Neo-Bonapartism? A parallel between Nicolas Sarkozy and ...

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Neo-Bonapartism? A parallel between Nicolas Sarkozy and Napoleon III Sarkozy relied on his accomplishments during his ministerial years, and gathered around him France’s main political parties in a strategic calculation aiming at being consensual, then representative of the people. As a matter of fact, startling resemblances are to be found between the two leaders electorates. As explained by Milza, Napoleon III’s electorate is “the fusion of a natural electorate, the one of the Orleanists, of the Right Wing which needed to establish order in troubled times, and of popular classes” (2009). For his part, Sarkozy extended his “natural electorate” to the extreme wings and Center’ voters during the second round of the 2007’s presidential election to reach his score of 53%: “according to TNS SOFRES polls, 60% of Le Pen voters supported Sarkozy, along with about 40% of the Bayrou supporters, and the quasi-totality of De Villiers and Nihous voters” (Cautrès & Cole, 2007). As stated above, Napoleon III was highly plebiscited in rural zones, and highly contested in big urban centers: Sarkozy, still quoting Cautrès and Cole, “obtained his best scores mainly in rural or semi-rural zones, in Alsace and the Mediterranean in particular, (…) and was very dominant in older segments, and particularly a significant segment of Le Pen voters” (2007). A final criteria needs to be outlined here to have a comprehensive physiognomy of Sarkozy’s voters: the wealthiest classes supported him heavily with more than 85% of the expressed suffrages, just like Napoleon III’s natural support of the privileged who feared the revolutionary will of the Legitimists. The social circumstances of the societies that elected Napoleon’s nephew and Sarkozy are here important to compare. As stated by Garrigou, Louis Napoleon “rallied to him a peasantry that was distressed by the social crisis of the Second Republic” just like what Sarkozy did when he called upon the wealthiest, oldest, and mostly-rural profound France; the very “Vieille France” A website dedicated to this project is available starting Dec 7 th 2010 at: http://www.aui.ma/personal/~Y.Assaoui/ 16
Neo-Bonapartism? A parallel between Nicolas Sarkozy and Napoleon III that expressed her discontent with the traditional Right/Left duality during the previous presidential election. In fact, this electorate has already converted its vote into a Front National’s few years before one in a desperate attempt to reinstate order and to arouse changes. “The weakening of the social solidarity accentuated the propensity of relying on a charismatic leader, even if he is mediocre, yet not being sparing of reassuring certitudes for the future” (Garrigou, 2008). In both cases, Louis Napoleon and Nicolas Sarkozy followed a mathematical approach to politics: the support of their mainstream allies was not enough to attain a comfortable electoral consecration. Both of their tactics at this regard were based on calculations: the masses were to be rallied via a populist discourse while the remaining voters were to be gained through political alliances with the other parties and actors of importance. Populism here is a convenient tool for achieving legitimacy: its primary vocation is to gather different social expectations under the same banner that is by nature a crossing-classes one. Louis Napoleon had to reconcile the interests of the working class with those of the bourgeoisie (and what remained of the aristocracy) via a powerful leitmotiv: the necessity of escaping from anarchy. Accordingly, and as explained by Baillet, « to reach such a consensus, he used all the tools at his disposal, starting from his prefects, and ending with an alliance of the throne with the Church, in order to fight the revolutionary propaganda” (2007). Sarkozy as well followed a consensual approach during the presidential race: he rallied the working class (“France that wake up early”), the middle class (shopkeepers, small firms owners), and both the big business owners (CAC 40 firms) and the media owners without omitting to include communitarian votes, and A website dedicated to this project is available starting Dec 7 th 2010 at: http://www.aui.ma/personal/~Y.Assaoui/ 17
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