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

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Neo-Bonapartism? A parallel between Nicolas Sarkozy and Napoleon III political animals who were indebted to the government for the restoration of order and currently on the wave of an economic boom” (2003). As a result, with a weak Senate and Chamber, Napoleon III centralized almost all of the legislative and executive powers via constitutional reforms which were all approved by popular plebiscite. However, the emperor gradually shifted toward a more parliamentary system starting from the decrees issued in November 1860. The concessions he made gave more influence to the parliamentary opposition via the granting of more prerogatives. Yet this reforming was still hesitant; for example “ministers were deemed responsible, but it was not clear whether they were responsible to parliament or to the emperor” (Gildea, 2003). His path of constitutional reforming was thus considered as very limited. This Bonapartist-oligarchic mode of governance was to some extent revived by Sarkozy. In the context of the Fifth Republic, the weakening of the Parliament and the dwindling of the government are recurrent issue not really created by Sarkozy. However, and as explained by Garrigou, “the concentration of power in the Elysée was never as pushed: the administrative and financial reform which put some order within the status of the staff assigned to the presidency, somehow erased by the increase of the president’s remuneration, realized the formula of a presidential government” (2008). As a matter of fact, Sarkozy inherited of the semi-presidential system established by the Fifth Republic, with its benefits and limitations regarding presidential prerogatives. He followed at this regard the powerfully built example provided by the General De Gaulle, and in particular this declaration issued during a press conference in January 1964 as cited by Le Figaro (2009) which remained significant at this regard: “the indivisible authority of the state is entrusted with the president by the people who A website dedicated to this project is available starting Dec 7 th 2010 at: http://www.aui.ma/personal/~Y.Assaoui/ 22
Neo-Bonapartism? A parallel between Nicolas Sarkozy and Napoleon III elected him, there shall be no other (authority), neither ministerial nor civilian, military, or judiciary (….) finally, he can adjust the supreme domain that is his own with those he is attributing the management to others”. Nicolas Sarkozy thus expanded a Gaullist hyper- presidentialism but with an unspoken-of Bonapartist centralization of powers. The model of governance he established is assimilated to “a return to a kind of presidentialism, or what we might call a presidentialization of the semi-presidential model; this model implies: tremendous government activism, an opening to the opposition, and a shift from the government and parliament toward the close advisors of the Elysee” (Lévy & Skach, 2007). The return to a strong presidency was visible since the early weeks/months of Sarkozy’s mandate: the head of state multiplied the interventions and speeches in an overflow of activism that left no space for the members of the government. The hierarchical and rather well-established prioritization of the French political life was disturbed by this President cumulating his own mandate with the one of the Prime minister, not to say with the ones of all the members of his government. As pointed out by Rieff, “rather than according serious room for decision-making to his Prime Minister, François Fillon, or to Fillon’s cabinet, Sarkozy has arrogated almost every lever of power to himself and his advisers within the Élysée Palace” (2009). Like Napoleon III, Sarkozy wanted to head on every decision, to comment all the events and issues of the French life, to initiate and appose his supreme stamp on all decrees and laws, even if such a state of affairs ended up more than once in grotesque situations. This was the case for instance in November 2008 when Sarkozy had a 4 hours flight from Paris to a rural zone in Southern France in order to reassure an aged lady who was rubbed by her neighbor that “the French state will do its best to get rid of such petty crimes”. A website dedicated to this project is available starting Dec 7 th 2010 at: http://www.aui.ma/personal/~Y.Assaoui/ 23
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