MUCH TO BE PESSIMISTIC ABOUT:

French protests draw droves nationwide (Thomas Fuller, 10/05/05, International Herald Tribune)

Demonstrators in Paris appeared glum more than angry, a mood captured by a televised debate Tuesday on the theme of whether France was going through a bout of depression. Guests on the program analyzed recent events in France, as if the country were lying on a psychiatrists' couch, an analogy that may be apt since annual per capita sales of antidepressants in France have doubled from half a box in 1990 to 1.09 boxes in 2003, according to government data.

The demonstrations came at a time of deep questioning in France about the persistent levels of high unemployment, and about the future of the country's relatively generous social programs.

France marks the 60th anniversary of its universal health care system this week, but pessimistic commentators, pointing out the perennial deficits of the health and unemployment benefits system, warned of the end of the "état providence," where the state served as a sort of divine caregiver.

Of French people polled over the weekend by the BVA agency, 72 percent said the strikes and demonstrations were justified. This high level of support is not in itself very surprising in a country where protest marches are seen by many as a normal means of expression.

But disapproval of government policies is broad-based. "The most worrying thing for Dominique de Villepin and his future political projects is that the pessimism is all-encompassing," Gaël Sliman, deputy director of the BVA, said in a report released Tuesday.

Sliman said 62 percent of people surveyed rated the government's economic policies as bad, including 70 percent senior managers, 68 percent of blue-collar workers, 66 percent of employees overall and 79 percent of private contractors.

Which should put paid to the notion that the French rejected the EU constitution for any reason other than that it was too liberal, in the Anglo-American sense, in economic terms.

Posted by Orrin Judd at October 5, 2005 12:00 AM