The vote is a particular moment in civic life: in the republican ideal, it is the moment when the individual, free and rational, expresses their opinion on the general interest. And the aggregation of these rational choices is supposed to produce a rational result itself, namely a head of state who faithfully represents the political preferences and interests of the citizens.
The Greeks, who are considered the inventors of democracy (of course, not the kind we know today), called it kathรฉkon (duty, a kind of ‘abstract’ obligation).
The Romans, whose culture was more practical and who preferred law to philosophy, called it ‘officium’, giving it, however, the meaning of a social duty, what is “right to do.”
Today, the election of the President of the French Republic will be the culmination of the symbolism of representative democracy.
In a few hours, we will know the name of the person who will embody for the next five years this “encounter between a man and his people.”
The electoral campaign has been tough, sometimes borderline acceptable. The two candidates have been actors armed with an unbearable and fabulous verbosity at the same time.
Each candidate presented their past, their present, and their promises for the future.
There has been, let’s say it clearly, a lot of discrepancy between what was expected and the menu we were served.
We thought that the citizens’ concerns were a vision for the future, the economic and moral crisis, the debt, unemployment, and purchasing power.
We mostly had speeches on migration policy and its many discursive variations (halal, swimming pool hours, canteen menus, and other tales to sleep by).
This top-level xenophobia gave the impression of being a prism allowing the reconfiguration of a fear-driven society. This retrograde nationalism focused on racial origin, stigmatizing the so-called profiteers of the French social model, appears as an object constructed through opposition like the fake windows painted on facades for symmetry.
Who will be the next President between the poll favorite, Franรงois Hollande, whom his detractors call ‘flamby’ for his apparently soft character, and the outgoing President, Nicolas Sarkozy, whom the German commentators nicknamed ‘guten tarte’ after his blunder during an interview on the public television ZDF when he addressed the spectators intending to say ‘guten tag’ (good day)?
Which of the two will have managed to capture the determining variable of Western democracies, that is, trust, participation, sharing, which alone merit the consensus of public opinion?
Yes, we know, during electoral campaigns, what is said before is not as important as what is done afterward.
So, which of the two candidates, once elected, will understand that, even crushed by the burden of sovereign debt, the shortsightedness of austerity without hope, European growth is still possible?
Who will have understood that the central problem of democracy is not so much the socially structured inequalities but the weight they have on individual destinies?
For example, France has a rate of 14.6% of young people that statistics (Eurostat) define as NEET (Not in education, employment, or training), that is, without schooling, work, or training programs.
Doesn’t each of them represent the perfect profile of a future unemployed person, socially unintegrated, a citizen adrift socially, a perfect target for ideological and religious extremism, a probable perpetrator of misdeeds?
How will a country be able to build its future and that of its youth, which is its richest capital, if it cannot provide an answer?
Goethe wrote: “From the moment one truly commits, providence also moves. Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has its genius, its power, its magic. Begin it now!”
In this anticipation, see you at 8 p.m.!
