A keen observer of French political life and columnist for FigaroVox, Maxime Tandonnet has notably published
André Tardieu.
The misunderstood
(Perrin, 2019) and
Georges Bidault: from the Resistance to French Algeria
(Perrin, 2022).
He teaches foreigners and nationality law at the University of Paris XII.
“The more public life tends to become bureaucratized, the more the temptation to resort to violence increases. In a totally bureaucratized regime, we no longer find anyone with whom it is possible to discuss, to whom we can submit demands, or on whom the pressure of power can take hold. Bureaucracy is a form of government in which everyone is entirely deprived of political freedom and the power to act”
(
On Violence
).
Hannah Arendt thus shows how revolts arise from people's feeling of having lost control of their destiny.
Indeed, chaos has become part of the habits of contemporary France.
Since 2018, it has become recurring, in various forms.
The “yellow vest” crisis lasted almost a year, marked by the occupation of roundabouts, images of riots and violence in Paris, until its recovery by the black blocs and the ransacking of the Arc of Triumph.
The social movement against the first pension reform took over during the winter of 2019 and 2020: for several months, public transport was blocked and the country was on the verge of paralysis.
Then came the health crisis of 2020 and 2021 with its confinements and its bureaucratic
Absurdistan
which caused a sort of glaciation of social and political life, and, in the process, the presidential and legislative elections of 2022.
Then, the climate quickly deteriorated again: the second pension reform, that of the emblematic “64 years” reignited the situation.
For three or four consecutive months, France lived to the rhythm of blockages, violent demonstrations, sackings and fires, images of clouds of black smoke above Paris.
Then as soon as this page was closed, the revolt in the suburbs was unleashed for a week, with unprecedented violence from June 27 to July 3: 722 members of the police injured, 11,113 fires on public roads, 5,662 vehicles burned , 1,313 buildings burned or damaged, including 254 premises of the national and municipal police and the gendarmerie, representing one billion €.
And six months later, just six months, the farmers' movement now threatens to block the country...
As soon as people feel that their vote is no longer of any use, riots or blockades, or even physical confrontation, are necessary as a last resort to express suffering, to assert protests and demands.
Maxime Tandonnet
Apparently, these events have no connection between them.
They come from environments that are the polar opposites of each other and their demands are very heterogeneous, when they exist... However, these phenomena have a common denominator.
They reflect the deep crisis of French politics and democracy.
The massive approval of the agricultural revolt – 87% according to polls – underlines that the vast majority of public opinion approves of a revolt as long as it massively identifies with its cause.
This situation which is gradually plunging France into permanent chaos is the result of the crisis of political speech.
She expresses, in the street, the same message as that of the CEVIPOF survey on the confidence of the French, according to which “
87% of them believe that politicians take no account of what they think
”.
As for abstention, it exceeded 54% in the last legislative elections – an absolute record.
As soon as people feel that their vote no longer serves any purpose, and as soon as they no longer believe in the will or the possibility of political power to improve their living conditions and to hear their concerns, the Riot or blockade, even physical confrontation, are necessary as a last resort to express suffering, to assert protests and demands.
Democracy, based on the law of the majority before which the minority agrees to bow, is thus profoundly sick.
Emblematic events that have occurred recently have once again demonstrated the depth of the malaise: presidential election by default followed by neutralized legislative elections;
poverty of the political offer;
systematic recourse by the executive to article 49.3;
de facto suspension of legislative power, caught between the straitjacket of European law and the invasive and random jurisprudence of the Constitutional Council;
abandonment of the referendum as a means of expressing sovereignty since the victory of the “no” vote in 2005.
Even more than during the “yellow vests” or the social movement against 64-year-olds, the French applaud the farmers' revolt as a response, in their name, to the feeling of democratic dispossession.
Maxime Tandonnet
The dominant feeling is that the major societal choices and the real essential decisions on daily life (for example on agricultural and environmental standards), are made in Brussels offices under the pressure of economic lobbies, when not under the influence of consulting firms.
And the people, despised by their ruling elites, no longer have a say.
Even more than during the "yellow vests" or the social movement against 64-year-olds, the French applaud the farmers' revolt as a response, in their name, to the feeling of democratic dispossession and the trivialization of a political regime which, since several decades (but the phenomenon continues to get worse), favors an above-ground autocracy, self-indulgence, clannishness and contempt for people, narcissistic exuberance, bureaucratic confiscation of power and destruction piece by piece of French democracy – the power of the people.
The narcissistic cult of personality, the staging of excessive personalization of power, the recourse to emotion or heroism through the myth of the savior, serve to mask the impotence and renunciation of politics - when the comedy drowns out the action.
But today, the big spectacle is no longer even an illusion – almost no one believes in it anymore.
The confidence of the French in political speech is destroyed and the crisis of authority is in full swing.
Hence the trivialization or normalization of rebellion as a mode of action on the fringes of institutions.
And the chaos, now trivialized, could well one day, due to a spark, degenerate into quasi-civil war.
France needs a deep and radical reform of its political model.