Between social answer of homelessness and security answer about public space: the case of an ethnographic research in Nancy

Based on a post-doctoral ethnographic research conducted between 2017 and 2019 in Nancy, this contribution shows how the ``homeless issue'' should be jointly treated with social and safety perspectives in the context of local political action. By adopting a sociology of institutional uses of sociology point of view, it seems that far from being opposed, these two logics of solving a problem that is both social (or even humanitarian) and security - or eco-sanitary - are in fact complementary for the actors in charge of this issue. Therefore, it seems that the ``dissuasive city'' and the ``city of solidarity'' should not be approached as empirical realities that define this or that city, but rather as logics of public action which, far from being opposed and contradictory, constitute complementary approaches. It would even appear that the sociopolitical framework of contemporary social action favor this duality of political action regarding the social issue.