Votez Non a La Macronette

In my opinion, the left should vote right; simply because it is necessary to smash the iron grip of trans-national neoliberalism that has been entrenched since 1994.

A vote for Le Pen is a vote for change and uncertainty. A vote for Macron is a vote for more of the same race to the bottom and cultural dissolution.

Needless to say, the global liberal establishment exhorts the electorate to vote Macron. The neoliberal managers of Germany, Spain and Portugal signed a joint declaration in Le Monde telling the French that the choice was between a man who will "defend our common values" and an "extreme right" candidate who is "attacking our liberty and democracy.”

Ah yes! The same ol' same ol' neoliberal dog whistle.

Let's be very clear: from the very start in the late 18th century, the world-roaming capitalist class has always tissued its free trade agenda in the happy talk of "liberal values," "the rule of law," "democracy" or some gushing humanitarian cause. But none of that is what they are about. They are about making money. They themselves actually tell you this. What are the “Four Freedoms” (or in French Les Quatre Conditionelles)? The free movement of goods, services, capital and labour. That's it. Nothing more than the basic ingredients of capitalism: production, consumption, money and labor to generate profit. Not a word about human values in the flesh.

In 1994 the OECD urged European countries to "dismantle" minimum wages, labor rights, social benefits and pensions in order to promote trade and economic efficiency. They have been doing exactly that ever since. Macron is simply the latest iteration. A vote for him is a vote to perpetuate the neo liberal long game.

When Macron and his apologists speak of improvement in the "economy" the question that should always be asked is whose economy. As Ferdinand Braudel pointed out in The Wheels of Commerce, at all times there have been three economies: top - middle - subterranean. The Covid pandemic made very clear that there is an economy for the upper 10% and the very rich; and another one for everyone else.

The economic crisis in 2008 and in Greece, the crises in Africa, the wars in the Middle East, in Afghanistan, in Libya, and now in the Ukraine were not caused by Le Pen but by the Washington-Brussels Axis of which Macron is the French representative.

Real democracy, real fraternité and egalité would promote economic enfranchisement and security not the austerity and wealth disparity we see growing day by day.

Le Pen's basic point is simple: a government exists to protect and benefit its own people, not some concept or invisible "three-passports class." That is hardly a novel or radical concept. It was once taken for granted.

Le Pen is against the present EU for the same reason Bernie Sanders was against the TPP. Like he, she is for extending and not cutting social protections and benefits. And like him she favours a multi-polar world as opposed to the imperium of one.

The “left” says it can't abide Le Pen's supposed anti-immigrant racism. In getting worked up over this the “left” simply falls for neo-liberal fear mongering. They are being duped.

Le Pen's basic point is one that has never been contested until of late: there have to be limits on immigration and immigrants who are allowed in should assimilate into the basic norms of their new country.

Le Pen does not say that Muslim immigrants should convert to Christianity. She does not say they cannot privately abide Halal. She says simply that immigrants should speak French and abide the concept of laicité. What is that concept? Nothing more than that in the eyes of the state, and in public intercourse, there are only citizens. It is this very concept that Napoleon used to emancipate the Jews.

However, these citizens are not mere ciphers. They are flesh and blood people each of whom embodies a shared historical experience and abides certain broadly accepted customs and usages. In other words, a “nation” is not a geometric construct but an organic entity that reflects a certain finesse.

Precisely because it is a matter of finesse, this chez nous, cannot be exposited with geometric precision. Those who attempt to do so only destroy the the underlying proposition. But it had never been difficult to grasp before.

After the Russian Revolution a whole class of emigrés came to France. They did not give up their Orthodox faith. They did not stop speaking Russian amongst themselves. They did not forget their slavic heritage. But they also adapted into and assumed the for them new heritage of France. They spoke French. They learned French manners and got into the game. In doing so, they enriched France and made Paris the vital place it was in the 1920's and 1930's. It is, ultimately, a question of temperance.

But who is the intemperate one here? Le Pen or the islamic fanatics that take over streets and kill people who say things they consider blasphemy? How would Voltaire fare at their hands I wonder?

None of this means anything to the global neo-liberal elites for whom man is simply homo-economicus. Their palaver about “multi-culturalism” is a canard that puts different, superficial costumes on what is essentially nothing more than a unit of production and consumption, as interchangeable with other units in whatever country.

The “left” ought to extremely wary of adopting a socio-cultural concept that was concocted in the cauldron of Robinsonnades and savage capitalism. It would be downright foolhardy to let the honeyed poison of a so-called “Open Society” lead it to vote against its own very tangible economic interests.

I do not know if Le Pen will be able to achieve her promises or if she will, instead, usher in a period of politial “fluidity.” I was put off by her talk of “law and order” and her somewhat vascillating stance on the Yellow Vests (whom I supported). I don't think she will be strong enough on the climate (although neither is Macron). But whatever reasons I might have for voting against her, I have greater reasons for voting against La Macronette. Stopping him and throwing a spanner into the geo-economic agenda he represents, would be for me an imperative.