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This paper questions the reality of a “civic turn” in French public policies on integration. It is based on a survey investigating and analysing the different integration contracts that had been put in place since 2003: the accueil et integration Contract, followed by the Family accueil et integration Contract and the pré-CAI replaced in 2006 by the integration républicaine Contract. Borrowing from both sociological and political philosophy studies, this article analyses these policies and elaborates on the evolution of the State embedded perception and definition of “good integration”. The paper also highlights the targets and objectives of these contracts while examining tensions, ambiguities and problems that underlie the “condition of republican integration” but also the legal obligation put on migrants to conform to the “values of the French society and the Republic”.