Has the well-oiled machinery seized up? Founded on the positive perception of resilient activism and showing, despite criticisms of its sometimes redundant display, a president who is always in command, even in stormy weather, presidential communication suddenly seems to be hitting its limits.
Nothing seems to help. Not even the successful visit of Nicolas Sarkozy to the Agriculture Show, which was a reconciling moment between “the France from above and the one that gets up early.” Neither the multiple work meetings and other inter-ministerial committees that follow one another urgently at the Élysée. Nor, finally, the multiplication of presidential interventions and public announcements followed by an impressive number of viewers. For the first time since his appointment to Matignon, the Prime Minister, along with the head of state, simultaneously records a noticeable drop in their popularity ratings. Has something gotten scrambled in the Élysée’s communication? Is there an “overdose” of state speech? Is this a passing phenomenon or a serious trend? Some believe they detect a “Guadeloupe effect.”
Until recently, the presidential image had rather well resisted in a most detestable social context: the generous bailout of banks, poorly understood by a public that felt the sharing of the burden with bankers was unbalanced, was beginning to take effect. Credits are gradually being granted to individuals and merchants due to the work of a mediator diligently relayed by the prefects. The “thousand projects” unlocked by the Government made visible, despite their sometimes gimmicky aspect, the state’s recognition of the dramatic rise in unemployment. The announcement of the “automotive pact,” a six billion euro support measure for a sector in crisis, was well received especially since Brussels hurried to criticize it. However, if it resulted in questioning the support for his LRU reform (Law on the Liberties and Responsibilities of Universities) among university presidents, the tardy management by the Minister of Research and Higher Education—despite being warned as early as November 2008—of the university protest movement has so far only caused collateral damage to the image of the head of state.
Alarming political leaders worried about possible contagion in mainland France, it’s the civil unrest in Guadeloupe that not only shuffled the presidential agenda but also disrupted the communication of its holder. While debates were ongoing here and there since the beginning of the crisis, involving tens or hundreds of billions of euros whose materiality the French had difficulty grasping, the measures considered for Guadeloupe—200 euros demanded by employees against 50 to 70 euros offered by employers—had a particularly resonant, “speaking,” and “accessible” impact on many “metropolitan” minds. It’s not certain that they will manage to calm the situation in the DOM TOM, but these announcements might instead stimulate the appetite for claims on the national territory: Olivier Besancenot was not mistaken in going to Pointe-à-Pitre to find his revolutionary inspiration.
This “Guadeloupe effect” could politically “cost” more than it seems to the head of state. It’s especially likely to disrupt the entire presidential message delivered since the beginning of the global financial turmoil: “pursue reforms despite everything,” the only “way to quickly get France out of the crisis.” Farmers, who usually have a keen sense of things, explained after Nicolas Sarkozy’s visit to the Porte de Versailles show that they found the president “changed.” Probably. It’s now up to his communication to adjust the dissemination of his image and the arrangement of his speech.
