The impact of globalization of French politics

Résumé du document

According to Manuel Castells, the pre-globalization state used to shape society, and identities, but this is no longer true because the state has lost power over space and time. The equilibrium has been upset by the sudden growth of the flows of goods, capital, information, services and technologies. Globalization undermines the autonomy and power of decision of the nation-state. It is difficult to control the globalization of crime, the interdependence of the economies, and the explosion of the means of communication. All of these changes are occurring while other types of constraints also appear for the state. They have to accept multilateralism in defense, foreign policy and global public policies as well. Moreover, for Castells, the current model of the nation-state is not adapted to a world organized between global networks and singular identities. Over and above the level of the state are new sources of powers and counter-powers that are independent from it and make it powerless to act alone. The states' are dependent on a broader system of enacting authority and influence from multiple sources.

Extraits

[...] He thus evokes the possible evolutions the state could witness in this network society. How can the state change the practices of governance on its territory in order to be more integrated in those networking structures? In this essay I will try to show how globalization questions the current modes of governance in France. I will also show that in parallel globalization allowed new forms of organization to develop, that are experimented in their more extreme forms by the contestation movements. [...]

[...] These organizations proved to be very attractive to militants, became omnipresent in the public debate in the 1990s, and now in the public opinion their action often seem to be endowed with more legitimacy than government- sponsored programmes. In the 1990s the French became aware of the importance of globalization and its effects: the WTO was created, the governments, were they right-wing (Balladur, Juppé) or left-wing (Jospin) followed the directions given by the European Commission and contributed to the liberalization of the economic French system, to adapt it to the new international context. The social movements of fall 1995 were partly led against economic deregulation and its consequences at the social level. [...]

[...] Thirdly, he is in favour of the application of the principle of active subsidiarity, and fourthly, he recommends the generalization of networking organizations. Here we notice that these propositions of evolution can be linked to a more theroretical formulation of concrete aspirations already expressed and partly applied by the alter-globalist movements seen above. More particularly, we recognize here the same will to turn to consultation and civil debate as a source of proposition-making, and the will to have a more massive resort to participative democracy. [...]

[...] Subsidiarity - contrary to the pervading jacobinisme that has been shaping the political practices in France for more than two centuries has also the virtue of favouring diversity. In active subsidiarity, the authority is no longer delegated from the centre to the local level, but delegated from the local level to the superior level when the local level is not able to deal with the matter questioned. This principle is already working at the European scale since 1992 and the Treaty of Maastricht: the EU may only make laws where member states are not able to do it efficiently. [...]

[...] He regrets that the debate is often slowed down by questions of form. But when talking about reforming the state according to some elements taken from the contestation movements, this question of decision-making becomes more crucial. This issue is unfortunately not directly examined by Pierre Calame: in his description of the new challenges that the state has to face, he points out that the problem lies in the articulation of the scales of governance, but he does not say anything about where the power of decision-making should then reside. [...]