It seems that things are going to the dogs across the Channel. It’s not just that the French birth rate, educational standards, and the homegrown car industry are all in decline; nor even that the homicide rate, Americanisms, and fast-food …
Down and out in the Paris Olympics
This April, 27-year-old Abdelkarim was forced to leave his home in the Paris suburb of Île-Saint-Denis — a decrepit squat inhabited by more than 300 migrants, asylum-seekers and refugees like himself. “There were about 200 police. They told everybody: ‘Let’s …
Does France have a Napoleon complex?
L’Année Napoléon in Emmanuel Macron’s commemoration-hungry France, was a bit of a damp squib. In 2021, two centuries after the death of l’Empereur on St Helena’s Island, there was enough noise from the anti-colonialist crowd on his reintroduction of slavery …
Will Marine Le Pen defend French Jews?
When more than 100,000 people marched in Paris against antisemitism on 12 November, one participant attracted particular notice: Marine Le Pen, leader of the far-Right Rasssemblement National (“National Rally”). As many recall, the party’s founder, and her father Jean-Marie, was …
The Gilets Jaunes achieved nothing
Five years ago today, Paris was liberated. Or, if you were a Parisian, the streets of the capital were blocked by tens of thousands of ploucs (yokels) in high-vis jackets. Right from the start, the Gilets Jaunes rebellion defied the …
Will Jews return to the Ghetto?
It is a warm Monday morning in Rome, and the city’s ancient ghetto resembles an armed camp. As carabinieri line the streets, a cloud of melancholy hangs in the air: not only had more than 1,400 Jews recently been slaughtered …
The millennials behind France’s far-Right youthquake
Marion Maréchal is 33 and Jordan Bardella, as of last month, is 28. These two young people — well-dressed, good-looking, in many ways archetypal millennials — are the leaders of the two main far-Right parties in France: Bardella of Rassemblement …
Terror is exposing France’s failed state
It is characteristic of France’s self-absorption that what started as a national sense of outrage at the latest Islamist killing on our soil soon evolved into a bitter scuffle between present and past tough-talking Home Secretaries. Last Friday, Dominique Bernard, …
Keir Starmer still doesn’t get Brexit
France has been swept up in a mood of cross-Channel rapprochement. As the country hosts the Rugby World Cup, its minister of sport has shown a special solicitude towards English visitors, hoping to atone for the mistreatment of English football …
Britain’s rulers should be more French
In the English-speaking world, we tend to place Charles de Gaulle and his confrontational style of politics, filled with strops and tantrums, into a category marked “The French”, where we can alternatively laugh at and be a bit scared by …
The emptiness of Macron’s grand strategy
In the latest battle for strategic autonomy, Emmanuel Macron has notched up a small victory. Last month, under French pressure, American Fiona Scott Morton resigned from her post as chief economist of the EU’s Directorate-General for Competition. Starting from this …
In France, money is dirtier than sex
Almost anywhere in the world, you would have confidently expected people to celebrate their country overtaking Japan, the UK and Germany, to clock more millionaires than everywhere else except the United States and China.
Not in France, though. Accusations flew, …
How France lost control of Gabon
Gabon fulfils all the stereotypes you might have about the west coast of Africa. Brutal, kleptocratic dictator whose family have been in power for over 50 years? Tick. Highly corrupt political system that facilitates large multinational companies to pillage, rob …
Why incels should read Michel Houellebecq
When I was younger and going through some particularly unhappy break-up or other, I’d relieve my tumultuous feelings by rewatching The World At War on telly. Sometimes it feels good to have confirmation that things really are as bad as …
Modern Europe was born on the battlefield
Why write about the Hundred Years War? This succession of destructive wars, separated by tense intervals of truce and by dishonest treaties of peace, was one of the seminal events in the history of England and France, as well as …