Q U I G O U V E R N E L A F R A N C E ? N ° 6 8 - Pouvoirs

S U M M A R I E Sreform these agencies where administration and politics too often meet.J EAN-DENIS B REDINA government of magistrates ?According to our tradition the magistrates are limited to a secondaryrole, at once praised and scorned. But recently a few judges who arevery much in tune with the contemporary political culture, who appreciateor are appreciated by the media, are dreaming of shaking up thepolitical world and of dazzling public opinion. Accordingly concernsgrow about a possible government of magistrates. Our old mentality isstill at work : we brandish the threat of an all-powerful judiciary whenwe should be worrying about the drift of our justice.É LIE C OHENEconomic constraint and political action189Economic constraint does not exist as such but is an instrument in thepolitical game, as exemplified by the so-called european constraint,which is at once a deliberate policy and the result of our democracy’sinability to envisage its own reform. What is called constraint is moreoften than not a political technology through which one attempts topresent a reaching political choices as automatic. This approach wasrecently submitted to a radical test : the monetary crisis of the summerof 1993 during which governments seemed to surrender to the markets.J EAN-LOUIS M ISSIKAThe media republicThe media pressure on the action of the government and, more generally,on political action, is not very well understood. The mass mediaare made responsible for phenomena which existed before their developmentand which are the outcome of the normal working of democracy.Critics often forget that the media are dependant on three majorpowers : the power of their sources, the power of the public, and thepower of the belief in the power of the media. Thus, media power doesexist but it is part of a very complex network of forces which representthe media Republic.R ENAUD D ORANDEU