Refractory Gauls, or the French politics thread

[Zanza]

Bit of a striking moment with Melenchon on TV recently calling German reunification an unconstitutional annexation that was conducted with unprecedented "social violence" against East Germans.

I understand what Die Linke considers as "social violence" in the context of reunification and some of it is even legitimate criticism of policies back then.
But what is the argument about constitutionality? 

[Sheilbh]

Certainly not yet.  But on the right we are heading in that direction.  During a leadership debate last night the front runner on the right declared he would replace the Governor of the Bank of Canada - an office which is supposed to be independent of politics.  According to reports only one of the other candidates called him out on the comment.

I still don't think you're in the same universe as Le Pen though.

On that point though I'm not sure with central bankers - who are probably the most powerful people in Western systems without any real form of democratic oversight. I think the role should be insulated from politics on a day to day basis. But they make hugely important decisions about our economy.

On central banks themselves I think we might come to an inflection point and monetary policy might get politicised again. Central bank independence works because politics on all sides broadly agree on monetary policy but I'm not sure if that will hold under less benign conditions and especially in the context of asset bubbles and housing prices there are clear class and generational divides that might benefit from different approaches. And in the past monetary poicy - gold standard or not etc - have been hugely important political issues.

Central bankers took a lot of credit for the era of benign high employment/low inflation. Some of it is deserved because they are powerful - I think there's an extent to which that era is as shaped by, say, Greenspan, Bernanke and Draghi as any elected politician. But I think their ability to expertly manage and shape market expectations was less important than the structural factors Minsky flagged: Asia, technology etc.

Now I think we're facing opposite challenges and the, for want of a better word, credit of the central banks might run out. There are, in my view, structural reasons for inflationary pressures which I don't think are going to go away and I don't think the central bankers will be able to solve. I think that will change the politics around them when they go from being the gnomic guys delivering a couple of decades of economic growth and saving currency unions (which they never were), to policymakers with constraints (which they always were but was not how they were reported or projected themselves). I think their institutional gravitas might get undermined because of that - then when you add in those class and generational divides, I can see monetary policy becoming re-politicised.

But for another example what about policing? I'm just thinking of the Met here the Commissioner is appointed by the Home Secretary in consultation with the Mayor. They are operationally independent and should serve their full term which doesn't coincide with any electoral cycle. But it's clear Cressida Dick was doing a bad job and there were systemic issues she wasn't fixing. In my view it's perfectly legitimate for the Mayor (or the Home Secretary) to make clear to the Commissioner that they don't have their confidence any longer - and, practically, that makes it impossible to continue in the job. Similarly if you elect a left-wing mayor who wants to move to community policing etc - how long do they have to put up with, say, a Bill Bratton as chief of police before it's legitimate to move them on without being a problematic overstep on police independence?

I can imagine that happening or being appropriate if there were systemic failure at a central bank or it was clear that their monetary policy views were absolutely opposed to or stymieing an elected government. Althought that might just be because I'm on the left and it's always been a thing that central banks might cause problems for a left-wing government

[Sheilbh]

I understand what Die Linke considers as "social violence" in the context of reunification and some of it is even legitimate criticism of policies back then.
But what is the argument about constitutionality? 

I've no idea - I think he phrased it as an "annexation" by West Germany.

I've heard the "social violence" point. I don't think it's particularly unprecedented and I don't think there are many better actual, real, practical examples of handling it than German reunification.

And it's far from the worst thing Melenchon's ever said it's just a really striking one in light of the popular front with the PS and Greens behind him.

[crazy canuck]

Certainly not yet.  But on the right we are heading in that direction.  During a leadership debate last night the front runner on the right declared he would replace the Governor of the Bank of Canada - an office which is supposed to be independent of politics.  According to reports only one of the other candidates called him out on the comment.

I still don't think you're in the same universe as Le Pen though.

On that point though I'm not sure with central bankers - who are probably the most powerful people in Western systems without any real form of democratic oversight. I think the role should be insulated from politics on a day to day basis. But they make hugely important decisions about our economy.

On central banks themselves I think we might come to an inflection point and monetary policy might get politicised again. Central bank independence works because politics on all sides broadly agree on monetary policy but I'm not sure if that will hold under less benign conditions and especially in the context of asset bubbles and housing prices there are clear class and generational divides that might benefit from different approaches. And in the past monetary poicy - gold standard or not etc - have been hugely important political issues.

Central bankers took a lot of credit for the era of benign high employment/low inflation. Some of it is deserved because they are powerful - I think there's an extent to which that era is as shaped by, say, Greenspan, Bernanke and Draghi as any elected politician. But I think their ability to expertly manage and shape market expectations was less important than the structural factors Minsky flagged: Asia, technology etc.

Now I think we're facing opposite challenges and the, for want of a better word, credit of the central banks might run out. There are, in my view, structural reasons for inflationary pressures which I don't think are going to go away and I don't think the central bankers will be able to solve. I think that will change the politics around them when they go from being the gnomic guys delivering a couple of decades of economic growth and saving currency unions (which they never were), to policymakers with constraints (which they always were but was not how they were reported or projected themselves). I think their institutional gravitas might get undermined because of that - then when you add in those class and generational divides, I can see monetary policy becoming re-politicised.

But for another example what about policing? I'm just thinking of the Met here the Commissioner is appointed by the Home Secretary in consultation with the Mayor. They are operationally independent and should serve their full term which doesn't coincide with any electoral cycle. But it's clear Cressida Dick was doing a bad job and there were systemic issues she wasn't fixing. In my view it's perfectly legitimate for the Mayor (or the Home Secretary) to make clear to the Commissioner that they don't have their confidence any longer - and, practically, that makes it impossible to continue in the job. Similarly if you elect a left-wing mayor who wants to move to community policing etc - how long do they have to put up with, say, a Bill Bratton as chief of police before it's legitimate to move them on without being a problematic overstep on police independence?

I can imagine that happening or being appropriate if there were systemic failure at a central bank or it was clear that their monetary policy views were absolutely opposed to or stymieing an elected government. Althought that might just be because I'm on the left and it's always been a thing that central banks might cause problems for a left-wing government

The reason politicizing the central bank in the Canadian context is that, other than Pollivre (who by the way floated crpto becoming an official Canadian currency) there is wide political consensus about the policy statements of the Bank.  In fact their broad policy directives are given by Parliament every number of years and then they go do their work independent of day to day interference.  That independence is then, of course, undermined if they can be terminated on a whim if they don't do as the PM wishes on a day to day.

Policy is an interesting question - and one of the reasons BC is going back to a regional police force rather than contracted policing with the RCMP.  Municipalities that already opted out and have their own local police have a police board and the mayor is a member of that board. 

[Sheilbh]

Interesting - so central bank in Canada doesn't have a formal over-riding mandate like the Fed, ECB, BofE? It makes a lot of sense to update that and have a measure of democratic control to reflect priorities of the government, especially if there are shifts on what that should be or if previous monetary policy was seen as not supporting a newly elected government's mandate.

I can fully understand the concer about a crypto bro directing that policy - see El Salvador. Although obviously central banks and treasuries are looking at it to work out what to do and if, or how, to engage with it.

There's similar mechanism in the UK on an elected official with a committee have oversight over the police in that area and can set broad strategic priorities, but aren't involved in operational policing. But it's the firing and hiring point I wonder about because they don't normally have that power within a police chief's term in office - but I think it can be justified if there's a shift in the politics or the police chief is failing. I'm just not sure that you can really put any formal guardrails around that and it's always likely that one man's justifiable "lost confidence in" is another's politicising the police.

[Crazy_Ivan80]

On a similar, but British, note absolutely thrilling to see Lutfur Rahman writing a piece in Jacobin about how he ran as an open socialist and beat the Labour party to become mayor - "the Left can win like I did: by going on the offensive". It's worth noting that Rahman was previously disqualified and banned from seeking office for five years because of electoral fraud and voter intimidation (and there's reports that, at least, the voter intimidation is back). His party is pretty much sectarian, has no women councillors (and a streak of misogyny) and a history of people making very anti-semitic remarks. It's also complicatedly tied to clan politics and political divisions in Bangladesh. Not entirely sure it's a model the democratic left should be holding up - or allowing to describe itself as primarily being about a strong socialist campaign, and holding your nose about the fraud, intimidation, sectarianism etc.

it's called cultural enrichment and you're supposed to love it and encourage it.

[Sheilbh]

There's other areas and communities with some similar issues, but nothing to the extent in Tower Hamlets. Large parts of it are just old school machine politics to be honest - for the same reasons that machine politics have always existed.

But the combination of factors and extent is fairly specific to Tower Hamlets (and started - as so much does - in an internal Labour party row that got out of hand ). I lived in the borough when he was last mayor and, annoyingly, he is actually a very effective mayor - which is also part of it. Especially compared to his successor, who's a decent guy but not been great from what I gather.

But it's not good and he shouldn't be given space as some voice of the left/a proper alternative to Starmerism.

[viper37]

Although Canadian politics might be bad - I'm just not sure the Conservatives or NDP are quite at Le Pen or Melenchon levels yet

According to reports only one of the other candidates called him out on the comment.

These reports are false.

Good to hear.  Who else called him on his bullshit?

Nearly everyone:

While the candidates do have some positions that they seem closely aligned on, like ending pandemic mandates and the carbon tax, Wednesday's debate showed one big area where other contenders piled on Poilievre: His support for and commentary on cryptocurrency.
It started with Poilievre bringing up his opposition to the Bank of Canada ever creating a digital currency. During the debate he promised to fire the governor of the Bank of Canada, a position currently held by Tiff Macklem, while pledging to restore the bank's independence. 

As part of his ongoing focus on the issue, he's also recently called Canada's central bank "financially illiterate."

In a rebuttal, Lewis drew attention to Poilievre's commentary on Bitcoin, raising concern over what she thought was questionable advice, and criticized his promotion of decentralized currency, something she said was "a problem" for someone who has been a finance critic.

Charest then pipped in, saying what Poilievre is suggesting is "totally bizarre," citing a recent drop in Bitcoin value. "Anyone following his advice that we saw on YouTube would have lost 20 per cent of their earnings," Charest said, questioning whether anyone would want their parents to lose 20 per cent of their retirement funds. "This lunacy, and it doesn't make sense at all," he said.

Brown then enters the conversation, saying he agrees with Charest and Lewis, and that "magic internet money fluctuates vastly."

Looking to defend himself, Poilievre shot back that his position has been mischaracterized.
Brown rebutted: "No one in this room, and no one in Canada will believe that you didn't say you can opt out of inflation through cryptocurrency. ... It is bad advice to be giving to Canadians, that is so risky, and you should know that as a former finance critic, that's not the advice you should be giving to the country."

This piece does not mention it, but he was also called out by regular members in the attendance who were interviewed post-debate.

[Sheilbh]

Still being counted but pretty strong result in the 2nd round of the legislatives today:


The big shock is probably the RN who have not hitorically done well in the legislative elections and are now projected to win over 80 seats - from 8 in 2017.

The unified left has paid off but probably a little bit less than they'd hoped.

Macron no longer has a parliamentary majority - he can form a coalition with the centre-right I suppose, if they're interested. Or try to pick off individuals/factions from NUPES and LR. It is still in its way a shock given that the system is designed to give the president a majority.

But zooming out it confirms the same picture from the presidential election. French politics is now a fairly hard left, a centre-ish party and the far right. All of those parties are reliant on leading personalities: Melenchon, Macron and Le Pen. Not sure who replaces Macron next time around and I'm not sure this polarised and personalised trend is good/healthy.

[Maladict]

A turnout of about 45% also isn't healthy.

[Sheilbh]

No - there's a wider trend there though. Turnout in Europe has been broadly declining basically since the 80s/end of the cold war.

But I think in France in particular, and I could be wrong, that it's taken a sharp turn down since its been aligned with the Presidential election. Given that it is designed to give the President a working majority I think it's probably reduced the importance/worth of legislative election in the eyes of voters?

Edit: Also important:

IPSOS poll. The death of the 'republican front'.
When Nupes faced RN: 72% of Ensemble voters abstained, 16% voted for Nupes, 12% voted for RN. 58% of LR voters abstained, 30% voted for RN and 12% voted for Nupes.

It was a running complaint during the campaign by the left that Macron's party would not say that in a NUPES-RN run-off, their supporters should vote NUPES.

[Duque de Bragança]

A turnout of about 45% also isn't healthy.

Higher than the previous legislative elections, but not by much.
Jupiter has a very narrow voter base but traditionaly these elections are less followed than presidential ones.

[Duque de Bragança]

No - there's a wider trend there though. Turnout in Europe has been broadly declining basically since the 80s/end of the cold war.

But I think in France in particular, and I could be wrong, that it's taken a sharp turn down since its been aligned with the Presidential election. Given that it is designed to give the President a working majority I think it's probably reduced the importance/worth of legislative election in the eyes of voters?

Edit: Also important:

IPSOS poll. The death of the 'republican front'.
When Nupes faced RN: 72% of Ensemble voters abstained, 16% voted for Nupes, 12% voted for RN. 58% of LR voters abstained, 30% voted for RN and 12% voted for Nupes.

It was a running complaint during the campaign by the left that Macron's party would not say that in a NUPES-RN run-off, their supporters should vote NUPES.

Ah the good old Front Républicain  Problem is, the main problem is the double standard, allying with the far-right is haram, while with the far-left it's hallal. 
I guess that was put to rest.

LR (conservatives) are in damage control mode so they have twice less seats than 5 years ago. It's somewhat positive given the dire straits they were after the failure of Pécresse, and Sarko's betrayal as in supporting Macron's candidates.

No prime minister position for Mélenchon, but it's still a pretty good result.

Jupiter can't have anticipated elections before one year at least.

[Josquius]

What I'm not getting is the criticism of Macron for pushing people to extremes. How has he done this?- Is the idea by grabbing the centre he is responsible for the decline of the centre left and centre right parties?

It seems to me a bit wishful thinking and that Macron is simply a logical thing to emerge out of a pre-existing dive to the extremes in a system that encourages binary thinking.

[Duque de Bragança]

What I'm not getting is the criticism of Macron for pushing people to extremes. How has he done this?- Is the idea by grabbing the centre he is responsible for the decline of the centre left and centre right parties?

It seems to me a bit wishful thinking and that Macron is simply a logical thing to emerge out of a pre-existing dive to the extremes in a system that encourages binary thinking.

Very logical thing that Macro. 

As for the playing the extremes, it's standard left-wing procedure since 1983. Preferably the far-right so as to divide the right and it requires some skill Mitterand had. Yet even Mitterand had FN députés back then, thanks to a modification of the electoral law. Jupiter has no such excuse.