The day I left for Taiwan, my father gave me the book While Europe Slept by Bruce Bawer. We had recently gotten in some debates about terrorism, society, Islam, etc. and he wanted me to tell him what I thought about the book.
My reaction to the book ranges from strong agreement on some subjects to strong disagreement of others. One of the things that urked me, though, was how ready Bawer was ready to make generalizations of what was European and what was American (concerning ideology, lifestyle, and outlook).
I want to put a quote up here about the elitist “European Establishment” here and see what people think:
Let me be clear about what I’m asking here. I’m not asking about what is presented in the European media so much as I’m asking about the establishment itself: How one gets into it and starts a career, for example. As Bawer puts it:
So is this true? When French people spoke to me about politicians like M. de Villepin, I always got the impression that he is a perfect example of this elitist class of politicians.
Are there politicians that don’t fit this mold? Are there any of the Jo Dirt’s who grow up to become Senators or Prime Minister? Or all they mostly really products of the “establishment.”
NOTE: This is not a “look at you Americans” thread! Not only do I not agree with all that he says about the American/European media/political establishment, I am highly critical of many aspects therein, on BOTH sides. I’m simply far more familiar with the American version, and I want to know what people think about its EUROPEAN counterpart. That’s it. Please keep all references to a minimum, resorting to it only in instances of useful comparisons, etc.
Don’t want to sound like a dick, but I know how these things can get off subject.
Here in the UK, for example, we have far more political parties than just Democrats and Republicans.
Also one Independent member of Parliament was elected over a hospital closure, another over a crooked politician:
'Dr Richard Taylor became MP for Wyre Forest in the 2001 General Election after pledging to fight the closure of Kidderminster’s A&E department. He explains why he believes people should campaign on a single issues. ’
'Mr Bell, who seized the Tatton seat from disgraced Conservative former minister Neil Hamilton in 1997, says a growing disillusionment with party politics is behind the independent movement.
“It is a good time to be standing as an independent candidate,” he says. ’
As for journalists criticising politicians:
During last week’s Iraq debate, Tories and other opposition MPs kept saying that they wanted an inquiry similar to that held by Lord Franks into intelligence failures before the Falklands invasion. A curious precedent to choose – since Franks’s investigation is best remembered for letting the government off the hook. For although he found plenty of evidence showing culpable negligence by Margaret Thatcher and her ministers, Franks concluded: ‘We would not be justified in attaching any criticism or blame to the present government.’
From the perspective of someone with the German political system, and with how the German media deals with them, the first set of statements (relationship between media and politicians) seems to be wholy wrong (possibly an agenda-driven misrepresentation, possibly misunderstanding the tone of reporting), and the second set of statements to have some basis in fact but I have another view on whether it’s a good or a bad thing.
The following applies only to the German political scene - I follow the British and French press but I am not really familiar enough to have a well-founded opinion on the topics there
Relationship between media and politicians
Quality as well as tabloid press do delight in pointing out “lies, inconsistencies, and hypocrisies” of the actors in the political arena. They also point out underlying ideologies and whether these appear to be deeply held or populist pandering (mainstream politicians are not considered to have an unified ideological project).
I don’t see much difference between reporting in Germany and the US. What might be a bit deceptive to someone used to US reporting is the tone: in political debate and in reporting incisive political debate and comment is not accompanied with such a degree of acrimony; rather than questioning someone’s personal integrity you politely try to demolish his political project.
Also the personal life and peccadilloes of politicians are pretty much off-limits by common consent, unless the person in question puts it into the public arena himself, then the gloves are off. For example former Minister of Defence Rudolf Scharping got himself into hot water when he had pictures of him cavorting with his new GF in a swimming pool published in a popular magazine while his soldiers endured well-publicised hardships on a peacekeeping mission. He was fair game to the press because he chose to expose his personal life himself in an ill-considered attempt to court popularity.
But this respect towards personal privacy is not peculiar to politicians but rather relects the public’s expectations on everyone’s personal privacy. For example, if I commited a well-publicised crime, became the victim of one or had a high-profile accident media reports would not identify me by full name; rather they’d give sketchy details (gender, age, possibly first name (not in my case as it’s a rare one), initial of last name, possibly profession if relevant, town of residence if the incident was out of town) - in any case, not enough information for people in my town to identify me as the person in the media report.
That’s just the degree of privacy for everyone that people expect of the press.
There is some bias of the media towards educated people. For example the ocasional article on political errors and missteps by the current German minister for the economy, Michael Glos, might mention that he’s a master miller, by way of painting him as a lightweight (who, by implication, didn’t have what it takes for an university degree). Joschka Fischer, the previous Foreign Minister, mostly got a pass on being a school dropout because he amply proved his brains in politics and as a state, later federal minister.
Political careers and the role of party youth organizations
It is true that German politicians, as a rule, don’t just discover politics in middle age. They typically get interested in politics in their teens and twenties, become members of a party and/or a political pressure group, learn the ropes by getting involved in local politics, earn their spurs in unsuccessful contesting an election etc. This is a good thing IMO. I wouldn’t call that ‘party hack’ but rather ‘someone who gets involved in politics, mostly with no prospect for personal gain’.
Only very occasionally do people get into full-time politics just after university (the current state parliamentarian/mayor-elect of my town is one of those rare examples). Usually they enter a normal career (disproportionately as lawyers, teachers or other professionals); they usually do politics as a hobby for decades; a few of them get to break into full-time elective office in their thirties or forties.
It seems to me that there are several different questions for discussion here.
Is there a homogeneous political class in Europe which is somehow separate from ‘the masses’.
Is this different from the US ?
Is there a ‘media class’ in Europe etc ?
Is this a Good Thing or a Bad Thing ?
And the big question : is there overlap and/or collusion between the ‘media class’ and the political class ?
My take is that yes, there is a fairly hermetic political class in Europe (although as Glee noted, Europe is very diverse) and also in the US. There is also a fairly hermetic intelligentsia and a fairly hermetic moneyed class which largely control and constitute the media. There’s a pretty large degree of overlap between these classes.
I haven’t seen any research showing that there’s a substantial difference between the US and Europe in this regard. Of course the research might be out there, I’d love to be enlightened ! Pierre Bourdieu did a lot of work on this question regarding France.
Dominique de Villepin is certainly a good example of this in France - old aristocracy, right schools, money etc. He’s also interesting as one of the rare people appointed to the current French government who’s never been elected to public office. George Bush would be a good example of the same phenomenon at work in the US.
The question of collusion between journalists and politicians is more complex. At first sight, this seems to be much more entrenched in the US than in Europe - where Fox News seems to be practically a party propaganda outlet, newspapers are aligned, the lobbying industry thrives, politicians are clearly in bed with businesses etc.
Most US lobbying practices are seen as unethical (and even illegal) in France for example, but obviously take place anyway - there’s currently some discussion of ‘coming out of the closet’ with this. There’s also been a lot of talk about Nicolas Sarkozy (future presidential hopeful) playing American style politics - buddying up to journalists, encouraging media attention in his life etc. There are also several well known news-anchor + politician couples eg. Anne Sinclair and Dominique Strauss-Kahn (Socialist Party big-shot).
Going back a few years here, another French case where there was a lot of talk about media collusion with politicians - French president Francois Mitterand ‘secretly’ had an out-of-wedlock daughter, Mazarine - a number of journalists were apparently aware of this, and chose not to reveal it for various reasons.
My impression is that the mechanisms are a little different, but both the US and Europe have an entrenched political elite and an entrenched intelligentsia, and the two are fairly enmeshed. Whether that’s all good or all bad is a whole 'nother debate !
IMO the entire premise of the book is flawed. “Europe” is not comparable to the US as an entity. Despite what many on the SDMB have attempted to allege, the countries in the EU are unbelievably diverse in terms of societym, history, government, media approach, education, constitutional style.
I can really only answer for the UK, but yes, there’s still quite a bit of elitism in the kind of person who ends up in politics: Oxbridge universities, public schools, etc. But it’s definitely shrinking: there’s also a lot of meritocratic appointment too, on the left and on the right.
As for the obeisance of the press to politicians - have you seen Jeremy Paxman at work against a politician? Kirsty Walk? John Humphrys? Paxman’s political interviewing ethos, he has famously said, begins with “why is this bastard lying to me?” He has as little respect for Blair as he does for any other politicians, and I have never seen anything like him in the US media. I really want someone to let him loose on Bush.
In journalistic terms, the government currently gets it in the neck from the left (the Guardian, the Independent, the Mirror) and the right (the Mail, Telegraph, Express, the Times, the Sun). There is no visible Labour-aligned newspaper that I can see - all sides are very critical, albeit for different reasons.
From a UK perspective, I would agree with Jimm, but would add that especially with ‘New Labour’ there has been a degree of cross job swapping between journalists and advisors.
My understanding is also that MPs get more in common with each other than they have with their constituents - which is understandable as they have their snouts in the same trough. To be fair, they also work with each other on multi party committees and they share the same rec rooms.
I also have a suspicion that journalists play a sort of game with politicians, they move in the same circles, so they must get to know the dirt. Heck, I’ve known two House of Commons secretaries - and those lasses had great gossip, things like Prescott’s grande affaire /must/ have been fairly common knowledge.
When it’s convenient for them and when public opinion favors it. The current President, for example, gets more (personal) good press than bad. The mainstream news media really doesn’t treat politicians as the lying slimeballs many of us normal folk see them as. It seems very hard to break a story on political corruption, but when they do, the issue gets a lot of (mostly redundant) attention.
Irishman chipping in here to agree with this. I’m largely non political, I’ve never given any donations whatsoever to any political party. I’ve twhice had dinner with the current Irish Taoiseach (Prime Minister), back long before he was a minister. One of them turned into a really good night, and I ended up being part of a contingent charged with getting him safely home.
I’ve twice written to government ministers, and on both occasions been invited to come and talk to them in a semiformal setting about the issues I raised.Terminology I used in one of those meetings ended up being enshrined in legislation.
Having had a quick look at the current list of Irish Cabinet members, I can make connections from me to about half of them … as in, I know someone who could probably get me invited to a dinner with them.
Of the current Irish national newsreaders,80% (exactly) have been seen naked by friends or acquaintances of mine (i.e. they’re lovers, spouses, ex-lovers - that admittedly is a bit of a freak result).
So that doesn’t seem elitist at all. But that’s the Irish experience. We’re a small country, everyone knows everyone… jjimm would probably report an entirely different experience in the UK.
But, aren’t the Christian Democrats, the Tories, and other anti-socialist economic libertarians in Europe also considered “mainstream politicians” in Europe? (As opposed to nationalist radicals like LePen, who probably would not be.) And don’t those camps also have their sympathetic political journalists, equally part of “the establishment”? Surely The Economic is about as “establishment” as you can get.
I’m guessing that to a US neo-rightist such as the cited author, even the main European conservative parties are sharing “social-democratic ideals” that are anathema to US conservatism. E.g. the dismantling of respective national health services, which isn’t on the agenda of any mainstream European conservative party (to the best of my knowledge). Of course, it may be speculated that this reflects the democratic desires of their respective electorates, but that won’t affect the opinion of ideologues such as Mr Bawyer.
Bruce Bawer is a liberal Democrat turned conservative Republican who is, well, not very fond of Muslims. I haven’t read the book (yet), but I’ve heard a lot about it (mostly bad). I suspect the title is played off the piece JFK wrote, While England Slept, where he blamed England for not stopping Hitler and preventing WWII. The Muslim population of Western Europe is 3% btw.
If you ask this question to the growing 5%-20% European far-right you’ll get a resounding YES! They have nothing but disdain for politicians, the media, the EU or “people not like us”. We have a couple of them here on SDMB.
In reality, the truth lies elsewhere. I think the most important point has been addressed by others, that Europe is very diverse. Countries with a traditionally strong aristocracy or upper class, like France and Britain, has a higher proportion of elitist politicians, but overall most politicians are fairly ordinary people. However, I would like to add that there’s a growing number of career politicians in Brussel who could be considered elitists. And while quite a few politicians have a past as members of political youth organizations, those organizations are mainly a place for discussing politics and engaging in local issues, it’s far from the closed clubs Bawer makes them out to be. Another point is that in Europe you rarely need to be rich or raise money to be elected to national office.
As for the media, it’s my opinion that European media does more day to day fact-checking and see themselves less as a carrier (or messenger), though IMO European media is changing towards the American role and style of presentation.
I’m not very knowledgeable about politics, nor have I been around in other European countries or the US in order to see the differences. So what follows is just some vague impressions from an ordinary young citizen.
I think I strayed a lot from the central question in what I wrote below, too.
That seems to be my impression as well. The growing anti-immigration parties are playing the populist card, but I think that’s based on a quite wide-spread already existing feeling of “contempt for politicians” among the general population – politicians are seen as generally corrupt and sometimes elitist especially by many less well-to-do people. But this kind of contempt of politics doesn’t have anything to do with another kind of suspicion towards politics which I imagine to be more common in the US – i.e. the kind of libertarian attitude that politicians and politics should mess as little as possible with the individual’s life. (Although the center/right wing parties have of course sometimes tried to connect the phenomenons in that way)
But I rather think the contempt of politicians that exists in Sweden today is perhaps partly rooted in a traditional class-conflict-based way of thinking, only now seeing politicians --even those of the left/social-democratic parties-- as part of a new elite/upper class. As I’ve heard, a large part of the voter base of the growing anti-immigration party Sverigedemokraterna (whose political outlook is quite right-wing/conservative on both moral and economical issues) are actually former traditional Social Democratic voters who feel the Social Democratic politicians have betrayed them, having a world view far distanced from their own supposed reality today, consisting of widespread unemployment and growing criminality, moral decay and general conflict/unsafety supposedly much due to the costs and effects of large scale immigration.
And it is often the case that op-pieces in the “serious”, non-tabloid, media, rather than simply joining this general “contempt-of-politicians”, express worries about tendencies of un-nuanced contempt for politicians and politics as a whole, feeling that this may be a threat to the vitality of democracy in the long run. This is connected to the fact that Sweden has historically had a quite large percentage of the population who were members and somewhat active in political parties and organizations, as well as a high voting rate. But these numbers have sunk a lot, especially for party membership, and while the voting rate in general elections (~80%) is still high, at least when compared to, for example, the US, I believe in many other ways the Swedish citizenry could be said to be rather inactive in politics (Among the citizens in the USA who do vote, there are a comparatively high number who are very active and interested in politics).
But that doesn’t mean that the press is behaving in any way uncritically towards politicians, at least not to a higher degree than in the USA – we have these small and big corruption scandals going on all the time, some sillier than other, of course, and often with a political motive behind the blowing-up/diminishing of their proportions, as everywhere in the world. “Moral” as opposed to “political” scandals are a lot more common than ten or twenty years ago, but perhaps with a different slant than in the US – the most common are where politicians misuse their political position for economical gain (like using a board member position in a charity foundation to give their children an appartment in sought-after inner-city regions) or ignore controversial laws which they made themselves (like using a black-market babysitter instead of paying Sweden’s high labour taxes, or the Minister of Culture systematically not paying the mandatory public television license for 20 years) – then it doesn’t matter if it’s about a really small sum of money. Sexual scandals are possible, but then they often contain financial aspects as well and it should be possible to give the whole thing a “feministic” rather than purely “moral” bent – like politicians visiting strip clubs, paying with representation money. The Monica Lewinsky scandal wouldn’t really work in that way here – even if we far from expect of politicians to have extra-marital lovers (they say about the French that it’s almost an institution there…).
Yes, and that’s a difference between Sweden and for example France. In Sweden politicians traditionally haven’t always been very well-educated, and it has rather been required of politicians that they demonstrate themselves to be ordinary people who have worked and lived as ordinary folks, rather than being “political broilers” or upper-class snobs.
Also, as I understand it, in France it would be expected of politicians to openly show if they’re educated and have an interest and understanding of, say, literature, or, for example, opera, and try to hide it if that were not the case. Whereas it’s almost the opposite here in Sweden.
There is definitely an element of elitism in the European press and among the leaders of the European Union that has no counterpart in the U.S.
In the U.S., the general belief is that the government should give the voters what they want. In Europe, I think the governing class believes in giving the voters what it believes they SHOULD want, and large segments of the European media share this belief. That’s why, when voters in various countries rejected the proposed new constitution for Europe, much of the European press practically SCOLDED the voters (“Giscard worked for years to create this document! Who do you idiots think you are to reject it? What do you think this is, a democracy?”).
Look at two hot-button issues: the death penalty and gun ownership. An American will have a VERY tough time explaining to an elite, educated European why those things are still allowed in the USA. If you tell a European, “Well, like it or not, the fact is, the great majority of Americans WANT those things,” he’s likely to respond with outrage. “So what? Millions of Europeans want to own guns. Probably MOST of them support the death penalty, at least in some cases. That doesn’t mean the government should LISTEN to the people!”
I exaggerate, I know, but I’m serious. I think the horrific experiences of the two World Wars concinced elite Europeans that their working classes were, to be blunt, dangerous idiots (“Those are the fools who pushed for war in 1914, and who supported Hitler in 1936”). And European governments have been built to prevent ordinary citizens from having too much impact on the professional bureaucrats who really run things, and are presumed to be a lot smarter than the citizens they work for.
Now bring your cites for:
a) European press was more focused on “scolding voters”, rather than carrying the public debate on the future of the EU
b) There are no European country with a higher gun ownership rate than America
c) Most Europeans support the death penalty
So are they right or wrong about that? Or is it possible such a view was defensible a generation ago but the people are more educated and sophisticated now?
