Menton, France: It surprised no one when Nicolas Sarkozy, France’s Minister of the Interior announced last week that he would be a candidate for the French presidency, in elections to be held next spring. He moved his announcement up a little to counter the positive media run Segolene Royal has been enjoying since she was named as the candidate of the Socialist Party. Sarkozy will have to face competition from other contenders, most notably Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin, but he is almost certain to win the nomination of the mainstream right in January.
Sarkozy is a formidable candidate, more than that, he is a political phenomenon. Since he burst on the political scene a couple of decades ago, as a young stalwart who was often seen in the company of Jacques Chirac---the two men are no longer fond of one another---Sarkozy’s hunger for advancement has stood out in every photograph, every interview, every speech. This man schemes for the top job with an appetite that has caused people to scrutinize him with equal helpings of admiration and anxiety. Members of France’s political class often display hubris, large egos and disdain for their competitors whether they are adherents of their own parties or of opposing parties. But none of them has done it with the ferocity and determination of Nicolas Sarkozy.
Sarkozy has preferred the job of Interior Minister, which gives him charge of the police and domestic security, in preference to that of prime minister. In France while presidents command respect, prime ministers do the dirty work, having to take care of the details of daily political life. If there is a disruptive strike, a spike in unemployment, a spate of plant closures, or an outcry among employers that the social charges they pay are too high, it is the prime minister who is roasted night after night on television news shows. While Chirac made it to the Elysee Palace (domicile of French presidents) after serving as prime minister, Sarkozy has been happy to leave the tougher job to de Villepin.
Sarkozy basks in the glory of being France’s tough guy. Whenever a riot occurs, he is there within hours, accompanied by the forces of France’s CRS, the tough national police, who don’t resemble any cop you’ve ever met on a beat. He cloaks himself in the colours of the French Republic, insisting that all will be treated equally, but that anyone who runs afoul of the law will receive stern punishment. Last year’s riots that erupted in the Paris suburbs, and spread to other parts of the country, where youths of North African origin feel deeply alienated from the mainstream culture that marginalizes them, made Sarkozy’s message resonate with a very large part of the French population.
Fear of social unrest and violence that wells up from marginalized and poorly understood segments of the population has fueled right-wing politics in many industrialized countries in recent decades. Without this fuel, Sarkozy would never have emerged as the leading candidate of the mainstream right.
Along with law and order, Sarkozy is running on a program the French call economic “liberalism”, which means a more market driven economy, with a reduction in social support for employees. The program is not original. It is a call to greater competitiveness on the backs of wage and salary earners that is the common political currency of the right everywhere in the industrialized world.
Nor is the combination of law and order and economic liberalism----which we in the English-speaking world call neo-conservatism---particularly original. In the very different social context of the United States, that combination has been the bread and butter of the Republican Party since Barry Goldwater won the party’s presidential nomination in 1964.
All political struggles are arguments about how the state should be structured and whom it should serve. The political right in the West marshals those forces that desire a shift in the balance within capitalism that favours capital against labour. The right uses the law and order issue to dress itself in populist garb. The political left tries to make gains for working people when possible. When the tide is running the other way, the left tries to hang onto the ground gained in the past.
In an age when capital can flow anywhere and there is plenty of cheap labour in Asia and other parts of the world, working people in the West are on the defensive. And their position is weakened further when the cry for law and order resonates.
That is why Sarkozy starts his campaign for the presidency from a position of strength. But he is far from unassailable. For one thing, if his political program is supposed to guarantee social peace, why have social tensions grown in France during his watch as Minister of the Interior?
Moreover, Segolene Royal is a formidable candidate. She speaks plainly about the conditions faced by working people, the marginalized in the suburbs and about the problems of an economy in which jobs are being lost in manufacturing almost every week. She talks tough about crime, but also about addressing the social causes of unrest.
The latest public opinion poll puts Segolene Royal and Nicolas Sarkozy dead even, each with fifty per cent support.
Sarkozy is a formidable candidate, more than that, he is a political phenomenon. Since he burst on the political scene a couple of decades ago, as a young stalwart who was often seen in the company of Jacques Chirac---the two men are no longer fond of one another---Sarkozy’s hunger for advancement has stood out in every photograph, every interview, every speech. This man schemes for the top job with an appetite that has caused people to scrutinize him with equal helpings of admiration and anxiety. Members of France’s political class often display hubris, large egos and disdain for their competitors whether they are adherents of their own parties or of opposing parties. But none of them has done it with the ferocity and determination of Nicolas Sarkozy.
Sarkozy has preferred the job of Interior Minister, which gives him charge of the police and domestic security, in preference to that of prime minister. In France while presidents command respect, prime ministers do the dirty work, having to take care of the details of daily political life. If there is a disruptive strike, a spike in unemployment, a spate of plant closures, or an outcry among employers that the social charges they pay are too high, it is the prime minister who is roasted night after night on television news shows. While Chirac made it to the Elysee Palace (domicile of French presidents) after serving as prime minister, Sarkozy has been happy to leave the tougher job to de Villepin.
Sarkozy basks in the glory of being France’s tough guy. Whenever a riot occurs, he is there within hours, accompanied by the forces of France’s CRS, the tough national police, who don’t resemble any cop you’ve ever met on a beat. He cloaks himself in the colours of the French Republic, insisting that all will be treated equally, but that anyone who runs afoul of the law will receive stern punishment. Last year’s riots that erupted in the Paris suburbs, and spread to other parts of the country, where youths of North African origin feel deeply alienated from the mainstream culture that marginalizes them, made Sarkozy’s message resonate with a very large part of the French population.
Fear of social unrest and violence that wells up from marginalized and poorly understood segments of the population has fueled right-wing politics in many industrialized countries in recent decades. Without this fuel, Sarkozy would never have emerged as the leading candidate of the mainstream right.
Along with law and order, Sarkozy is running on a program the French call economic “liberalism”, which means a more market driven economy, with a reduction in social support for employees. The program is not original. It is a call to greater competitiveness on the backs of wage and salary earners that is the common political currency of the right everywhere in the industrialized world.
Nor is the combination of law and order and economic liberalism----which we in the English-speaking world call neo-conservatism---particularly original. In the very different social context of the United States, that combination has been the bread and butter of the Republican Party since Barry Goldwater won the party’s presidential nomination in 1964.
All political struggles are arguments about how the state should be structured and whom it should serve. The political right in the West marshals those forces that desire a shift in the balance within capitalism that favours capital against labour. The right uses the law and order issue to dress itself in populist garb. The political left tries to make gains for working people when possible. When the tide is running the other way, the left tries to hang onto the ground gained in the past.
In an age when capital can flow anywhere and there is plenty of cheap labour in Asia and other parts of the world, working people in the West are on the defensive. And their position is weakened further when the cry for law and order resonates.
That is why Sarkozy starts his campaign for the presidency from a position of strength. But he is far from unassailable. For one thing, if his political program is supposed to guarantee social peace, why have social tensions grown in France during his watch as Minister of the Interior?
Moreover, Segolene Royal is a formidable candidate. She speaks plainly about the conditions faced by working people, the marginalized in the suburbs and about the problems of an economy in which jobs are being lost in manufacturing almost every week. She talks tough about crime, but also about addressing the social causes of unrest.
The latest public opinion poll puts Segolene Royal and Nicolas Sarkozy dead even, each with fifty per cent support.
1 comment:
I wouldn't be so harsh on Sarkozy's planned economic reforms to say that "It is a call to greater competitiveness on the backs of wage and salary earners that is the common political currency of the right everywhere in the industrialized world." His ideas might be radical in France, but surely not the US or UK. One only need look at how the US or UK economies have been doing compared to the French to see there need to be changes. Not that there aren't significant problems in the US (stagnant wages, growing inequality), but the French model has performed far worse.
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