Parliamentary Commission on Cults in France

Who is Parliamentary Commission on Cults in France?

The French National Assembly, the lower house of the Parliament of France, set up a Parliamentary Commission on Cults in France on 11 July 1995 following the events involving the members of the Order of the Solar Temple in late 1994 in the French region of Vercors, in Switzerland and in Canada. Chaired by deputy Alain Gest, a member of the Union for French Democracy conservative party, the Commission had to determine what should constitute a cult. It came to categorize various groups according to their supposed threat or innocuity. The Commission reported back in December 1995.

Some non-French-citizens and certain organizations, including the Church of Scientology and the United States Department of State, criticized its categorization-methodology as such. The Parliamentary Commission always bore in mind the difficulties of establishing any objective classification, although it never called into question the actual ethical and political imperatives of doing so, especially in the wake of the Order of the Solar Temple "mass suicides" and other dangerous cult activities occurring around the world. The Commission held various hearings with persons involved in new-religious-movement activities or involved in anti-cult movements, and had the French secret service Renseignements Généraux give it lists of NRM activities and memberships.