We French can do a pretty good line in talking ourselves down. Too often we indulge in defeatism and self-denigration. Our elites — those with the influence and the technical expertise to move the country forward, and the people upward — instead broadcast pessimism and resignation. Those who have the influence and the technical expertise to make the case for the reforms that are essential if the nation is to solve its social and economic crises — and set the short-term sacrifices against the long term benefits — have shied away from their responsibility.
To justify their own lack of courage and perpetuate their own privileged position in the status quo, they have been pretending the people are not ready for the reforms needed to reward risk-taking, innovation and to liberate the entrepreneurial spirit. These will drive higher growth, greater employment and improved competitiveness. The same elites have had a tendency to acknowledge the dangers of populism but take refuge in fatalism when asked how best to prevent the extreme right from coming to power. Add to that the inability of part of the left to cope with the realities of globalisation, and its archaic vision of the economy, and you have a recipe for stagnation, despair and a collective nervous breakdown.
But something shifted with this month’s terrorist attacks on French journalists, French police and French Jews. Those who perpetrated the murders wanted to create fear and hatred. What they got instead was millions demonstrating peacefully, singing “La Marseillaise” and expressing their pride in being French, whatever their origin, religion or political allegiance.