CHIRAC, SARKOZY The French Right prepares for presidentials

From the Guardian (so I haven't to translate French)

These maps from today's Le Parisien (page 10) show how the country is divided:





Related the report in the Independent: French electorate splits into two tribes of young and old

Au Revoir
De Gaulle, Le Pen, and the Communist party have been expunged from French politics.

By Laurent Murawiec


Good news for the French, good news for us: Nicolas Sarkozy's impressive victory in this weekend's French presidential election sounds the death knell of key components of French political exceptionalism.

GAULLISM AT HOME…
First, the Gaullist exception in both the domestic field and in international affairs has finally been done away with. Domestically, Gaullism has been terrible for the Right. In France, after 1945, the figure of General de Gaulle singlehandedly prevented the consolidation of a powerful and durable Christian-Democratic party as arose in Germany or Italy and as existed in Britain. Even after de Gaulle's retirement, his legacy prevented the often-attempted establishment of a conservative, right-of-center party. This fragmented the center and the Right, and forced a general shift to the center. The Right was softened, which in turn enabled the rise of an uncouth ultra-right in the form of Jean-Marie Le Pen, whose National Front took a large part of the conservative electorate.

Furthermore, de Gaulle essentially established a pact with the Communist party, which paralyzed the political landscape: Against an erratic coalition of Gaullists and Communists, it was virtually impossible to effect significant change. For the better part of fifty years, the Communist-dominated unions were like a lead balloon burdening the body politic, a powerful lobby on behalf of corporatist status quo.

No figure comparable to that of Mrs. Thatcher ever rose to break the back of the unions, no figure remotely comparable to that of Ronald Reagan ever appeared to free the political system from the poisonous legacy of Gen. de Gaulle. Sarkozy's ascent represents the consolidation of a genuine right-of-center force in French politics and the final vanquishing of the Gaullist exception.

…AND ABROAD
In international affairs, de Gaulle repeatedly broke ranks with Atlantic solidarity; he tried to sunder NATO and flirted with Moscow. De Gaulle foolishly France, with him at it head, as the leader of an international "third way" in which the "non-aligned" and the Soviet bloc would join him. The Islamic world, Latin America, and Asia would heed his anti-American call. De Gaulle's successors kept up that tradition, though with partial exceptions: President Pompidou improved relations with Richard Nixon somewhat; Socialist president Mitterrand supported Reagan's deployment of the "euro-missiles" (but furiously opposed missile defense). Jacques Chirac turned out to be the most virulent hater of America, ready to go to almost any length to harm the U.S.

Sarkozy's very first statement upon being elected pointedly emphasized a strong alliance with and friendliness toward the United States. This is an enormous change: For the first time since the strongly Atlantic-oriented Fourth Republic, Paris will not be anti-American. This does not mean that Sarkozy's France will be "aligned" with, or a mere appendix of, American diplomacy ?- in his speech, Sarkozy first underlined that he was "a good European" and favorable to a stronger Europe. Rather, it means that Sarkozy's France will stop trying to berate, harass, and scoff at the United States at every opportunity; that Sarkozy's France will stop trying to lead a worldwide anti-American coalition, as was the case under the bumbling but tenaciously noxious stewardship of Jacques Chirac. The professional America-loathers at the French foreign ministry, the Quai d'Orsay, will have to watch their step. Israel will be able to count on a more level playing field and less Islamophilia. Washington can do business with Nicolas Sarkozy, whereas Chirac only wanted to do injury to America. The European Union can again envision a center-right French-German leadership that is not intent on pitting the EU against America.

THE END OF LE PEN
The second French exception that suffered a fatal blow Sunday is Jean-Marie Le Pen, a clever, oafish demagogue. By defying the politically correct denial that there was any problem at all with Muslim immigrants, with their wayward, violent, and inassimilable children, or with the ghetto-like "banlieues" ?- breeding grounds for drugs, criminality, and Islamic recruitment ?- Le Pen proved a powerful attraction for the popular electorate and dragged it away from the mainstream, which in turn strengthened the Left. Mitterrand and the Socialists underhandedly supported Le Pen so as to weaken the Right, which gave Le Pen an otherwise unattainable lease on life. The fact is that Le Pen's strength was a mainstay of Socialist power. Deprived by Le Pen of more than 15 percent of the electorate, the Right was politically weakened; with Le Pen unwilling to engage in coalition politics except on his own terms, the conservative camp was in poor shape. The farce of the 2002 presidential election, where all the Left voted for Chirac ?- "the crook," as they called him ?- in order to stop "the Fascist" Le Pen was the crowning tomfoolery of the French exception.



The portion of the popular electorate that supported Le Pen, at least 15 percent of the whole, had shifted over decades from de Gaulle to the Communists and then from the Communists to Le Pen. Sarkozy's strategy, tested and steadfastly practiced over many years, much resembles Richard Nixon's recapture of George Wallace's electorate. Nixon did not deny, as the respectable elites did, that there were serious reasons for disaffection among blue-collar workers and disenfranchised whites. Sarkozy likewise stated the obvious, which the Chiraquist, as well as Socialist, elites were discounting ?- giving Le Pen, as a result, a monopoly on proclaiming that uncontrolled North African and West African Muslim immigration had created a massive problem; that the withdrawal of police and justice from the high-density clusters of immigrant and second-generation Muslims and the abandonment by the authorities of the poorer, lower-middle-class French had worsened the problem; and that some major policy-shift was urgent.

MARGINALIZED FRINGES
On the abhorrent basis of ideological racism and hatred for "foreigners" (he even badgered Sarkozy for his Hungarian roots), Le Pen recognized the Muslim problem and spoke up strongly about it. In so doing, he strongly contributed to the disintegration of the Communist party, which was once one of the most vigorous in Western Europe, with a quarter of the vote and a powerful grip on labor: Le Pen stole the Communists' popular base. In the present election, Le Pen lost about half his electorate and the Communist candidate polled 2 percent of the vote.

The radical (Left or Right) hijacking of blue-collars has come to an end, even if various Trotskyites and Greens and sundry absurdists managed to siphon off about 10 percent of the total vote in the first leg of the election. In France, the fringe radicals are on the wane. Just as, in Germany, the CDU-CSU was wide enough a tent to include more nationalistic oriented voters, so it will now be in France.

THE END OF AN ERA
The exceptions of Gaullism, the Communist party, and Le Pen have been fatally weakened or eliminated altogether. The French body politic is ripe for a thoroughgoing reshuffle, and this is what will occur now. A new, post-Gaullist conservative pole will take shape around Sarkozy. Should the new president go to the country to acquire the parliamentary majority he needs, he would consolidate a five-year majority for himself, enabling him to implement what priorities he will select, which, if the campaign is any indication, will represent a pro-market inflection (not revolution) in the étatist policies of the French state.

The Socialist party will be torn by defeat, by the exhaustion of the '68 generation, by the failure of the post-'68 (Ségolène Royal's) generation to capitalize on even as calamitous a 12-year legacy as that of the pseudo-conservative Chirac. The moderate, more Social-Democratic types in the Socialist party have been signaling their willingness to deal with the center: Former Socialist government minister Bernard Kouchner, founder of the "French Doctors," is now talking of joining François Bayrou's new Centrist (Christian-Democratic) party. Claude Allègre, renowned geophysicist (and noted global-warming skeptic) and a former Socialist minister of Education, was spotted leaving Sarkozy's offices a few days ago.

The grip of the "Sixty-Eighters" (soixante-huitards) on the political and cultural establishment and the complete connivance between Gaullists, Communists, and '68ers on anti-American, anti-Israeli, anti-Christian, pro-Arab, pro-Muslim, pro-Russian, and pro-"third world" policies has now been seriously weakened. In his campaign, Sarkozy emphasized national identity and cultural roots (Judeo-Christian, Catholic, French, and Western) ?- subjects that drive the Left into fits of rage. The '68ers idolized cultural relativism and multiculturalism; the new president has no sympathy for their shibboleths. The virtues he stresses and the vices he attacks have nothing in common with the worldview of the '68ers.

With the end of its persistent and toxic "exceptions," from the so-called French social model to the conceit of French international leadership, and with a new chief executive unburdened by these follies, France will join again the ranks of reasonably governed nations. Good news for the French, good news for us.

?- Laurent Murawiec is a senior fellow with the Hudson Institute in Washington, D.C. His next book, The Mind of Jihad, will appear next year.

Murawiec's view is significantly opposite to the actual voter's anylysis (see e.g. quotes above).

Besides that, he is wrong re Bayou's party, which most clearly isn't becoming a "Christian-democratic" party - that role is already filled by Sarkozy's (and before that de Gaulle's and Girac's) UMP

(Seriously: I totally doubt that the UMP will leave the Christian Democrat International only to support Bayou's new party. Besides that, the name for new party is already known and trademarked.)

Actually, as it seems now, Bayrou's former party, the UDF, will end to exist with the founding of Mouvement démocrate on Thursday.

(The UDF was formed in 1978 by the [Christian-democratic] Democratic and Social Centre, the [conservative-liberal] Republican Party, the [liberal] Radical Party, the [centre-left] Social Democratic Party and the [centrist] Perspectives and Realities Clubs.)

Quite a few of leading members of the UDF already joined Sarkozy's UMP.
(The UMP is a merger of the Gaullist-conservative Rally for the Republic (Rassemblement pour la République, RPR), the conservative-liberal Liberal Democracy (Démocratie Libérale, DL), and a sizeable portion of the centrist Union for French Democracy (Union pour la Démocratie Française, UDF), more precisely many Christian Democrats (such as Philippe Douste-Blazy and Jacques Barrot), the social-liberal Radical Party and the centrist Popular Party for French Democracy (both associate parties to UDF until 2002.)


sources: Wikipedia France, Assemblée nationale, France 1, France 2, EUROPE 1.

Wikipedia isn't the more reliable of sources; in both 1965 and 1974 presidentielles Mitterand was supported by the French Communist Party - whether he was an actual member, ever, is said to be not proven, but the Russian archives, opened since the mid-1990s, indicate he had been at some point,


http://www.election-politique.com/pcf.php#parti

Source: website for French Communist Party (and a more obnoxious lot I've never met, personally - worse even than the old Berlin anarchists)

Speaking of the old Sovs, however, it must be said to Mitterand's credit that, soon after his election in 1981, he came across a whole group of them in France (up to no good, I guess) and he notified the U.S. a.s.a.p.

It's not for nothing he was known as the inscrutable "Florentin" - presumably meaning Machiavelli.

I haven't doubted at all - and you never wrote that, too - wether the Communist Party supported Mitterand or not.

I don't post which extreme right-wing party supported which conservative candidate neither.


Back to Sark de triomphe :wink:

LOL Walter - knowing you, I'd have thought you're staying away from Arc de Triomphe, being all the way across town at Place de la Bastille!

Seems that Mme Royal and M. Hollande (and others in the Socialist party) have some severe discussions ...

Election defeat exposes strategy split of France's 'power couple'

And in today's The Guardian ...





The French seem to have the perfect lifestyle: long lunches, short hours, great food and plenty of ooh-la-la. But their new president is determined to make them work harder, faster, more efficiently - just like the British and Americans. Merde alors, says Stuart Jeffries

Goodbye to la belle France?

Amusing article -- but not much point to it.

The problem was that despite widely available and high quality public services, ranging from public transport to child and medical care, France has become a more unequal society. Worse, the forms of inequality themselves are not readily overcome by intelligence and hard work, too often leaving the most energetic and creative people on the outside, ready to make trouble.

The economics of the system were unsustainable. Public sector productivity is low, despite the generally high quality of the services provided, and marginal tax rates are very high -- not much room there for continued adjustment.

Finally, the French themselves made this choice and did so for their own reasons, about which we can only speculate.

It is not unreasonable to assume, though, is it O'George, that you are pleased with the outcome?

You are indeed a perceptive devil !

I believe that I have been relatively magnanimous in all of this -- not at all overbearing and triumphant. (Except for a couple of pokes in Walter's eye - but he deserves it.)

Unless you were prepared to demonstrate that you had significantly contributed to Sarkozy's victory, there would be nothing for you to feel triumphant about.

I have found this interesting, and in fact began a thread about Royal quite some time ago--but it didn't have "legs." Of course, reasonably speaking, neither you nor i have a big stake in the outcome of this election (at least, i assume you don't--got any major business interests in France, O'George?).

Unfortunately, i continue to subscribe to the notion that the French have the right to make their own choices in such matters. Therefore, when Chirac (who is right-wing) would not support Bush's military adventure in Iraq, i pointed out that Chirac was simply doing the will of the French people. And Sarkozy now has Chirac's old job due to the will of the French people.

I'm doing eyerobics now.

Glad to see Walter noticed. Nothing is worse than an undetected poke in the eye.

I agree Setants, I had nothing to do with Sarkozy's victory and therefore no basis for triumphalism. Thank you for pointing that out.

I agree with you about the very interesting aspects of the contemporary political debate in France. I'm sure that the story is not yet over and that the forthcoming parliamentary elections will add a few new elements to the situation and our interpretations of it. I don't have much confidence in my understanding of the left wing in France and would be interested to know your interpretations.

I also agree that the French - like everyone else - are entitled to their own interpretation and approach to things. However, I can't escape the impression that Chirac - right wing, though he may be - was animated partly by an odd desire to take a path distinct from our own (whatever it may be) - even in the face of objective reasons not to do so. Much of this is popularly associated with DeGaulle, but I believe its roots go back to the period between the World Wars. I don't claim to fully understand it, but I do welcome the prospect that it may now be somewhat reduced.

The politics of the postwar period derived somewhat from the events which took place during the war, but i don't think de Gaulle's attitudes can be ascribed simply to his resentment of his treatment during the war.

Churchill thought he should run the whole show. "Bomber" Harris thought the 8th United States Army Air Force should just be handed over to him to do with as he pleased, and Churchill attempted to pressure Roosevelt into authorizing the hand-over. Generals Marshall and Eaker deserve credit for digging in and refusing to be lackeys of the RAF. The Royal Navy treated the Royal Canadian Navy like a collective red-eared step child, taking their destroyers for their hunter groups, and sneering at the Canadians for their lack of U-boat kills. Credit is due to Admiral King for resisting the pressure to put his resources in the hands of the Royal Navy, and for pointing out that the United States had more than 150 years of deployment and operations in the Atlantic without Royal Navy help, thank you very much.

Charles de Gaulle had as much claim to command the Free French as anyone else did, and Churchill and the Imperial Staff found him distasteful because he was "political." So French troops in Italy were put under the command of Alexander's United Nations Command, and French troops in France fought with the Third Army and with Patch's Seventh Army. At one point, de Gaulle threatened to pull his troops out of the Allied command if Eisenhower did not consent to the liberation of Paris.

But de Gaulle was a canny politician, and i don't think resentments from the war conditioned his behavior when he was President. After all, he did not stand for the office until 1958, more than 13 years after the end of the war. He had to deal with the Secret Army Organization (the OAS) and at the same time appeal to a constituency which resented the notion that as one of the Allies, they would be garrisoned by U.S. forces. The OAS even attempted to assassinate de Gaulle, but he stayed with a middle course. He accepted the need to abandon Algeria, but he still needed to deal with nationalists disillusioned by that "defeat," and the failure of the Suez operation, which had humiliated the French in the eyes of much of the public. Ranting about the Americans and throwing them out of France did no violence to the economy or national defense, and helped him to keep his broad appeal with the population. I think he was more motivated by political considerations that he was by any real antipathy to the Americans. One the lasting appeals of de Gaulle's presidency for the French was that he placed them on the map again as "a great power," which could walk a middle ground between England and the United States on the one hand, and the Soviet Union and China on the other. That may have been illusory, but it worked with the French voter.

In the case of Chirac and Iraq (nice rhyme, there), the sondages had already shown that the French public was not convinced by the American arguments, and would not support French participation in the invasion, before Chirac ever publicly turned his back on Bush. Once again, he was expressing the will of the French public.

Setanta,

Thanks for the very interesting commentary. The British had been in WWII for a couple of years before our entry, and it was, to a degree, understandable that they should wish to see us as an adjunct to their effort. As you noted, we did resist, and did so very successfully.

It may also be noteworthy that, with respect to both the French and the British, our policy towards their colonial empires was - properly - perceived by them as a threat to their traditional self-interest.

I agree with you about DeGaulle, and was very taken by your reference to his need to, "and at the same time appeal to a constituency which resented the notion that as one of the Allies, they would be garrisoned by U.S. forces". We saw the French expulsion of NATO forces as an unconscionable strategic betrayal. Where else could we position defensive forces with which to deter or defend from a Soviet attack? They saw it as equating their status to that of Germany, a former beligerant, and this touched a sensitive nerve for them. I had not considered this aspect of the situation, though it seems obvious now. I also agree about DeGaulle's management of the political forces he faced within France.

I always found the British military forces, particularly at the working level, very good and very easy to deal with. Something seemed to happen to them though when they became promoted above a certain level. Their Captains, Generals and Admirals always managed to poke their fingers in our eyes, and assert that we were relative amateurs who sorely taxed their patience and forbearance. The result was that in combined operations there was always a certain tension in the air.

Oddly the French were easier to take - though we worked with them less often. For almost a year in the Indian Ocean I regularly refuelled my carrier from a very modern and well-operated French supply ship, The "Var". We all used to look forward to helo rides and lunch on Foch or Clemenceau. However it was all very informal -- no defined organization, no press releases, no public association.

You know, that's interesting to me on another level, and that is a consideration of the quiet professionalism of French private soldiers, non-coms and company and field grade officers. During the "Crimean" War, the French and English got along well enough at higher levels (although Lord Raglan habitually referred to the Russian opponent as "the French"). But what strikes me is how well prepared the French were for a prolonged campaign, and the extent to which the English were not. The French had all their ducks in a row, had all the supplies they needed, including attractive vivandieres who sold vin ordinaire and cognac to the troops. Many, many English soldiers and officers commented on the compassion with which the French treated them in that first horrible winter as they slowly starved and froze thanks to the insane mismanagement of their logistical evidence. The French would find reasons to invite their English comrades to dinner in their well-heated bunkers, usually the excuse was the many "USO-like" tour shows which were organized and sent out to keep up the troops morale up. That provided the opportunity to invite the English in for a good meal without touching their pride. Recently, there have been quite a few studies done on the letters and diaries of officers and private soldiers in that war, which had previously been ignored or even buried, because it was humiliating for English historians to acknowledge just how badly the war effort in 1854 was so thoroughly screwed up.