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WSWS : News & Analysis : Europe : France
France: Support for war, attack on democratic rights
By Marianne Arens and Françoise Thull
23 November 2001
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French troops have been participating in the Afghanistan war since
November 16.
The first contingent of 58 soldiers was sent from the French base
at Istres. It has been tasked with securing the airport at Mazar-e-
Sharif in northern Afghanistan, preparing the way for further troop
deployments. As the troops were leaving, President Jacques
Chirac said on television that he and Prime Minister Lionel Jospin
had decided to “extend our contribution by sending additional
combat aircraft”.
Chirac announced there were already 2,000 French soldiers and
several Mirage IV fighters in the United Arab Emirates, which were
conducting “intelligence and secret service operations”.
On November 13 in parliament, Prime Minister Jospin used the
question of humanitarian aid to try and cover over France’s efforts
to position itself in strategically important Central Asia. Speaking
about the fall of Kabul, he said, “These events are positive,
because they permit a new strategic progress and also open a new
field of action in regard to humanitarian questions. The occupation
of Mazar-e-Sharif, the fall of Kabul, the liberation of a certain
number of northern provinces... open up a new field for
humanitarian aid, which France, the other European countries, the
international community and the UN want to use.”
France’s turn towards active and open participation in the
Afghanistan war is directly connected with an attack on democracy
at home. This was already made clear by the fact that the
government consciously dispensed with a parliamentary vote over
participation in the war.
On October 9, two days after the outbreak of the Afghanistan war,
and contrary to previous announcements and what had happened
during the Gulf and Balkans wars, Jospin categorically told the
National Assembly that he would keep parliament up to date, but
would not permit a vote. This was not a war like the Gulf or Balkans
wars, the prime minister argued, but concerned a global conflict
with international terrorism.
In response to question from the Green Party, Defence Secretary
Alain Richard acknowledged on 15 November that there would be a
hearing and a parliamentary debate, but these would not result in a
vote. “The position of the government has not changed on this
point”, he said.
French daily Le Monde commented, “Jospin is obviously afraid that
such a procedure”—i.e. holding a parliamentary vote—would
strengthen “the break up of the different components of the
government coalition, which would receive the support of the
Socialist Party [PS] and the rightwing, but not the Communist
Party [PCF] and the Greens. One can understand the political
concerns of the prime minister.”
The motives of the PCF and the Greens, who occasionally protest
weakly against the rightward turn of the government, do not arise
from any principled opposition to the war or allegiance to
democracy. For example, the Green Party’s European
parliamentary delegate Daniel Cohn-Bendit is an open advocate of
this war. Rather, they are motivated by petty electoral
considerations: next year sees presidential, parliamentary and
local elections in France.
Beefing up the state apparatus
Like many other governments, Paris is also using the September
11 attacks to carry out long-held plans and substantially beef up
the state apparatus under the banner of “internal security”.
On the night of September 12, the Vigipirate security plan was
activated again. Introduced in 1995 by Gaullist Prime Minister Alain
Juppé in response to the threat from Algerian Islamists, rubbish
bins on the streets of Paris were welded shut from fear of bombs.
Under the Vigipirate plan, thousands of policemen, paramilitary
CRS units and soldiers are now patrolling all the strategic places in
Paris and other large cities.
Vigipirate “means the presence of a very large number of
policemen, gendarmes and military in public places, particularly
those with sizeable public traffic”, explained the Defence Secretary
Alain Richard. It is “the logical and intelligent consequence” of
terrorism.
In view of the extensive tasks being undertaken by the army both at
home and abroad, the prime minister wants to introduce a new,
additional 100,000-strong volunteer reserve. He announced
November 17 that all young people, who wanted to “contribute to
the defence” of France, could participate in a 14-day basic training
programme next year. Compulsory military service was only
abolished last year.
After the attacks in New York and Washington, the senate and
parliament passed the “law for security in everyday life” (LSQ—loi
sur la sécurité quotidienne) by a large majority, which was adopted
on October 31.
This law grants wide-ranging powers to the state and sharply
intrudes on the individual’s private sphere. This includes the use of
dragnets, house searches even at the pre-investigation stage, the
continuous monitoring of telecommunications, harsher immigration
procedures and much more besides. It is particularly worth noting
that private security agencies have been given far greater powers to
engage in personal checks and luggage inspections in public
places, and now may also carry out body searches.
The measures to monitor e-mail and Internet traffic are extensive: in
the future, telecommunications companies must retain all the
codes, which serve to identify their customers, for up to one year
and hand these over to an examining magistrate if necessary.
Official bodies have the right to use technical means to decode
messages. Those providing encryption facilities are obliged to
supply their programmes to investigators on request.
The new law also seeks to barricade France against refugees. For
example, the French police will be allowed to carry out passport
checks throughout the entire Eurotunnel system, up to the British
side.
The background to this is the dramatic events taking place near the
entrance to the Eurotunnel, in the refugee camp at Sangatte near
Calais. The British government wants to fine Eurotunnel for every
“illegal immigrant” who makes it to the UK through the tunnel. The
tunnel operators have been pushing the French government to
introduce stricter measures on their side of Channel. According to
Eurotunnel, some 100 people a day are detained near the tunnel
entrance, there have been at least 30,000 incidents recorded this
year. At least four people have died attempting to jump onto moving
trains.
Long-held plans
Although the government has tried to justify the new law by
pointing to the situation after the September 11 attacks, in
essence it means extending state controls over the whole of
society, a project that the ruling elite in France has been pursuing
for four years.
At the end of 1995, the French ruling class had been confronted
with the shock of a general strike movement, which threatened to
derail the control. In October 1997, shortly after Jospin entered
office, his government adopted certain security points in its
programme, e.g. the introduction of the police de proximité
(neighbourhood police) and the contrats locaux de sécurité (local
security contracts between the central government and the
individual municipalities).
On the basis of these measures, the strongly centralised French
state apparatus has been extended through a network of local
control arrangements, for example, using the suburban traffic
system to introduce a network of private security guards and video
cameras. The city mayors are taking on a central role in the efforts
to monitor difficult working class neighbourhoods.
The local security contracts open the door to extremely reactionary
measures. On June 15, the new mayor of Orleans, Gaullist Serge
Grouard, introduced a limited curfew for minors in three problematic
city boroughs, banning all young people under 14 years old from
going out after 11 o’clock at night, punishing their parents by
withdrawing their child benefits or subsidised public housing. He
was only able to carry out this special measure, because his
Socialist Party predecessor had already introduced a “security
contract” in these districts.
>From the outset, the restoration of state controls, under the banner
of “public security,” was in the government programme of Lionel
Jospin and the Socialist Party. PS secretary François Hollande
acknowledged this at the last party congress: “Civic
consciousness can exist only if a respected constitutional state
exists”. This was supported by the Gauche socialiste, the left wing
of the party, who vehemently called for the extension of the
neighbourhood police and to guarantee the 24-hour presence of
specially-trained police officers, since otherwise the poorest layers
of society would fall victim to crime.
Since Jospin entered office, the police apparatus has grown by 15
percent, by 2002 the size of the French police force will grow to
145,000 from 125,000 in 1997. In August 2001 in an interview with
the TF1 television station, Jospin rebuffed the accusation that he
lacked the political will to guarantee security, with the words:
“Along with [Interior Minister] Chevènement, have I placed security
at the centre of my politics since 1997.”
Jean-Pierre Chevènement, of the Mouvement des Citoyens (MDC,
Citizens Movement), is a convinced representative of the
“centralised republican state.” However as Interior Minister,
together with his cabinet chief of staff, police chief Bergougnoux,
he has developed and introduced the system of additional,
decentralised local security contracts. He resigned from the
cabinet in summer 2000, in opposition to the granting of any partial
autonomy to Corsica, and is now conducting his own election
campaign as a presidential candidate. In this context, he never
misses an opportunity to publicly criticise Jospin for not having “the
courage to carry out what is necessary”.
The topic of security has meanwhile come to dominate the entire
election campaign. The reactionary and frenzied climate this is
producing was demonstrated only last week, as policeman took to
the streets each day to protest against the government and call for
more personnel, more money and more resources to fight crime.
When last Saturday the Green Party presidential candidate, Noel
Mamère, wanted to curry favour by participating on a policemen’s
demonstration in Paris, he was physically ejected under a hail of
insults.
Looming recession
While the new security laws grant almost absolute authority to the
state, they do not have the slightest thing to do with ensuring the
real security of the general population. They neither provide
individual workers with more security from unemployment and
poverty, nor protect them from deportation and arbitrary state
actions.
Not so long ago, praise was being banded about for France’s
economic growth and the creation of new jobs promised. In its
election campaign, the government is trying not to give rise to any
panic about a recession, but Economics Minister Laurent Fabius
has had to screw back the September estimate for economic
growth by a quarter point to 2.25 percent, even here there could be
no guarantees.
Since May, unemployment has continually risen and already
threatens to break through the symbolic 10 percent barrier. The
government introduced some purely cosmetic measures a few
days ago: It modified the methods used to record the jobless
statistics and now employs the statistical methods of the ILO
(International Labour Organization). Accordingly, unemployment in
September was about 8.9 percent, but it has done nothing to
change the fact that the year-on-year level of unemployment has
risen by 2.4 percent.
Since the beginning of the year, France has witnessed an almost
permanent series of labour disputes and desperate actions taken
by workers whose jobs, standard of living or work safety are
threatened. Following the strikes and demonstrations by staff at
Danone and private hospital personnel, Moulinex workers hit the
headlines a few days ago, when they threatened to set fire to their
factory in Cormelles-le-Royal.
The worsening economic situation makes clear that the new
security laws are not so much directed against international
terrorism, but rather give the state the necessary means to deal
with any domestic unrest.
Copyright 1998-2001
World Socialist Web Site
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