Every day the news bears witness to a territory in dire straits, undermined by rifts and hostilities that prejudice social cohesion. Religious communitarianism, social separatism, ethnic ghettos in lower class urban areas becoming commonplace and the proliferation of exclusive "private towns" have ultimately put our very notion of society into question.

In this context of depoliticization and fragmentation of the public space, how can we make sense of this theory, frequently expressed over the past few years, that the territorial fracture between lower class urban areas and undisturbed France will be resorbed with the return of social mix, a theory upheld by both right and left political parties

Particularly when it alludes to the "legendary past" of great societies, the notion of "social mix" tackles reality by employing terms that are often contradictory: cohabitation, coexistence, mingling, social diversity, mosaic, the melting pot, sociological equilibrium, etc. In fact all this gives evidence of a constraint or a desire to disguise what is fundamental to the debate on mix: the racial reference.

In this work of anatomical and virulent political analysis, Hacène Belmossous deconstructs this myth through two major areas: housing and the school.

Who are towns built for? Are they for individuals or for groups of humans? Are they for animal societies? Who are we aiming at? Towns mustn't be built first and then people chosen to fill them afterwards, but rather we should observe what kind of people there will be and decide what kind of town to build for them. This seems obvious; however in many cases we can see that what is obvious is forgotten.