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

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Neo-Bonapartism? A parallel between Nicolas Sarkozy and Napoleon III qualified as xenophobic, though again, he did not create anything. As a matter of fact, Soubrouillard reminded us that he simply recycled “what the Prodi government in Italy did in 2007 after an isolated act of delinquency of a Romanian tsigane, before Berlusconi’s political exploitation of it” (2010). Again, the ethnic stigmatization of this community seems to be based on a desperate populist approach, even if a recent communiqué of the Reuters news agency, cited by Le Point, unveils that an IFOP opinion polls showed that “56% of the French disapproved this policy while more than 71% of them estimated that the image of France abroad was damaged by these deportations”. At this level emerges the (last) missing link of Sarkozy’s Bonapartism, at least as far as his political philosophy is concerned: the primacy of security and order. At this regard, Duhamel comments are worth mentioning: “the order has always been the priority of the Right while the movement was rooted in the Left; the originality of Bonapartism, this authoritarian and modernist Right, consists in mixing order with movement and tradition with change. At this point, Sarkozy is to be affiliated to the Bonapartist family” (2009). The obsession of statistical results in that domain and Sarkozy’s everlasting and, on the long-run, tiring police state dynamic roots even more the security card within his political philosophy. However, his latest declaration supporting the “extension to video-surveillance to all big urban centers” is subject to virulent debates and raises the question of whether if Sarkozy will stop his securitarian escalation or if he will simply bypass the Republican conception of civil liberties. A website dedicated to this project is available starting Dec 7 th 2010 at: http://www.aui.ma/personal/~Y.Assaoui/ 36
Neo-Bonapartism? A parallel between Nicolas Sarkozy and Napoleon III Chapter II: An economic policy aiming at modernizing the country via advocating a neo-mercantilist liberal approach « L’industrie, cette source de richesse, n'a aujourd'hui ni règle, ni organisation, ni but. C'est une machine qui fonctionne sans régulateur ; peu lui importe la force motrice qu'elle emploie. Broyant également dans ses rouages les hommes comme la matière, elle dépeuple les campagnes, agglomère la population dans des espaces sans air, affaiblit l'esprit comme le corps, et jette ensuite sur le pavé, quand elle n'en sait plus que faire, les hommes qui ont sacrifié pour l'enrichir leur force, leur jeunesse, leur existence. Véritable Saturne du travail, l’industrie dévore ses enfants et ne vit que de leur mort. » Charles Louis Napoléon Bonaparte, Des Idées Napoléoniennes, 1860. I. A selectively dirigist state relying on a neo-liberal mercantilist approach It is undeniable that Napoleon III and Sarkozy inherited very dissimilar economic situations while they accessed power. The emperor for instance had to deal with the growing urbanization and the 2 nd industrial revolution’s repercussions on the mid 19 th century France. Accordingly, he somehow benefited from a relatively prosperous situation, though he handled a severe monetary crisis in 1857-1858. Sarkozy for his part inherited from the Chirac’s presidency a country embroiled in many economic difficulties he assessed thoughtfully since he promised during his presidential campaign to tackle them through large-scale reforms. In fact, if the emperor benefited from an ideal economic timing, the president inherited of an explosive situation, worsened by the occurrence of a financial crisis few months after his election. As assessed by the Economist in its cover story, the incredibly shrinking president, “the strengths that protected France's economy from the worst of the recession are turning into weaknesses in the recovery; last year even the Dutch exported more than the French” (2010). A website dedicated to this project is available starting Dec 7 th 2010 at: http://www.aui.ma/personal/~Y.Assaoui/ 37
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