Nicolas Sarkozy is pro-american, pro-capitalism and pro economic reform.
Segolene Royal is a socialist.
This should be interesting.
I hope that Sarkozy wins. The French economy has been suffering from the ills of socialism for quite a while now. Taxes are extremely high, the social service system is overburdened and the jobless rate is very high. Royal represents the status quo, Sarkozy represents a radical depature from it.
It will be interesting to see what choice the French make.
Royal is a socialist, but more of a “third way” socialist in the vein of Tony Blair than a traditional one. Sarkozy is a rightist, and as Evil One says he is pro-capitalist (don’t know about pro-American, he’s probably not anti-American but I don’t expect him to toe the US line either), but as far as I know what he’s been mostly talking about in the last few months was the need for more security and less immigration. In other words, he’s been playing in the water of the far right. (I haven’t been paying close attention to the French election, though, so it’s possible he’s touched other issues too.) So we can’t describe the main candidates in terms of left and right in the American sense.
We also can’t describe them in terms of “status quo” and “change”. Royal, as I said, is a different kind of socialist than what the French are used to. Sarkozy is also a different kind of rightist. And I should also mention the honourable showing of centrist candidate François Bayrou, who finished third but would have had a good chance of winning if he’d been able to qualify for the runoff. His comment was that it means that the French are starting to reject the status quo of left vs. right politics. Of course, that’s what you’d expect him to say. But it does illustrate the fact that both left and right (they are of course not the same left and right as in the US) are entrenched in France’s political debate.
I’m curious to see what our French posters (clairobscur, Themenin, etc.) and other posters in France have to say about this election. Right now it seems that Sarkozy will win the election.
Comparing this with this, I hope it’s Royal! Sarkozy is a crazy xeonophic right-wing authoritarian populist. Royal is a “socialist,” only not really. From In These Times:
One would think a “third way” socialist might have more luck passing economic reforms without as much of the suspicion and protest that Chirac was met with when he attempted to pass similar changes.
I understand that Royal is a product of the French political machine, something like the Ecole d’Administracion - which makes me suspect that she’ll not make many changes.
Sarkozy sounds interesting, he has his finger on the pulse of those that are worried by sink estates full of Arabs and immigrant Africans, but I’m pretty sure that he is unlikely to do anything to upset the vast majority of the population who are doing very well.
The students rioting about the proposal to remove any job security should have been enough to make him realize that the problem is that 80% (say) are doing very nicely and the other 20% want to get in on the game - not change the game.
From what I’ve seen, France is well run, affluent, and a nice place to live. It appears to have a high level of productivity but high unemployment among certain very specific sectors.
I can see him continuing his harsh approach to civil disorder and illegal immigration, cutting a bit of bureaucratic red tape and breaking up sink estates.
France is not in the mess the UK was in, back in 1979, when we elected Thatcher, it is actually doing rather well, especially when compared to the UK - which is all smoke, mirrors and hype.
While I’m not that au fait with French politics, I would say that Sarkozy is a natural replacement for Chirac and he is not going to tear up the rule book - although he will confront problems head on, rather than try to disguise them.
I would be very surprized if Royal landed up as President, and very surprized if Sarkozy did more than sort out a few messes.
Well, it took only 11 posts until an irrelevant Bush-bashing. Not bad.
I heard an interview with Sarkozy, in which he said, “If you talk about the poor committing crimes, you’re called an elitist. If you talk about immigrant communities, you’re called a racist. But these are real issues and we need to have a real discussion.” Later on: “The problem with our economy is not that we work too much, but because we work too little.” I can’t imagine a major candidate in an American election being that forthright, and I think it’s quite admirable.
No, that’s Le Pen. Sarkozy isn’t that bad. He just sometimes says unfortunate things.