France's president elect, Francois Hollande, could not be more different from his erstwhile opponent, Nicholas Sarkozy. A convivial, somewhat rumpled, self-proclaimed "normal" man, Hollande cuts a rather average figure. He identifies publicly with ordinary French people, and appears to chat comfortably with supporters along the campaign trail.
In contrast, Sarkozy is blunt and impatient. He has been known to vacation in Wolfeboro, NH with millionaire friends, while people back home criticise his displays of wealth as vulgar and American. At the same time, Sarkozy has prided himself on ridding the presidency of its stubborn vestiges of royalty. With American-style demands for transparency and accountability, he has acquired a reputation as an iconoclast, whom some consider crass. In trampling tradition, he has caused collateral damage to French sensibilities.
Hollande is a more familiar type of career politician: a paunchy devotee of wine, cheese and chocolate who has been referred to as "Flanby," after a soft French pudding. He favors medium gray suits and was long considered to be a second rank contender. Martine Aubry, the head of the French Socialist Party once called him a couille molle, a down and dirty epithet meaning "spineless."
Hollande's credentials are anything but second rank. He's a graduate of "l'ENA" (l'Ecole Nationale d'Administration), the highly selective graduate program that grooms the elite for top level government posts. Regardless of party affiliation, powerful ENA graduates traditionally remain close throughout their careers.
Hollande's former domestic partner and the mother of his four children, Segolene Royal, graduated from the ENA the same year he did. Royal defeated her ex-partner to run as the Socialist candidate for president against Nicholas Sarkozy in 2007, then lost the general election. She remains a prominent figure in the Socialist Party.
Francois Hollande was born in Rouen, in Normandy in 1954. His father was a doctor and his mother a social worker, and he says it's from them that he learned to take others into account. He attended the Institut d'etudes politques de Paris, a prestigious institution of higher education that specializes in the social sciences, politics, history, law, and business. Sciences Po, as it's popularly called, is frequently a stepping stone to the ENA.
Throughout his student years, Holland was an ardent, if good-natured, leftist who worked for various unionist movements, even agitating for democratic reform of the starchy ENA while studying there. His field of choice was economics, and as a student volunteer he wrote white papers for Francois Mitterand's campaign to become the first Socialist president of France in 1974. Mitterand lost the second round of the election to Valery Giscard d'Estaing, and would wait until 1981 to become president.
Five years later, at age 25, Hollande, joined the Socialist Party. But his political career has been marked by stinging defeats, starting with a loss to the neo-Gaullist Jacques Chirac in his 1981 bid for a seat in the National Assembly. He became a Special Advisor to then newly elected Mitterand. In 1983, he served as a Municipal Councilor for Ussel, a city in south central France, in the administrative district of Correze. He did win a seat in the National Assembly in 1988, but lost it again in 1993 in a wave of right wing reaction to Socialist Party policies.
The late 1990's were marked by inner turmoil for the French Socialist Party. Hollande opted for a conciliatory role in the power struggle. He called for a reuniting of the party, first behind Jacques Delors, the President of the European Commission, who in the end declined to run for the national presidency. Later he championed Lionel Jospin, who became Prime Minister of France in 1997. That same year, voters in Correze returned Hollande to his seat in the National Assembly.
With Jospin serving as Prime Minister, the French Socialist Party elected Francois Hollande as its First Secretary, a position he filled for eleven years. In 2001, he was also elected Mayor of Tulle in Correze, the position for which he is known to many voters today. But during the early millennium, Hollande's authority over his party eroded, and in 2007 he was replaced as First Secretary by his domestic partner Segolene Royal. He was widely blamed for the poor performance of his party in the 2007 presidential elections, which Royal lost to Nicholas Sarkozy.
It is widely believed that Hollande only emerged as a viable presidential candidate in 2012 because the lead contender, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, met disgrace as a result of a sexual harassment scandal in the United States. And his victory is regarded as a vote against Sarkozy, not a personal triumph. There's little doubt that he has ridden a wave of backlash against austerity.
It's difficult not to project his difficulty holding on to power while the Socialist Party leader on to his upcoming presidency. Does he have what it takes to govern, or will his persistent adherence to what he sees as the right causes do him in? His platform is popular, but to some it looks like old-fashioned "tax and spend": raise the minimum wage; hire sixty thousand more teachers; lower the age of retirement; and, of course, raise taxes.
Road to ruin or recipe for recovery? By themselves these measures would certainly increase debt. But Hollande himself points to his history of defeat as the whetstone on which he has honed important presidential skills. There's reason to believe he's learned from the past, and may adopt his German counterpart's strategy of small, incremental steps.
Many of the 60,000 new teachers will come from other civil service positions, so they are already on the payroll. The age of retirement would only go from age 62 to 60, and the minimum wage increase would be minimal. At any rate, Hollande has little choice but to compromise with German Chancellor Angela Merkel by ratifying her fiscal discipline pact at the same time that he enacts measures to stimulate growth.
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Comments: 22
On the other hand, Merkel's party the CDU lost today some 8% of the votes in the most importat state (land) and that the SDU plus the greens are already the Majority (51%) and that Europe Central Bank backs Hollande recovery project.
Taxes, retirement, etc. are to be ratified by the new congress to be elected since June 11.
And yes again, legislative elections in France and Germany will be decisive for countries' Euro policies
In France, touristic areas and large cities RE values are still growing fast as does Switzerland RE.
In Switzerland the unit (sq. m) went from ab. 8,300 CHF up to 9,100 in just 1 year and the trend, as in France, didn't stop since more than 10 years.
Pretty lucrative to be a socialist these days....is that reflective of the "normal" French citizen? I don't care personally, but for all of his rhetoric about how he hates wealthy people, I guess he only means people other than himself. I guess time will tell whether anti-austerity will result in stimulating the economy...
The flat in Paris cost is even worse in sq. m cost ( min. 17,500) and it may be rented. Some capitalists are doing far more better and need elevators for their cars.
He is a BRILLIANT economist and did quite well before devoting all his time to politics.
On top of it ALL his "fortune" at today's prices has been acquired long time ago and will be taxed, if the Congress agrees, at 1.8% per year. He has nothing outside France while I know many people, middle-class people who have lots in other countries.
You show envy. Nothing else.
Tax middle-class not Romney!
Renee, Francois Hollande is what we In the UK call a Champagne socialist, a person who does not mind being wealthy but hates the idea of other people being wealthy and would bring down the country by taxing until they squeak the ones that make money for their country. They are naive to say the least they are also hypocrites. Francois Hollande is a person who did not mind taking advantage of the tax breaks that his predecessors would have put into place that is probably how he managed to fund the homes that he has. He came from an average middle class family however; he certainly is not middle class now, not with over £ million portfolio in property.
Lowering the retirement age in France will be popular as it would be in any country however; one only has to look at Greece and what their low age retirement has done for that country to see the folly in that move. The money to pay the state pensions will have to be found and the drop in tax revenue from the people retiring early will be felt.
Raising the minimum wage will put prices up in shops, and we will see a price rise in anything that is made in France. Someone will have to pay for people getting a raise in their minimum wage and it will not be employers but the consumers of France that will have to stand that raise.
Tax, it will not only be the rich that will see a hike in Tax, the ordinary person who works in France will see a hike in tax. Someone will have to pay for those 60 thousand teachers and the extra jobs that will have to come with employing them.
One thing that everyone is forgetting is that the German Chancellor Angela Merkel will most probably be the next European leader to fall. Changes are a coming to Europe in the next few months. For the good or bad who knows?
Gilbert, no offence meant, I hope he is able to be a wonderful uniting figure and bring France forward on a path to prosperity. What I cannot stop thinking about, however, is that there is a level of hypocrisy in demonizing the rich while being rich (Do most citizens in France own five properties, rental or not?) and demonizing anyone in general really bothers me.
Like Graham says, the money for all of these promises will have to be found somewhere? Where? Taxing the rich (the ones that stay, as many are leaving and who can blame them) will not cover it all.
Gilbert, you say that he is a He is a "BRILLIANT economist and did quite well before devoting all his time to politics", so hopefully he knows what he is doing, but I suspect he is just saying what people want to hear.
From "The Guardian":
QUOTE
François Hollande, the socialist "Mr Normal" who will be sworn in as French president next week, says he is worth almost €1.2m (£960,000), considerably less than his predecessor Nicolas Sarkozy.
Hollande, who campaigned on a promise to ditch the showbiz style that earned Sarkozy the nickname "President Bling Bling", says in a declaration published on Friday that his principal asset is a house on the French Riviera.
The declaration shows that Hollande, who rents his apartment in Paris but could now move into the presidential Elysée Palace, has declared assets of €1.17m, primarily the house in Mougins.
Other assets declared are bank accounts worth €8,200, a life insurance contract worth €3,550 and €15,000 of furniture, said the declaration.
The man who used to travel to work by scooter, and described himself as Mr Normal during campaigning, does not own a car, the declaration says.
Sarkozy, who hands the reins over to Hollande on 15 May and may go back to work as a lawyer, said in an official declaration in March he was worth about €2.7m, up from €2.1m when he took power in 2007.
Most of that is in life insurance products, but Sarkozy also declared a collection of autographs, watches and statuettes worth €100,000 and a joint bank account of €57,000 with his wife, the singer and former model Carla Bruni-Sarkozy.
Hollande's wealth falls just below the threshold that would make him liable to pay wealth tax in France.
His Riviera residence was bought in 1986 for just over half its current declared value and is the place where he spent summer breaks with former partner Ségolène Royal, with whom he had four children in a quarter of a century together.
He now lives with Valérie Trierweiler, a journalist.
Hollande, whose father Georges, a doctor, dabbled in property investment, said in his declaration he had part ownership of two apartments in Cannes that are worth €370,000 in all.
Among the first measures he says he will implement after he takes over is a 30% cut in the presidential salary of more than €19,000 a month.
UNQUOTE
He don't mind, for the time being, if rich people are exporting the wealth they can. Any way properties, if the next Congress accepts, will be taxed far more than presently. It has been lowered by Sarkozy from 0.8% to o.5% and could be set in 1.8% after the elections of June.
A way to achieve, by Sarkozy, a GWB politics? At the least Cecilia, the ex of Nicholas, was against this.
Interesting to note that Sarkozy was a "friend" of the banker "assassinated" in Geneva by his sex partner. Sarkozy and him pertain to the same group.
Skepticism is good when data are right.