By Clare Premo, Paris
The French adore Barack Obama, and they aren’t shy about it. A recent poll in the daily newspaper Le Monde showed 68 percent of the population would vote for Obama, whereas only 5 percent would vote for John McCain. In this week’s Le Nouvel Observateur, the magazine’s managing director, Claude Weill, suggests this enthusiasm stems from what the Democratic candidate represents to the French—a break from the American heritage of slavery, racism and discrimination.
Maybe it’s only natural for the country that penned "The Declaration of the Rights of Man" to condescend about Americans finally overcoming their original sins. The French, with their national motto of “liberty, equality, fraternity,” would like to believe that such a figure as Obama could have the same sort of meteoric rise and evoke the same kind of noble passions right here in France as the candidate they are watching from afar.
What are the chances, however, that the son of an African immigrant could graduate in the top tiers of the best French university and be elected president of the republic at age 47? Not great. In a speech in Philadelphia, Obama pointedly remarked that “in no other country on earth is my story even possible.” As Weill points out, the way Obama addresses the question of race is more straightforward and more honest than what you’ll hear among the French. When his ex-pastor’s statements caused an uproar, Obama spoke out. He stressed the importance of refusing to “simply wish [racism] away, to condemn it without understanding its roots.”
France is not nearly as straightforward about race. Even though the country has a huge problem, people pretend it doesn't exist until a scandal forces them to pay attention to the elephant in the room. A recent soccer match was a case in point. During the game between France and Tunisia, kids with French nationality who came from Tunisian backgrounds insulted and disrespected the French national anthem. That got the nation’s attention, but the result was just a new collection of platitudes and condemnations.
It’s convenient for the French to pretend that America’s reprehensible racial past is purely a product of the institution of slavery, and that their own country is somehow immune to the guilt and resentments that stemmed from it. But to believe that, as Weill points out, you have ignore France’s own history of colonialism (and slavery). You also have to overlook the racial crises in working-class suburbs of the big cities, the sporadic riots and the failure of local political systems. “It’s not by denying inherited divisions that we can overcome them," says Weill, "it’s by tackling them head on. It’s not by preaching about grand principles that we can achieve equal rights for all citizens; it’s by acting.” Although the United States has sometimes failed to ensure the rights of minorities, these disappointments are overshadowed by spectacular successes. Without the stunning progress of the past 50 years, Obama could not be in the position that he enjoys today. Whether he wins or loses, Obama’s campaign has shown how far America has come … and how far France still has to go.
