A Sad Requiem for France
 

France is slowly fading away.

This dire situation is sad, but clearly predicable. Unless France counters two dangerous trends - low birthrates and meager economic growth - domestic discontent will continue to rise and global power will continue to decline.

France becomes less visible each day; overshadowed by Asia and the United States.

France’s population is not replacing it self and its also becoming more older. How well France fare with so many elderly people, heavily dependent on government benefits?

France’s way of life is threatened. Higher immigration is one possible solution to low birthrates , but many in France don't like the immigrants they have, mostly Muslims from North Africa, and don't want more. You could revive economic growth by reducing social benefits, taxes and regulations, but that is unlikely given the rabid response of the unions and students of late.

Cradle to grave social welfare requires a strong economy, but the high taxes, stiff regulations that provide for this security, weaken the economy. An aging population will only make the situation worse.

France is immobilized by its dire situation. Simply put - too many people benefit from the status quo to change it; but the status quo isn't sustainable. Frenchmen live in a state of delusion and believe change is menacing. The sun is setting slowly on France, and perhaps much of Old Europe. Unwilling to address their due situation, all they can do is be reflexively critical and rant about America.

This might fool some Frenchmen into thinking they are an active player on the world stage, but they are only sadly acquiescing in their own ultimate demise.

Sad for France. Sad for the USA. Sad for the World.

Let us hope Eastern Europe will learn from all this and pick up the mantle of leadership and economic vitality in the future.

Well, France is obviously doomed.
One great advantage they possess is an excellent education system.
This means that even the "more younger" of them are able to write in their own language without making elementary spelling and grammatical errors.
That in "it self" is a great advantage.

France has been slowly fading away since 1815. At least part of their inability to adapt to the modern world is the result of the Napoleonic Code, the Byzantine legacy left by that wretched Italian who ruined the country with his megomaniacal military adventures.

From the excesses of monarchy to the revolution and terror, Napoleon, the Commune - they just don't seem to focus.

oldie, thank you for letting us know that young French people never make common grammatical errors. That comes as a complete surprise to me -- and also to my mature French friends who rant about the lack of basic language skills among their youth even more than their US counterparts.

Surely there is a more appropriate forum for your political views on France than the Fodors > travel < message board. Hmmm......

I thought it was Germany who had these problems....???

Not to mention the inaccurate history:

A year before Napoleon Bonaparte was born at Ajaccio in Corsica, the island had been sold by Genoa to France's Louis XV.

Hey, Cato, if you want to get really maudlin, you could probably expound on “A Sad Requiem for the United States.” Before our present oligarchy, we used to have something at least straining toward a democracy around here.

As for grammatical errors, no one is more deeply committed to them than our clueless “leader” in the White House.

Ok, ok, I guess it simply has to be done. It's a tough job, but somebody's . . .

I volunteer to become French. To, you know, swell the population by one. It's a sacrifice, but I'm prepared to make it.

Can someone point me to my French apartment please?

s

Oh Oh
I think there was a tear in the fabric of the time/space continunim. Either that or theres a full moon :)

ok im confused....when did France acquire the Bahamas?

"Not to mention the inaccurate history:

A year before Napoleon Bonaparte was born at Ajaccio in Corsica, the island had been sold by Genoa to France's Louis XV."

That hardly makes him French in anything but nationality. By birth and upbringing, he was Italian to the core.

I doubt that any Corsican nationalist would consider himself Italian:

"An important figure in Corsican history is Pasquale Paoli (1725-1807), the Corsican general and patriot who struggled for Corsican independence, first against Genoa, then against France."

Well, I've never gotten over the fact that when we viewed the amazing fireworks at Ajaccio on Bastille Day that they were nearly all red, white, and green. That must mean something?

Precisely. Case closed.

>I thought it was Germany
No, we just want to make sure everybody finds us as unattractive as possible. Makes life a lot easier;-) As every good salesperson should know: "If you don't complain about how bad business is going, something's wrong!"

The Dutch would have red, white and blue fireworks, and that would make them neither American nor French.

I do nor rejoice in France’s terrible woes. My heart aches for it’s sad decline.

I call on all Frenchmen to wake up before it’s too late. Be brave and bold as in past years.

Be smart enough to cast aside the crutch of big government and an outdated welfare state that promises the moon and then eventually collapses.

Seize the moment. Enact change before the lights dim further across a great land. Give your disgruntled youth a chance to work and be productive.

Egad, Cato.

What an awful future.

Remember the Danish Empire? British Empire? Dutch Empire? Belgian Empire? Russian Empire? Soviet Union?
German Empire? Austro-Hungarian Empire? Yugoslavia? Czechoslovakia? Spanish Empire? Portugese Empire?

Change doesn't necessarily lead to destruction.

((I))

Cato, I also fear for my beloved France!

A wake call is in order even if it is not popular to point it out. Sometimes it is hard to admit the real truth about people and things you love dearly.

I hope you are not right in your predictions, but I'm not encouraged by the negative trends of the past decade.

Let us pray that things change sooner rather than later.

Don't know what's the matter with you people. Civil war, state of emergency, what? Nothing, absolutely nothing out of the usual. It's called progress and change and happens every day... so what.

I don't see any change in France, just more of the same old fear of the future and clinging to a failed economic system. No wonder so many people are depressed in France. and all the french leaders can do is storm out of a UN meeting when a frenchman dared to speak in english that says it all about france's leaders. Face reality before it is too late!

I apologize for my grammar mistakes in the orginal post - that happens when you are not a native english speaker.

I DO NOT apologize for my deep concern about France and my call for positive action.

dangerous trend - low birthrate

Does this mean that every other country in Europe is in worse shape, since France has the highest birthrate in Europe (tied with Ireland)?

> failed economic system
Get real, it may be many things, but a failure, it's not.

"The Dutch would have red, white and blue fireworks, and that would make them neither American nor French."

Huh? I fail to get your comparison to my example if it was meant to be one.

all the french leaders can do is storm out of a UN meeting when a frenchman dared to speak in english

A French person would never dare to speak in English at a UN meeting -- nor would any other country speak in a different language from its own.

If you wish to criticize someone, you should at least know what sort of meeting it was -- the UN is not in Brussels.

You might as well add Italy to the list; it is suffering many of the same problems, e.g. very low birthrate, high unemployment, large numbers of immigrants in the past fifteen or twenty years, etc.

Couple the above with a generation of, oh, let's be kind and call it political ineptness, and it makes for a worrisome situation at best.

About the low birth rate - i just read in the French Embassy newsletter that France's birth rate was amongst the highest in Europe - not the dire one you quote - maybe the problem is that some of the birth spurt are due to immigrants from North Africa. I was surprised by the stat from the embassy as i too thought the birth rate was below replacement rate but it's not -one of few countries in Europe to not be so - i think Germany is amongst the lowest.

From the BBC website, March 29th :

"With all this, it is maybe not surprising that France is managing to buck the trend of European depopulation. With a fertility rate of 1.916, it is second only to Ireland in the birth stakes and, unlike many countries, its population is growing strongly.

According to recent government figures, France's population should reach 75 million (from 62 million today) by the middle of the century, in the process overtaking Germany - whose numbers the UN says will fall from 82 million to 70.8 million in 2050."

[And, no, it has nothing to do with the immigrant population, which has a very low birthrate (there are far more male immigrants than female immigrants!).]

And here I thought that Robespierre resigned his position as "public accuser" in 1792.

France is wonderful! It seems to be resisting CHANGE; its change is inevitable. France will rise again. Today it is an experiment in real democracy. France is part of Europe, each bit has similar problems. The problem is how to share national wealth.

FYI the name Cato has a biased liaison in the US, so I thought maybe that was where your name came from (it is th ename of a right-wing "think tank") and so it's hard to read anything politically that you think might be coming out of that institute.

France does have one of the highest birth rates in Europe now, but it is still below replacement a bit. One of the reasons is that the govt. gives bonuses to women who have children (800 euro). Now that was proposed by Chirac (I think) -- and was put into effect a few years ago. That is one way of trying to influence the idea of an aging population.

Most of these issues are true for every industrialized country -- they are problems everywhere because society has changed from the agrarian population where women raised families and didn't work, and kids were an asset. They are true for the US, also, although I think the US birth rate is a little higher, but a lot of that is due to immigrants here, also, who have higher birth rates (and least in early periods of immigration history for a particular group). The US has big problems in terms of sustaining social benefits that were based upon the younger population contributing to the pool to support old age benefits.

NOw some other economic issues are different, and I do agree with that. We have much fewer social benefits in the US than France and many other European countries, however our taxes in the US are pretty darn high, also (when you add up federal, state and local, and then throw in some minor sales taxes, etc.) so they are actually getting more for their money IMO, since we don't get much health or education out of our taxes. I think the US probably doesn't get as much bang for their tax buck than Europeans do (I pay at least 50% of my income in taxes, for example).

The US does not have a very strong moment for workers' rights, and Europe does, so that is a big difference. I think things need to loosen up a little in some regard in France and Germany and elsewhere, but some things are better there. My impression is that some of those countries have too many rigid social expectations and processes, so it is hard to change your life or job if you want. It is also too hard to be an entrepreneur, or change careers. Everything is laid out too much at a very young age as to what your path is, and it is hard to change. All of the Europeans I've known who left (France, Germancy, etc.) say that there are pros and cons to both countries (European ones vs. US), but one thing they like most about the US is that it is easier to change jobs, careers, etc., than in Europe. My German friend said it is very rigid in Germany regarding employment and jobs and that's one reason it is hard to get one, and that you can't just decide at age 45 in Germany to entirely change careers, go to college for another degree, etc., like you can in the US.

> it is hard to get one
As it is in most places of the world, it is very!!, very easy to get a good job in Germany, if you have learned something and are smart enough to sell your knowledge. The people who have problems are UNEDUCATED and elder. You need to be able to earn what you get. It is close to impossible to find skilled workers in most areas.

George W Bush aka Mr. Malaprop; star of the satirical comedy "The Rifles."

"We here in the US are at the pineapple of success when it comes to gas consumption."

Neopolitan,

Red, white and green = colors of fireworks in Corsica and the Italian flag

Red white and blue = colors of the Dutch, French and American flag

Yes, Michael. My point exactly. Red, white, and blue are French colors, but the fireworks in Corsica (supposedly France) were red, white, and green -- the Italian colors.

I still don't get why Dutch using their own national colors has anything to do with a comparison in this case. Get it?

And my point is that Corsican nationalist colors may be the same as the Italian flag's; that does not make them Italian. That is why I included the quote about Pasquale Paoli, who fought against the Genoese (Italy did not exist as a nation at that time) and the French.

Actually, my association with <i>Le Grand Comit&eacute; de Salut Public</i> was, er, severed in July 1794.

“Be smart enough to cast aside the crutch of big government and an outdated welfare state that promises the moon and then eventually collapses.”

&gt;&gt;&gt; Who needs an education system, a functioning health system and a silly pension system. Enough of such luxuries. Yes, the Scandinavians can manage such a feat, but the welfare system will collapse, so change we must.

”Seize the moment. Enact change before the lights dim further across a great land. Give your disgruntled youth a chance to work and be productive.”

&gt;&gt;&gt; So young adults, get ready to enter this new workers paradise, where the loss of a job is only a mangers discretion away. And for those who do lose their jobs, the thrill of falling down the social ladder without a welfare state to catch you awaits - far more fun than a silly riot, eh.

pineapple of sucess - I'm still laughing!