[Marxism] Jeremy Harding on the French elections

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx>]

Royal?s ratings in the polls have fluctuated, and 
lately she has flagged. Her niceness quotient has 
been thinned away by unpleasant stories about her 
from people who?ve deserted her campaign, and by 
the popularity of the extremely nice Bayrou. She 
is desperate to impress business ? and to 
encourage ?medium and small? businesses in 
particular, since large numbers of people will 
have to invent themselves as earners in the 
absence of a flourishing labour market between 
now and 2012. To this end she is promising more 
and more liberal economic measures and start-up 
exemptions. She stands, however, for a not very 
different, still immobilised France where 
unemployment figures will remain steady even if 
the low purchasing power of the French earner, 
which she?d like to improve, means a narrower gap 
between rich and poor than exists in the lands of 
sterling and the dollar. She hopes there?ll be 
French flags in every home, and she is adamant 
there?ll be security on the streets: she?s a 
tough love figure, big on law and order, big on 
boot camps for young offenders. She wants 
?citizens? juries? to monitor public policy and 
public life. At the same time, she has said she?d 
like to shake down the bureaucracy with its 
?jacobin? intrusiveness and complexity, but she 
hasn?t explained what job losses this would 
entail in the public sector. She is for more 
spending without raising taxes, and wants to 
constitute a Sixth Republic with an element of 
proportional representation for election to the 
National Assembly and devolution of power to the 
regions. Beneath the appearance of candour, her 
policies can seem elusive. In the Middle East 
last year, she expressed solidarity with the 
Israelis and the Palestinians. She is worryingly 
touchy-feely and stands in relation to the Parti 
Socialiste a little like Blair stood in relation to Old Labour in 1997.

The difference, according to some of her 
defenders, is that if she won the presidency, she 
could not go on to become Blair, because the 
party wouldn?t let her. In this view her much 
vaunted rout of the PS elephants ? Laurent 
Fabius, Dominic Strauss-Kahn and a handful of 
lesser figures ? is an illusion; they are merely 
dozing with one eye open. Were she to become 
president, renewed efforts in the defence of 
older party values would be in order; the heads 
of the herd would stagger to their feet and send 
out their stentorian call. Ségolène would trundle 
back from far, far away, just like Nellie, 
leaving behind the world of circus politics for a 
fully authentic socialism. It would be as if, in 
May 1997, the remains of Old Labour had risen up 
and smothered the new prime minister in an avalanche of coal dust.

full: http://www.lrb.co.uk/v29/n08/hard01_.html

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