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Royal's French Lesson
Ségolène Royal learned this weekend just how little the Socialist Party has taken her presidential candidacy to its heart. Following Royal's proposals to take a tougher line on violent hoodlums, party chiefs have quickly seized the chance to paint her as a right-winger posing as a leftist.
Up to now, it's been mostly plain sailing. Royal's still undeclared candidacy has been warmly welcomed by France's citizens - who are beginning to rate her above centre-right challenger Nicolas Sarkozy in the polls - while the Socialist Party hierarchy limited its disapproval to sexist snickering. Interviews where she professed an admiration for Tony Blair - in leftist French life, a confession on a level with worshipping Satan - were dismissed, or perhaps filed away for future attacks. Her ever-so-mildly liberal views on reform of the French economy went the same way, as did her conservative views on homosexual marriage.
However, Royal's response to renewed rioting in Paris' troubled suburbs gave party rivals the opportunity they needed to attack her candidacy. Criticising the left's traditional "minimising" of security problems, she called for a return to national or community service for hoodlums over 16. Learning a trade overseas, she said, would convince troublemakers of "their good fortune to live in France."
The hoodlums' parents would be obliged to attend "Parenting schools" on pain of losing welfare benefits: The troublesome youngsters themselves would be sent to reform school, to prevent them disrupting other classes.
Too much, said opponents in her party. Laurent Fabius, a former prime minister who is eyeing the candidacy himself, declared "We already have one Sarkozy in France - we do not need another." Another party figure complained that rather than attacking Sarkozy, Royal was "legitimising" his ideas on crime. Royal was duly heckled by Socialist protestors at a party conference in Strasbourg, and again in Lille.
Lille is the fiefdom of Martine Aubry, a rank outsider for the presidential candidacy but a talismanic figure on the left thanks to her introduction of the 35 hour week during her time as employment minister. When Royal took the stage, several delegates booed and two harangued her for being insufficiently leftist. Aubry, meanwhile, couldn't contain her delight, smirking stage right as Royal - a critic of her beloved 35-hour week - took the heat from her lackeys.
Doesn't seem to have had much effect, though. Despite calls from some party members that Royal be publicly reprimanded for "promoting ideas contrary to socialist tradition" (yes, really), Royal responded with another assault on the 35-hour week, which she says had the “unintended consequence of worsening the situation for the most vulnerable workers, notably for women with few qualifications.” (NB See Update below)
More squirming from the party, not least Royal's partner and father of her four children, Socialist Party leader Francois Hollande. Hollande fancied the presidential candidacy himself, but recent events have propelled him into the position of "Monsieur Royal" - a task he handles with some aplomb, admittedly, even if he is obviously uncomfortable in the role.
Reporters delight in imagining domestic discussions chez Hollande-Royale. Hollande has the unenviable task of holding the fractious party together - last year's rejection of the EU constitution and tensions between the party's centre and left caused some commentators to wonder if the Socialist's weren't heading for a split. On top of that, he has to balance rival claims to the presidential candidacy next April (including his own) - the only clear Socialist policy appears to be "Stop Sarkozy": How best to do this is what divides the party.
The Socialists need to prevent votes seeping to France's many hard-left groups if they want their candidate to get into the second round in 2007. Some critics say that former candidate Lionel Jospin's inability to enthuse the extreme left led to his defeat in 2002's campaign - if the Socialists were beaten by the National Front's Jean-Marie Le Pen to the "final" next year, a split would be almost inevitable.
Worried party members will have watched the (typically fawning) media coverage of the extremist Trotskyite sect Lutte Ouvrière's summer party ruefully. Along with the usual hammer-and-sickle toys for children were invitations to throw water bombs at the standard row of the hard-left's bogeymen: Le Pen, Blair, Sarkozy, Chirac and now Ségolène Royal.
Ségolène Royal's maverick break with party tradition certainly frightened the horses, but it is guaranteed to prove popular with the public. Nearly 70 percent of citizens polled agreed with her tough line on violence in the schoolrooms and suburbs. The 35-hour week has gone from worker's playtime to being widely identified as one of the major causes of French unemployment. Moreover, the fact that only the privileged employees of the state or large industries appear to benefit from it further divides French society, as small businesses must work around the clock to succeed.
As for her would-be opponent Nicolas Sarkozy, it's certain that his camp is spooked by Royal's tactics. The interior minister has led calls for tougher policing of violent hoodlums in France's housing estates - and his popularity among voters has been matched only by the loathing he provokes on the left and in the media. Sarkozy has known for years that French voters see security as an issue - last autumn's riots brought that home to the elite, if nothing else. Additionally, hitting criminals hard appeals to voters who might otherwise support the hard-right National Front - and could defuse the threat to French political life from that quarter.
Royal has cleverly broken ranks with the sometimes distant and elitist ranks of her party to seize an issue identified with the right and made it her own. Perhaps its her Blairite Clause Four moment?
The ball's in Sarkozy's court - will he reciprocate with a centre-grabbing leftist measure? Even though the interior minister has posed as a radical, his economic instincts have been as protectionist as any enarque. He's been visible - perhaps too visible - for so many years and associated so closely with Chirac's decline (some might say he masterminded much of it) that voters might no longer see him as a fresh face.
Despite this, he's almost certain to be the centre-right's candidate next year. Will he face Ségolène Royal? The people seem to want her to run, and could even vote her president - only her party, it seems, is holding her back.
UPDATE: Interestingly, the FT is reporting that Royal's attack on the 35 hour week comes from the left, rather than the liberal right. Executives enjoy shorter hours, she claimed, but workers further down the ladder have seen their previous flexibility eroded.
Furthermore, she also took a popular trade union line on the prime minister Dominique de Villepin's "economic patriotism." She criticised the merger he brokered between Suez and Gaz de France, which protected the smaller company from an Italian bid. But instead of attacking de Villepin's move on liberal grounds, she complained that the merger would water down the French state's holdings of shares in GdF.
The French goverment has denied it stands to lose control over the utility giant - moreover, Suez shareholders have expressed concern that the French state will continue to contol the merged companies, to the benefit of the unions and to the potential detriment of shareholders and customers.
So is she coming from the left or the right? And, more pertinently perhaps, does Royal have a solid grasp of the issues at stake? The FT calls her stance on the 35-hour week "startling", while her failure to see that GDF-Suez may remain doomed to state control is bizarre, and suggests she's as susceptible to anti-liberal globophobe propaganda as she is to Sarkozy-esque posturing.
Some Socialist Party critics despair that Royal spends too much time following the discussions on her campaign website, which she set up to give citizens a voice in her policy. The "first internet president" has a certain ring to it - but EURSOC would be the first to admit that surfing the net all day introduces you to some rum ideas.
