Emmanuel Todd on Sarkozy's race baiting

by Jerome a Paris
Sun Dec 27th, 2009 at 09:50:30 AM EST

Another fascinating interview in Le Monde this week-end with one of the most interesting political commentators in France, Emmanuel Todd. Originally a demographer, he's been actively involved in French public debate since the early 90s. He provided Chirac with the concept of the fracture sociale that helped him win the 1995 election by focusing on how large swathes of the population were left behind; he's one of the few public figures that I know to have been against Maastricht in 1991 but in favour of the EU Constitution in 2005, and he's always been an optimist about the integration of immigrants with Muslim backgrounds in France (and he says so in this interview again). Read the full text in French if you can, I've translated a few tidbits below, but the notable assertions are:

  • France is successfully integrating its immigrants of Muslim culture;
  • Sarkozy was elected by fearful old people rather than by fearful racist people;
  • Sarkozy is looking for scapegoats to hide his regressive economic policies and still thinks the immigration card works; this creates nasty shades of the 30s.


Ce que Sarkozy propose, c'est la haine de l'autre

Le Front national a commencé à s'incruster dans le monde ouvrier en 1986, à une époque où les élites refusaient de s'intéresser aux problèmes posés par l'intégration des populations immigrées.

On a alors senti une anxiété qui venait du bas de la société, qui a permis au Front national d'exister jusqu'en 2007. Comme je l'ai souligné dans mon livre, Le Destin des immigrés (Seuil), en 1994, la carte du vote FN était statistiquement déterminée par la présence d'immigrés d'origine maghrébine, qui cristallisaient une anxiété spécifique en raison de problèmes anthropologiques réels, liés à des différences de système de moeurs ou de statut de la femme. Depuis, les tensions se sont apaisées. Tous les sondages d'opinion le montrent : les thématiques de l'immigration, de l'islam sont en chute libre et sont passées largement derrière les inquiétudes économiques. La réalité de la France est qu'elle est en train de réussir son processus d'intégration. Les populations d'origine musulmane de France sont globalement les plus laïcisées et les plus intégrées d'Europe, grâce à un taux élevé de mariages mixtes. Pour moi, le signe de cet apaisement est précisément l'effondrement du Front national.

On estime généralement que c'est la politique conduite par Nicolas Sarkozy qui a fait perdre des voix au Front national...

Les sarkozystes pensent qu'ils ont récupéré l'électorat du Front national parce qu'ils ont mené cette politique de provocation, parce que Nicolas Sarkozy a mis le feu aux banlieues, et que les appels du pied au FN ont été payants. Mais c'est une erreur d'interprétation. La poussée à droite de 2007, à la suite des émeutes de banlieue de 2005, n'était pas une confrontation sur l'immigration, mais davantage un ressentiment anti-jeunes exprimé par une population qui vieillit. N'oublions pas que Sarkozy est l'élu des vieux.

(...)

What Sarkozy offers is hate for the Other

The Front National began to make inroads amongst blue collar workers in 1986, at a time when elites refused to look at the problems caused by the integration of immigrants.

One could see feelings of anxiety coming from the bottom of society, which have made it possible for the Front National to exist until 2007. As I wrote in my 1994 book, the Destiny of Immigrants, the vote map of the FN was statistically driven by the presence of North African immigrants, which generated a very real but specific anthropologic anxiety linked to different social values or to the role of women. Tensions have come down today. All polls show it: Islam and immigration worries are dropping and have been overtaken by economic fears.

The reality is that France is succeeding in its integration process. Populations with Muslim origins in France are the most secular and most integrated in Europe, thanks to very high rates of mixed marriages. For me, the proof of that success is precisely the collapse of the FN.

It is usually said that it was Sarkozy's policies that caused the FN to lose votes...

The Sarkozysts think they picked up FN voters throught their policies of provocation, because Sarkozy has set fire to the suburbs, and that dog-whistles to the FN electorate worked. But it's a mistaken theory. The push to the right in 2007, after the suburban riots of 2005, was not about immigration but rather an anti-youth strain expressed by a population getting older. Let's not forget that Sarkozy was elected by old people.

(...)

Je pense de plus en plus que le sarkozysme est une pathologie sociale et relève d'une analyse durkheimienne - en termes d'anomie, de désintégration religieuse, de suicide - autant que d'une analyse marxiste - en termes de classes, avec des concepts de capital-socialisme ou d'émergence oligarchique.

(...)

Si vous êtes au pouvoir et que vous n'arrivez à rien sur le plan économique, la recherche de boucs émissaires à tout prix devient comme une seconde nature. Comme un réflexe conditionné. Mais quand on est confronté à un pouvoir qui active les tensions entre les catégories de citoyens français, on est quand même forcé de penser à la recherche de boucs émissaires telle qu'elle a été pratiquée avant-guerre.

(...)

L'habileté du sarkozysme est de fonctionner sur deux pôles : d'un côté la haine, le ressentiment ; de l'autre la mise en scène d'actes en faveur du culte musulman ou les nominations de Rachida Dati ou de Rama Yade au gouvernement. La réalité, c'est que dans tous les cas la thématique ethnique est utilisée pour faire oublier les thématiques de classe.

More and more, I think that sarkozysm is a social pathology and should be analysed through the lense of Durkheim - in terms of anomy, religious desintegration or suicide - or that of Marx - with concepts of corporate socialism or oligarchic emergence.

(...)

If you're in power and are failing on the economic front, the quest at all cost for scapegoats becomes a second nature. A reflex. But when one sees a team in power which feeds tensions between various categories of citizens as today, one cannot help think about the scapegoating that took place in the 30s.

(...)

The genius of sarkozysm is to play on two opposite poles: on one side, hate and fear, on the other, the play-acting of scenes putting Muslims in a favorable light, such as the nominations of Rachida Dati or Rama Yade in government. The reality is that in both cases ethnic themes are used to make people forget about class conflict.

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It seems that Monsieur Sarkozy's regime is rather heir to Vichy republic than to noble French revolution. And he dares (or allows his henchemen) to criticize Swiss neighbors after he himself threw principles of the revolution, protection of human rights and religious beliefs into dustbin.

I don't know much about his internal policy and it matters little (as long as French do not engage in overseas adventures) but Mr Sarkozy's image on international scene was like Arlekin's, hysterical, stupid and utterly ineffective. All his theatrics and antics (like threats to walk away from every forum where he was participating) did not go down well with foreign leaders. So they will have to adapt to his mercurial style if they really need France's support. But he should not expect that anybody will listen to his initiatives or acknowledge his leadership.

by FarEasterner (avdavydov@yandex.ru) on Sun Dec 27th, 2009 at 11:01:07 AM EST
There's two things in your comment: one is domestic, and one is international.

On the domestic front, the good news is that people have been reacting rather strongly against Sarkozy's most recent attempts to have a debate a bout "national identity" - so while I agree that Sarkozy is playing on dangerous ground, indeed at times reminescent of Vichy, it's not working.

On the international front, I can only hope that his fellow leaders, and pundits, are now getting tired of his permanent attempts to take the cover to him whatever the topic, and will treat him accordingly (the risk for France is that smart partners will give Sarkozy his chance to strut in the limelight while getting deals that are better for them than for France in reality if not in appearance). But as people catch on, he'll be increasingly ineffective, which is mostly a good thing, I guess.

In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes

by Jerome a Paris (etg@eurotrib.com) on Sun Dec 27th, 2009 at 12:34:46 PM EST
[ Parent ]
La réalité, c'est que dans tous les cas la thématique ethnique est utilisée pour faire oublier les thématiques de classe.

"In reality, the ethnic themes are used to make people forget about the class issues".

Todd is alluding to several of his well know themes about French society: the strong egalitarian streak that is permeating throughout the French psyche and also how race based politics has consistently failed to get any serious traction in France (even antisemitism). For the French people, since the revolution, the traditional enemy is not another ethnic group but rather the upper class: aristocracy and bourgeoisie.

Europeans think a hundred miles is a long way. Americans think a hundred years is a long time.

by Bernard on Mon Dec 28th, 2009 at 04:15:48 PM EST
bernard, how is the french revolution taught in french schools?

is there an effort to 'tone it down' as time goes by, or is it still lauded unconditionally, like the awmerican one?

"Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do." Jim Hightower

by melo (melometa4(at)gmail.com) on Mon Dec 28th, 2009 at 05:46:50 PM EST
[ Parent ]
The Revolution is the founding myth of the French Republic and modern France generally speaking; has been so for the last 150 years (since the 3rd Republic in 1870).

The values of the Republic (Liberté, égalité, fraternité) are pretty much the only common themes from the left to the right of the political spectrum. Even the Front National speaks of defending the Republic.

If there's any effort to tone down historical achievements , it is the more recent ones, the ones that have been put together in the aftermath of WWII: social security, health insurance, collective bargaining in the workplace, several weeks of paid vacation... everything that we collectively refer to as "the French social model" that neo-lib advocates regularly decry as "unsustainable".

Europeans think a hundred miles is a long way. Americans think a hundred years is a long time.

by Bernard on Tue Dec 29th, 2009 at 06:41:30 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Nice to see this- Todd has long been one of the most effective voices in support of the notion that cross-cultural research consistently reveals strong patterns of action and ideology linked to such things as family structure, and that it is not only acceptable to judge these patterns, but obligatory. There ARE sick societies, and it is possible to describe their genesis, their signatures and the general outlines of their demise.
As a sociologist in the US, I ate it big time when I wrote along a similar vein in the 80's. It was revealed doctrine then that the Sociologist only studied, --did not, EVER, judge. That was because, by any rational standard of judgement, --consumer society in the US looked really, really sick.
As I look up, I see he hangs out on my "actively referred to" shelf like this:

Alexander Cockburn
Roberto Saviano
Fritjof Capra
C. Wright Mills
Emmanuel Todd
Diane Ackerman
Annie Dillard
Noam Chomsky
Neil Postman and Stanley Weingartner
The Chicago Manual of Style

Etc.
Good company, I think.
Would like to read it all.
 

Grabbing what you can, as John Ruskin said, isn't any less wicked when you grab it with the power of your brains than with the power of your fists.

by geezer in Paris (risico at wanadoo(flypoop)fr) on Tue Dec 29th, 2009 at 07:58:45 AM EST
"Would like to read it all".  referred to the article excerpted by Jerome, not the shelf. These are old friends of mine, on my shelf.
 

Grabbing what you can, as John Ruskin said, isn't any less wicked when you grab it with the power of your brains than with the power of your fists.
by geezer in Paris (risico at wanadoo(flypoop)fr) on Wed Dec 30th, 2009 at 02:03:38 AM EST
[ Parent ]


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