Joyeux Le Quatorze Juillet

Today is Bastille day and also my mother's birthday (although that is neither here nor there in the political impact in French history). Colonel Cooper, who is courting many French men and women, and I say Joyeux Le Quatorze Juillet.

Joyeux Le Quatorze Juillet.

The French proudly celebrate the 14th July to celebrate their revolution for two main reasons. Firstly they see the French Revolution, through the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (Déclaration des droits de l'homme et du citoyen), as the beginning of human rights. Although I must add, there is massive historical opposition over this which I happen to agree with. Secondly, and more importantly to me, it is the long process of the creation of democracy in France which took over 100 years, arguably almost 200. 

Prise de la Bastille.

The path to French Democracy is a case study example of how bloody the path to democracy is. Until 1968 there was no stable form of government in France and since 1789 there have been monarchs, elected dictators, socialist communes and Nazis. Hundreds of thousands died in wars, genocides and famines in the quest for liberty, equality and fraternity so eventually true democracy came to France. There were many steps backwards along the way as well. But actually 200ish years is pretty quick for establishing a democracy, ours took way longer. However, despite the fact that the French people should feel proud in their democracy now that they have it, the way it was established was awful.

La Liberté guidant le peuple.

Democracy comes at a very high cost and its acquisition almost seems to distant for anyone in the West to remember how they got theirs. Of course the subject of democracy is very topical at the moment with Egypt where they seem to be following French history very accurately. Since Morsi has gone there has been a loss of control. The streets are tumultuous where many have died. There is no control because no one will agree to any constitution for the country. What is slowly happening is the takeover of the military. A new Mubarak-lite is the next Pharaoh of Egypt after Mr Morsi, which represents steps backwards. C'est de la folie. Indeed if democracy ever occurred from the Egyptian Spring it lasted from the first election for the assembly to that of the constitution under Morsi and died after that.

La Mort de Marat.

The situation in Egypt like France is going to be one horrible mess which the people of Egypt have to live through in order to have democracy. We cannot give it to them. People don't like systems of government enforced upon them, we restored the monarchy in France and after multiple coups and revolutions it eventually fell. But they can take a good lesson from the French people so that some of the mistakes like electing dictators or staging military coups can be avoided, but perhaps it is too late for that. Maybe one day the Egyptian people will celebrate a national day with the same significance of the 14th July having achieved a state of democracy. We may not even live to see that day, although I jolly hope so because I'm looking forward to the follow up blog article of celebration when it comes.

Napoléon III Empereur des Français

In the mean time Vive La France, Vive La Démocratie and excuse my French. 

Over The Pond

Today the growth figures for Europe came out. What a mess, is the best description of what is going on.

The best news is that Germany received 0.1% growth in the last quarter, although they probably lost 0.2% from serve snow. Essentially it's not going well, the German economy has lost 1.4% growth in 1 year. The Germans should be a lot higher than this seeing as they're the biggest economy in Europe. The recession in  the rest of Europe is going to hit them hard, I wouldn't be surprised if they go into one as well.  

 The German economy narrowly missed recession today. That may not happen in the Future.

France entered its third recession today, which shows how well Hollande's policy of tax the people till 'they're bled white' (to quote Clemenceau) is going. The problem with the French economy is that it is very inefficient and has been so for a long time. Three hour lunch breaks and some of the strictest employment regulations in Europe says it all. There is very little work because of government intervention and no actual desire form the French people to knuckle down. They'll pay for this very hard, 10.6% unemployment is nowhere near the peak.

Hollande's vision of what makes a good economy is rather clouded. My advice is not to be so wet.

And what of the rest of Europe? Nine members of the Eurozone are in recession. Spain has 27% of its population unemployed. Recently Greece has been re-classified as an emerging economy in line with Botswana or Tibet. There is no hope within the Eurozone because countries are reluctant to overcome their inefficiencies which a single currency demands.

The ECB cannot really help much eithe,; earlier this year it lowered interest rates to 0.5%. That's fine if there is credit in a country but there is none in Europe at this moment because of the ongoing crisis. The wacky smash and grab policy of raiding people's savings will not help this problem. I'd watch out for a banking crisis in the next few years.

The European Economy is getting to a point where countries in Europe are doing worse than some in Third World Africa. 

How do we compare then. Well we have just better growth than Germany of 0.3%. We haven't had a recession since the days of Gordon Brown as the one last year was recently discovered to have never happened. The only way is up for the moment. Nor do we have the problems of a single currency or any of the financial controls placed upon us by being in the Euro. So I think we'll do fairly well compared to Europe in the next few years. This is in spite of having a trade policy that makes it so difficult to trade with anyone not on the continent. And Nick Clegg thinks Europe is the economic future, Greece can't even ship in medicine, most African states can. 

Comparatively the UK economy is doing well. Once we get over the hurdles of our debt we will be doing better than the rest of Europe.