Reading de Gaulle's book makes you wonder how politicians became what they are today, it's as if they lost 50iq points and became business owners instead of world leaders
"After Washington rebuffed his proposal to overhaul the Western alliance and once he ended the war in Algeria, de Gaulle launched a forceful attack on what he called the "American protectorate." The West's nuclear strategy, the structure of NATO, and West German dependence on Washington were only some of the issues that fell subject to Gaullist revisionism"
https://publishing.cdlib.org/ucpressebooks/view?docId=ft4w10...
But he saved France from the coup generals and was responsible for the withdrawal of the French from Algeria.
In the summer I saw the Algeria memorial on the Seine, in France they still have a problem with the colonial crimes in Algeria.
Maybe it is easier for some when they can view it from a distance, I see many who grasp the severity of say, the Japanese state's indifference to their imperial war crimes which still causes immense tension with their neighbors, or the denial of the Armenian Genocide by Turks and so on. It's a shame that such indignation rarely is maintained for systems that one may be far more complicit, and consequently far more able to rectify.
Of course in hindsight (even if we ignore all the mass murder and atrocities, which we can’t..) that was was entirely pointless from the French perspective. What were they even hoping to achieve? Unless they were willing to grant full suffrage and civil rights to the entire Muslim population independence seemed inevitable. Best case was holding onto the majority French/pro-French areas in the north..)
Sure, I'm under no rose-tinted delusions about their methods - nor the methods of any other guerilla movement in a similar position - but the vital distinction is that one side is aimed at enforcing a racist and cruel colonialist regime and the other is a popular nationalist movement aimed at achieving sovereignty from that colonialist regime. There is no equivalence here. The FLN wouldn't have needed to liberate Algeria at gunpoint if it wasn't under occupation in the first place (and if a peaceful or diplomatic resolution was not refused).
>What were they even hoping to achieve?
Yeah, I think there comes a similar point with many reactionary movements where they kind of began a mindless march into self-destruction, where whatever self-interested outcome they originally fought for is no longer even feasible yet they continue fighting for no other reason than institutional momentum and spite.
> to liberate
It’s not like they turned it into a democracy or even tried to. It was bit like Castro liberating Cuba just a probably with more atrocities targeting civilians or former Algerian soldiers serving in the French army.
>It’s not like they turned it into a democracy or even tried to
How familiar are you with the cold war, and especially the third world movement? Do you know what happened to the democracies?
>more atrocities targeting civilians or former Algerian soldiers serving in the French army
Did you expect them to grant amnesty to a domestic reactionary fifth column, who in the case of both cuba and essentially every other third world country during that century, immediately began programs of terrorism and destabilization with foreign support? I'm not talking about the civilians who should've been securely repatriated, but a lot of those informants and French soldiers where not peaceful bystanders. The french state would not have been able to carry out their programs of torture and terrorism against the civilian population without their help.
I'm not exactly condoning or celebrating reprisals or violence but once again, all of these things become inevitable when a country is colonized and repressed, so I'm not sure why you place the moral condemnation on people that will inevitably resist an occupation rather than the instigator.
In any case, what's your ideal scenario? That a brutal struggle for national sovereignty somehow manages to secure their freedom with limited violence or guerilla tactics against an infinitely more funded and lubricated colonial machine, and immediately institute a parliamentary democracy that will avoid being subject to a purge or military coup (as was the case in Algeria) or outright foreign intervention (in the case of Allende, Sukarno, Park Chung Hee, Goulart, and literally too many others to list).... somehow? Or instead should they have just rolled over and assist the French in violently pacifying the population, or in the case of Cuba help maintain Bautista's dictatorship solely to prevent civil instability at all costs, since national sovereignty clearly cannot be attained in a manner you deem proper.
What are you trying to say?
> so I'm not sure why you place the moral condemnation
I'm not sure why do some people insist on treating the world as black and white and are so obsessed with some sort of ideological purity of one type or another.
The FLN was a terrorist organization, they targeted both French and Algerian civilians (and had zero qualms about consciously sacrificing the lives of thousands of lives and used that as tool to achieve their political aims). The fact that the French were as brutal or much more brutal is tangential.
That every time a third world nation during the Cold War moved towards democratic rule (along with the land and resource re-distribution that will inevitably follow from politicians engaging with the interests of the franchised population) there was immediately counter-opposition in the form of reactionary para-paramilitaries, or military coups internal to the state. This subversion was often funded by foreign intelligence agencies and business interests (essentially always, though the degree may vary e.g. Brazil had a much more embedded reactionary sector thanks to the legacy of slavery and the social castes that arose, compared to say Indonesia where the CIA had to do a lot more work in directly authorizing bombing campaigns and funding anti-communist programs for young military officials in Sukarno's government) [see Vincent Bevins book on Indonesia].
>The fact that the French were as brutal or much more brutal is tangential
No its not tangential at all unless you are missing the point I've made. Do you not understand that militant terrorist tactics come out of a reaction to brutal oppression? It's not a difficult concept to grasp: any situation where peaceful opposition is stifled, democratic political action is repressed, and activists targeted for arrest and extra-legal violence, you force people to either form or support groups wielding militant guerilla tactics which include terrorism and brutality, since such groups cannot be quelled so easily.
And this is a fact well known to colonialist powers both historical and contemporary as is reflected in their tactics, since a militant opposition is much easier to frame as violent barbarians than their peaceful predecessors and is used retroactively to justify their oppression.
>I'm not sure why do some people insist on treating the world as black and white and are so obsessed with some sort of ideological purity of one type or another
Where are these people you're talking about? Can you show how anything I said relies on some explicitly moralistic or ideological argument? Do you understand that I'm not thoughtlessly cheer-leading violence but simply pointing out that it is an inevitable consequence of colonial repression?
To the contrary I think the moralistic position would be to argue that historical actors should be condemned retroactively for engaging in any kind of violence while refusing to consider the immediate (and asymmetric) cause of such violent resistance as a contingent factor. Not sure how your abstraction of history into a series of totally unrelated events, wherein the actors should be morally judged individually constitutes a less subjective analysis.
Who would you have supported in the place of FLN? What should they have done to earn your approval? Would would be the outcome of such an action in that context? Of what use is any of this speculation?
I read Annie Ernaux's book, Algeria was far away and there is propaganda and misinformation and ruthless suppression of people who care.
Germany right now supports the war crimes in Gaza - there is propaganda and suppression of people who care.
Churchill is similar and possibly more familiar to the English-speaking public: presented as a lion against Hitler, but don’t dig too much towards what he did with Irish republicans or around India’s independence.
I don’t think FDR was that much different if you read what he privately wrote about Jewish immigrants to the US in the 1940s or the internment camps of Japanese-Americans.
All three are the modern keystones of human-rights-defending countries, but the second best-known thing about them is how much effort they put into planning openly racist policies, up to genocides. You can read Hannah Arendt and re-read after accounts on what happened during the Battle of Algiers, the Bengal Famine, or Manzanar, and it hits differently the second time.
That's why it's hard to judge past personalities with our modern standards. Go read what Jules Ferry or Victor Hugo said about colonies, they both were very engaged and vocal about human/civil rights yet they said the most insanely racist things, I don't think any known public figure alive today said anything remotely as racist as them.
This couldn't be more naive, you understand that these are not some default cultural norm of the time, shared by all, and we today are simply more empathetic and enlightened than them with each passing decade? These attitudes are a direct reflection of the political sphere and centers of power in which those originating these ideas are embedded within.
People knew racism and colonialism was wrong during WW2. They knew it long before then.
You can take any time and place in history, and if you look you will find someone opposed to colonialism, exploitation, and prejudice, for as long as those concepts have existed. Just maybe not in the military leadership, or political class, since their positions in society constrain the range of beliefs they would've held in order to enter such positions in the first place.
Ironically they all call themselves "Gaullists", even though none of them are, but since it is the benchmark of what a leader should be they all defaults to that term. I think de Gaulle's legacy explains why France hasn't completely collapsed yet (only country in EU with the atom bomb, country with the highest % of nuclear in its energy mix, a decent army), all of it is slowly crumbling away of course
The 5th republic presidential system, which we owe to De Gaulle, is a large part of the issues we have, though.
> country with the highest % of nuclear in its energy mix
Civilian nuclear happened after his departure, though. If anything, De Gaulle's fierce protectionism had pushed the french civilian nuclear industry to pursue homegrown graphite-gaz tech, which was a dead-end technologically, as the Brits eventually found out. De Gaulle's departure opened the way to importing Westinghouse-designed reactors which were a success.
The current political issues are caused by a lack of majority in parliament. So arguably this is really the one scenario the "Presidential system" cannot be blamed for.
> It's the same in parliamentary systems.
Coalitions happen all the time in parliamentary systems. Even in countries with a strong presidential executive, having legislative elections on a separate schedule that help incumbents getting re-elected independently from the head of state helps a lot in getting bipartisan deals. Even in France, the Senate, notwithstanding its issues, is frequently a welcome source of balance of powers for this very reason.
> There is no majority so it's very hard to form a government and that government is very unstable.
Many countries have parliamentary systems and manage to be stable and working democracies. Many more have mixed systems which are much less forceful than France and also work fine.
Coalitions may or may not happen in parliamentary systems or now in France.
> having legislative elections on a separate schedule that help incumbents getting re-elected independently from the head of state helps a lot in getting bipartisan deals
That's how it is in France unless the terms somehow align, which is more common now that Presidential and Parliamentary terms are both 5 years but not guaranteed. In any case this has nothing to do with coalitions, which are a result of a lack of majority, not of the constitutional system per se.
> Many countries have parliamentary systems and manage to be stable and working democracies
Yes but that's beside the point.
The issue in France is that the strong Presidential system is seen as "right wing" not least because it was created by a General so the left likes to criticise. The reality is that it has worked well and that more parliamentarism would not be a silver buller to solve issues, real or perceived.
The terms always "somehow" align, because the president can reset the term of MPs, which is extremely beneficial just after winning the presidential election.
Because of that and because the president's mandate now has the same duration has the legislature, the two terms are synchronized, we rarely have snap elections (this year was the first time ever since the 5-year presidential mandate was introduced).
The senate works differently, but since it can't block laws, it's less relevant.
> but not guaranteed.
Situation: you get elected but the Assemblée Nationale is against you. Why would you ever not call snap elections? That's what Mitterand did in 1981 and 1988, and it worked both times. We are extremely likely to have new MP elections in 2027, just after a new president gets elected.
> In any case this has nothing to do with coalitions
Of course it does. Because the president has so much weight on the executive, and because appearing as principled and uncompromising is important to prepare for the next election, coalitions are too risky for opposition politicians to enter them: they risk too much and they gain too little by entering a coalition.
> Yes but that's beside the point.
Why? Explaining the lack of coalitions using the concrete constitutional mechanisms that make it impractical makes much more sense than trying to explain it by some immaterial virtue of french political ethos.
> The issue in France is that the strong Presidential system is seen as "right wing" not least because it was created by a General so the left likes to criticise.
Ah, yes let's make it a partisan issue now.
> The reality is that it has worked well
Everything works well when there is no hardship.
If you're the President and Parliament is against you and you don't want to quit you have to step aside as happened in 1986, 1993, and 1997 and the system does become essentially parliamentary.
Again, coalitions stem from lack of majority and potentially large number of parties, not parliamentary vs Presidential systems per se. You enter a coalition only when you have to. If you have the majority you don't.
Countries that have a "culture" of coalitions are those where there are many parties and potentially proportional representation so that majorities in Parliament are rare.
Hence the UK which is completely parliamentary but very rarely has coalitions because the system is designed to create majorities, whereas Germany rarely has outright majorities so often has coalitions.
For a cohabitation to happen, you still need a majority. The legislatures in '86, '93 and '97 all had clear majorities. The current situation doesn't have it. Also cohabitation is likely a thing of the past since the constitutional reform of 2000.
> not parliamentary vs Presidential systems per se.
The system and the chronology of elections it creates has an impact on political strategies and the willingness to compromise.
> Countries that have a "culture" of coalitions
Countries that have a "culture" of coalitions have it because making coalitions isn't punished by the electoral system. France had a "culture" of coalition before the rules were changed. In fact, that "culture" is not some hard-to-pin virtue, it's political agents understanding the rules of the game, and optimizing their chances to win.
> You enter a coalition only when you have to.
Here is the thing: you never "have to" enter a coalition, and if you do so, you get milked by the senior party, because having the president on their side gives them an overwhelming edge. And so, at the next elections, you get destroyed because you've pushed little of your program and enabled the other side. It's much more rewarding to stay in the opposition.
And over the 70 years of the 3rd Republic and 12 of the 4th, stable and working are not labels that could be applied. The average length of a government in that period is around a year, with many being in power even less than that.
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_des_gouvernements_de_la_...
Like tech is not the solution to social problems, laws are not the solution to political issues.
Alternatively, looking back at the disasters of the 3rd and 4th republics, a strong Presidential system is the only option for a coherent stable long term government to exist in France. The 5th tries to do everything to ensure there's a strong figure and a majority they can work with; the first time there has been no majority, and it's total chaos, reminiscent of how the 3rd and 4th (didn't) worked. And their existence over multiple decades shows that if deputies were forced to compromise more often, it still wouldn't help.
The 3rd republic was interrupted when the nazis invaded, and was replaced by an undemocratic collaboration government. I don't see what the 5th constitution would have changed in that situation. I would say that the 3rd was, by very far, the republican system that endured the worst situations in France, and it survived most situations.
The 4th republic was interrupted by a military putsch, and replaced by the 5th, who barely survived a second putsch a couple years later. Likewise, no constitutional point of the 5th would have prevented this to happen.
Like it or not, the 5th republic never had to survive any situation comparable to what the 4th and (especially) the 3rd republic survived. Personally, I'm happy that we don't have world wars and civil wars anymore, but that's unrelated to our constitution.
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_des_gouvernements_de_la_...
If you want to assess the resilience of the third republic, you have to look at the challenges it overcame. The fifth is far behind in that aspect.
Or look at how they ignored the occupation of the Rhineland, when even the German army felt they would be crushed if France attacked.
Etc etc
Do you mean to blame politicians for the military's failure? The military organized, equipped, trained, planned, and commanded their short-lived WWII efforts.
In Germany after WWI, if I recall correctly, they made scapegoats out of those they wanted to demonize rather than take responsibility.
Nobody said that, but it absolutely makes no sense not to blame the military primarily.
Yes, because the military was:
* not given enough to organise for what was coming, and as a result their whole strategy was centred on "keep the Germans at the border for a few years, and then when we have enough arms and people we'll attack in 2-3 years"
* put under the command of an incredibly inept man, Gamelin. He was politically well connected and useful (republican values and loyal to democracy, unlikely to launch a coup), but was unprepared for anything more recent than WWI. Worst of all, he was incapable of taking any sort of feedback from his subordinates, and in fact sent off men who were questioning him to shitty posts away from him. Even worse, he was consulted on foreign policy, and had way too much sway in deciding French foreign agenda around appeasement of Hitler (e.g. Gamelin refused to support Czechoslovakia unless Poland also joined; Poland was way too short-sighted and opted to get some rail junction from Czechoslovakia instead of realising they're next and siding against Hitler. But this was irrelevant, French + Czechoslovak armies outnumbered the Germans by a good margin, had better industry and more arms manufacturing, would have had them on two fronts, and both had extensive defensive systems; and unknown to them, the German army probably would have couped Hitler if it had came to war in 1938).
The French military was better equipped than the Germans; they just didn't understand how to use armor and air tactically.
Even the GGP refers to the 'huge army' of the French.
And yes, it was very badly used. In part because of bad tactics and the wrong lessons learned from WWI and the Spanish Civil War, in part because there wasn't enough of it so they decided to spread it out across the front.
The politicians also allowed the gap in Belgium, for political reasons. Germany invaded through that gap (like on the previous two invasions, just so you don't think this is hindsight). These were all political decisions, just like the appointing of terrible commanders because of their political away, as others have noted.
If you get run over in weeks, you are really stretching to point fingers if you are not looking at the military. If you don't, you end up with a corrupt, incompetent military.
The French were better equipped than the Germans at the outset of the war, in terms of armor, etc., but didn't know how to utilize what they had tactically.
I still believe people like Macron, Scholz, Trump or Biden look like absolute buffoons, for different reasons, compared to the average leaders of the last 50 years
I used to give him the benefit of the doubt on the above question, but based on the last decade of his actions reported in the press, I'm less clear. There is stepping up, and then appearing to step up. Which would a politician be best at? Or is it the press as you say... the press ignoring things in situations that require unity, and reporting bad things in comfortable times when people are jockeying and its time to get clicks/views...
Yes for sure, but thats not enough. Otherwise we would see a lot of similar moral leaders ie in Africa or South America and reality is very different, isn't it.
Not exactly a career path that’s easy to follow in any stable western country. You can’t really just jump from the military to government regardless of how capable and qualified you are.
Even today, a not-insignificant number of US reps and congressmen are people who have served in the military. Same goes for Singapore, India and Indonesia (if we're going by stable democracies). I think Europe is an exception to the norm, even if there are some cases (like the current Czech President).
Yes as a consequence of WW2 not before (outside of other major wars) or currently.
I’m not saying that there is anything wrong or particularly strange about a former officer or general standing for office.
But it’s not quite the same, de Gaulle, Eisenhower and (to some extent McArthur) were pretty much slingshotted to the top because of who they were and what they did during the war. They skipped all the traditional steps and “filters” that most politicians have to pass and had huge amounts of political capital. That doesn’t really happen during peacetime in stable countries.
e.g. US had 5 presidents which didn’t hold any elected office before becoming president:
3 of them (Taylor, Grant, Eisenhower) directly leveraged their success as military commanders during major wars to get elected, Hoover was a cabinet secretary for 8 years so he barely counts and the last one is Trump.
He was both, as were many generals of the 3rd republic.
He absolutely was not pre-WWII.
> as were many generals of the 3rd republic.
He was not a general during the 3rd, safe for its last few months.
How do you suggest he suddenly appeared in a government in 1940? De Gaulle had been in contact with Paul Reynaud since 1936. He was also in contact with several other high-ranking politicians, and actively trying to convince them to support his ideas on reshaping the army.
Oh you would be surprised. Check the assassinated/persecuted/encarcerated leaders for going against Western interests.
Some that comes to mind: Haile Selassie, Gaddafi or Fidel Castro speeches at the UN.
Tried to create a pan-African currency backed by gold, French government intervened with backing of NATO, a whole region with millions of people was pushed into misery.
Thanks!
We could give multiples higher salary to MPs, stack the commons with the best Cambridge, Oxford, Imperial, LSE, etc. have to offer ... but you can't do that, because matey earning a living wage or whatever already thinks they're grossly overpaid and that extra income besides their MP salary should be illegal - when a software engineer could earn more. So woman of the people who left school at sixteen to work retail gets his vote, that's who we need in power, not these educated toffs.