French Presidential Election

Post Reply New Topic

I wasn't talking about the behaviour of individuals, I was referring to the ideology of economic liberalism, otherwise known as economic rationalism, which has become dominant in most Anglophone countries but which does not have universal support and is rejected by proponents of different ideologies, of which socialism is one.

It is only known as rationalism in Australia, the rest of the world doesn't use that term so really it took me off guard as you claim it meant something I didn't say. I never said that liberalism had universal support, however, France has many economic problems and I believe that these are related to the low levels of economic freedom and the poor choices for interventionist policies(france has one of the lowest levels of economic freedom for all 1st world nations, and one of the poorest policy competitiveness scores). I would argue though that if you mean pure socialism, then you pick an economic ideology without much intellectual vigor or strength. I believe that most economists have accepted that planning and planners cannot pick up on all of the information or trends and formulate perfect strategy in response or accept that government feedback mechanisms can be poor. Really though, if you want to debate the merits of socialism, we already have a thread devoted to that which is 29 pages long and that has me posting on most of those 29 pages.

Well, I am Australian, so that's what I understand economic rationalism to mean. What did you mean by the term?

Anyway, we could just as easily have a 29 page debate on the merits of liberalism if you wanted. Or any other ideology, really. Such is the nature of ideology. What is different about liberalism, though, is that it is the dominant ideology of our society, and therefore people tend to forget that it even exists, thinking that it is self-evident. This is not unique to liberalism, though, it has always been the case that the dominant ideology has been considered self-evident. My point is that I (and many others on the Left, I imagine) do not entirely accept the dominant ideology. I do not, therefore, accept the argument that France's woes are a result of its failing to manage its economy according to the prevailing norms. I think that social problems run much deeper than that and I also think that the countries which do manage their economies in the currently approved-of way (e.g. the US) are the ones with the greater social problems.

I already stated that I meant economic systems that made sense in terms of efficiency.

Ok, I know about liberalism. The only issue is that France has economic woes greater than its fellows who have gone a different path. It has higher unemployment, the french have lower financial satisfaction, there is lower growth, and the GDP per capita is not very high compared to others in its category as well. If one nation has worse than its peers and it has unusual policy tendencies, then I would blame those policies. This is not a matter of prevailing norms so much as it is one of working systems, I claim that liberalism works and its opponent doesn't do so as well. Given the fact that the US has a slightly lower life satisfaction inequality level than France and higher life satisfaction levels with France only equalling the US in happiness net, I would not consider us worse. As well, the racial issues in France are definitely at a high level given the success of politicians such as Le Pen and the France have higher levels of racial distrust than Americans.

Looks like Sarkozy will win...
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/ ... 4CE856.htm

Sarkozy wins. Looks like the late leaners went to Royal by they weren't enough.

(source)

ADDENDUM: Hmm...just about in line with the current poll results. (8-7 (53%-46%)

Well, I just hope that he does good things for France.

Good...

France needs to fix its fiscal and economic workings to give it some slack so that it can adjust its social policy. It is completely hide-bound.

Well, the right has only been in power for a mere twelve years (roughly the time-frame during which France started experiencing all those riots, etc.), so obviously they're the best bunch to fix all of France's social problems

Given that I see France's biggest problems being caused by its economic model, yes, the right is the right choice even though the French right isn't that good. The left will only take France down a path of more of the same. This is not to say I love Sarkozy's social policies, frankly I would prefer someone more libertarian, however, if the economy sucks, especially for the less well off groups such as immigrants, unrest will be the result.

Last edited by Awesomelyglorious on 07 May 2007, 1:02 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Cleanly and truthfully spoken.

But they can make strides to prepare for social overhaul. It changes are made in light of that, they will improve their standing for the next election. It goes without saying that no party holds the reins forever. If our former Canadian government, the liberals, had made proper strides in repairing their dishonest reputation, they might have formed another government.

As it is, electorates choose the lesser of two evils, and as scary as our conservatives as to the eastern portion of Canada, they were just less scary than the liberals as a whole. The conservatives(closer to euro conservatives than American ones) took power.

Economic responsibility is not against the tenets of socialism. But those parties often act like it. You dont have to be a cruel miser, just spend wiser.