interviews with the journalist Pierre Assouline, he reasserted his love of his country which led to his participation in the Resistance and is commitment to French Algeria. Girardet died on 18 September 2013 at the age of 95. ==Publications==