‘Hollande is our
man’, ‘the left revival starts in France’, ‘now is our time’. Sound familiar? It
is if you have been following political developments on the continent. Hollande
has beaten Sarkozy and there will almost certainly be a socialist president of
France which will spark a turn of fortunes in social democratic parties across
the continent. With Hollande, things will be different.
Or so one reads; the
reality is very different and celebrations are too preliminary. Just because
something is cliché does not make it false; a week is a long time in politics.
In 2010 the Liberal Democrats were scoring over 30% in the polls two weeks
before the election, yet won just half of that.
There is still two
weeks until the next round, and the fortunes of Hollande depend upon factors
out of his control like media perception. It also depends on whether he
campaign strategy; if he attacks Sarkozy or if he focuses on policy and then
how that message is received. Even then, one should never really be surprised
at French politics; despite the centre right’s association with the openly corrupt
Jacques Chirac and Villepin they still won the presidency. I expect Hollande to
win, but would not be surprised if he didn’t. But even if he did win, how much
would change and would it really spark a revival in Europe?
To put things into
perspective, out of 27 EU countries only four have a social democratic
government. Would a PS victory really mean much? In terms of French domestic
politics that depends on the much overlooked parliamentary elections in June.
Politics has a bad habit of focussing on one individual; when someone thinks of
French politics they think of Sarkozy, German politics is all about Merkel,
Obama has total control over the USA political scene – the reality, as we know,
is very different. The centre right currently have 320 seats (plus 23 from the
New Right) and the left has 204 seats (plus 24 from the extreme left). It is a
big ask.
Even in a wider
context, what would Hollande as president and a PS majority in parliament mean?
Hollande talks the talk, and wants to renegotiate the Eurozone deal. But how
much of that deal was actually decided by democratic government and how much forced
by the markets and IMF? How much control do politicians have over economic
affairs? If the past four years are any indication then not much. Europe is at
the mercy of the financial markets – and the only way out is a unified European
response; no country can go it alone.
This requires all
socialist and social democratic parties to work together and have a common
vision with shared values; the fundamental questions need answers. Of course
socialism looks different in France than in Britain or Slovakia, just as
socialism looks different in urban and rural areas – there is not one absolute
answer. But there are shared European values and aims.
Social democratic
parties are still in a hangover from Third Way politics and are still unsure in
their beliefs and aims, but it is no surprise that in Western Europe France is
the first to recover as they were the first to embrace Third Way politics under
Mitterrand. Social democratic parties, including the PS, still face fundamental
questions; what does it mean to be socialist or social democratic, what are our
aims, what kind of society do we want and how do we get there? Hollande cannot
answer such questions on his own.
Something else
that should be pointed out is that the social democratic revival, if there has
been one, started before Hollande; Robert Fico had an amazing victory in
Slovakia, a leftist party topped the poll in Slovenia, Martin Schulz was
elected president of the European parliament in 2012 and let’s not forget about
Denmark in September 2011. Yet the fortunes of social democracy in Europe have
not changed even with the Danish social democrats holding the rotating EU
presidency. So why is Hollande “our man”? Because he has the biggest mandate.
There is a false
perception that France and Germany run the show in Europe, for that reason many
tout Germany 2013 as the key to Europe’s soul, and again many on the left have
already assumed a social democratic win. Once again, this is misguided; German
politics is all about compromise and coalition and the Social Democrats (SDP)
are not surging in the polls but are caught in an existential crisis. Merkel
looks likely to win in 2013, with the balance of power being the Greens or, as
one poll put it, the Pirate Party. But again, it should be pointed that
economic policy is not made by politicians but by the markets.
Even before
Germany, there is a likely election in the Netherlands, Czech Republic and
Slovenia, and elections in Romania, Italy and Greece. The Netherlands is more
important than France; it is not entrenched in two party politics and the prime
minister is not as unpopular as Sarkozy but it is a genuine election between
Christian Democracy (Verhagen), de-regulation fiscal neo-liberalism (Rutte),
anti-immigration populism (Wilders) and a revived social democracy. Further, no
party in the Netherlands is mired in corruption like in Slovakia and Croatia,
the ruling party has not been in government for too long like Denmark, the PM
is not vilified like France and their politics is not totally mad like Italy. It
is a genuine election of values rather than an election of personalities like
France. The result in France would not show a revival in social democratic
values, but the Netherlands would.
Where next for
social democracy? Not Germany, not even the Netherlands, but to the streets.
The best way to get social democratic values out there is to practise them. We
cannot wait and hope for a messiah like many in the USA did with Obama; he
couldn’t make changes he wanted to due to outside frustration beyond his
control. Social democracy is not about one man, whether that is a continental figure
like Hollande or even a national figure like Miliband; it is about the hundreds
of CLPs, the thousands of branches and the tens of thousands of volunteers who
dream of a fair society. Any kind of socialist revival needs to come from the
people; we need a unified continental vision, visions for each state, a plan
and a group of people, both politicians and regular people, to carry them out. Unless
socialism looks at itself hard and practises what it preaches, then this
election will mean nothing.
Picture; Handelszeitung, 18/4/2012, Peter Schrank
