For decades, Europeans have agonized over the power and role of Germany —
the so-called German question — given its importance to European
stability and prosperity
writes the New York Times's
Steven Erlanger (merci à LF).
Today, however, Europe is talking about “the French question”: can the
Socialist government of President François Hollande pull France out of
its slow decline and prevent it from slipping permanently into Europe’s
second tier?
At stake is whether a social democratic system that for decades prided
itself on being the model for providing a stable and high standard of
living for its citizens can survive the combination of globalization, an
aging population and the acute fiscal shocks of recent years.
Those close to Mr. Hollande say that he is largely aware of what must be
done to cut government spending and reduce regulations weighing down
the economy, and is carefully gauging the political winds. But what
appears to be missing is the will; France’s friends, Germany in
particular, fear that Mr. Hollande may simply lack the political courage
to confront his allies and make the necessary decisions.
Changing any country is difficult. But the challenge in France seems
especially hard, in part because of the nation’s amour-propre and
self-image as a European leader and global power, and in part because
French life is so comfortable for many and the day of reckoning still
seems far enough away, especially to the country’s small but powerful
unions.
The turning of the business cycle could actually be a further impediment
in that sense, because as the European economy slowly mends, the French
temptation will be to hope that modest economic growth will again mask,
like a tranquilizer, the underlying problems.
The French are justifiably proud of their social model. Health care and
pensions are good, many French retire at 60 or younger, five or six
weeks of vacation every summer is the norm, and workers with full-time
jobs have a 35-hour week and significant protections against layoffs and
firings.
But in a more competitive world economy, the question is not whether the
French social model is a good one, but whether the French can continue
to afford it. Based on current trends, the answer is clearly no, not
without significant structural changes — in pensions, in taxes, in
social benefits, in work rules and in expectations.
… Sometimes, talking to French politicians and
workers, one has the feeling that they all consider themselves
communards and revolutionaries, fighters on the left — but at the same
time, like the far right, they wish to lock into place the comfort of
the known.
In May 1968, students at the University of Paris in Nanterre began what
they thought was a revolution. French students in neckties and bobby
socks threw cobblestones at the police and demanded that the sclerotic
postwar system must change.
Today, at Nanterre, students worried about finding jobs and losing state
benefits are demanding that nothing change at all. For Raphaël
Glucksmann, who led his own first strike in high school in 1995, members
of his generation have nostalgia for their rebellious fathers but no
stomach for a fight in hard economic times.
“The young people march now to reject all reforms,” he said. “We see no
alternatives. We’re a generation without bearings.”
The Socialists have become a conservative party, desperately trying to
preserve the victories of the last century. Many in the party, like the
anti-globalization campaigner
Arnaud Montebourg,
now the minister in charge of industrial renewal — let alone those
further to the left — seem to believe that France would be fine if only
the rest of the world would just disappear, or at least work a little
less hard.
