Nicolas Sarkozy: The Hyperpresident
Source: The Brookings Institution
Sarkozy’s honeymoon, of course, will not last forever. The vested interests who oppose change will resist and try to sabotage his reforms, the government will inevitably make mistakes, and, eventually, the opposition will find its feet (and new leaders). Most important, if recent signs that the French economy is slowing bear out, the government’s popularity—and its abilityto implement its promised reforms—will take a severe hit, as unemployment and budget deficits mount. Even so, it is hard to avoid the conclusion that something significant has happened in France. The French have elected a leader who has promised to break with thirty years of welfare-state stasis at home and conventional risk-averse diplomacy abroad, and whose energy, dynamism and ambition have not been seen since the foundation of the Fifth Republic in 1 958. Sarkozy’s success in reforming France over the next five years is far from guaranteed. More certain is that this determined hyperprésident is going to try, and that France will never be the same again.
