PARIS -- "France," according to one of its best-known poets and political thinkers, Paul Valery, "is the most heterogeneous country that ever existed." The present tragedy in Kosovo makes this sound hyperbolic, yet there is an element of truth in it. The French who live on the shores of the Mediterranean, for instance, are closer in many ways to the shore dwellers of other Mediterranean countries than they are to the inhabitants of Brittany, Burgundy or Alsace -- who themselves present many physical and cultural contrasts. No wonder these varied peoples resisted so strenuously the Capetian kings' centuries-long attempts to bring them under their crown through wars, purchases and weddings. When the French Revolution took place, the moderate Girondist party called for a more decentralized state that would take account of the peculiarities of France's various regions. But the Girondists were defeated by the Jacobins, who overthrew the monarchy only to follow in turn its firmly unitarian tradition. A great admirer of the Roman Empire, Napoleon Bonaparte built in the imperial spirit many institutions that have in many respects survived him.

In several parts of France, regionalist and even separatist movements have appeared in the two centuries since, mostly animated by the desire to preserve their own customs and languages. But the great majority of the population, from Gaullists to communists, want unequivocally to remain French and support the idea of a strong state -- from which, indeed, everyone routinely expects some degree of help. It was only in 1981, when Francois Mitterrand was first elected president, that the 22 regions of present-day France, each with its own elected executives, were created. With one exception, these regions have caused the central government no major problems.

That exception is Corsica, "the isle of beauty,"where the situation is presently so fraught that it often pushes the Kosovo war out of the headlines in France. After the murder in February last year of the regional prefect (the main local representative of the Republic), his successor was dismissed for participating in the April 20 burning down of an illegally built beach restaurant by a special unit of military police. The man is now in jail.