Ms. Daniel in her editorial "French Unity of Spirit Lacking In Americans" [Jan. 10] claims that the French, unlike the Americans, have a "unity of spirit" grounded on their tradition. Adducing the French tendency to go frequently on strike, as revealed in the current demonstration in France, the author, for reasons that I'm not clear on, applauds the French for preserving such a hostile value.
Although I sympathize with the disillusioned author, apparently troubled by the moral degradation of American culture, I cannot possibly agree with her assessment of French culture. To me, what Ms. Daniel identifies as the praiseworthy "ancient national spirit" of the French is merely their irrational mob mentality, which from time to time toppled their otherwise stable regimes. I'm certainly happy that I live instead in a nation capable of restraining itself from such devastating irrationality.
Why I call the French "unity of spirit" a mob mentality becomes clear by understanding, for example, the French people's motivation behind their latest strike against the government, which intends to curtail its profligate spending on social welfare. The new budget was a needed reform for a country whose unemployment rate is above 12 percent clearly due to too generous benefits for the unemployed, and whose public-sector deficit, 2 percent of Gross Domestic Product in 1990, has grown bloated with social programs to sixpercent, according to the latest Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development figures.
The French must obviously seek a balanced budget more desperately than the Americans, especially since they hope to join the European Monetary Union soon. After all, the U.S. deficit has shrunk to one of the lowest among advanced nations. However, the impending U.S. budget (whether you pick that of the Republicans or the Democrats) is much more draconian in absolute numbers than its counterpart; France must attain by 1997 only a 3 percent budget deficit, set by the Maastricht treaty. And to this mild reform, many irrational spoiled French workers, most of whom are civil servants, whose pay will rise by 3.1 percent this year, are joining to rebel violently; they are driven by nothing but a mob mentality.
Further analysis of this French attitude reveals its historically perilous nature, left as a legacy of the French Revolution. Despite the atrocious years Napoleon brought about not only to the French but to all Europeans, many French seem to remember only the revolution's utopian idealism, which in reality was transformed into a brutal dictatorship. They believe in the virtues of wanton destruction of tradition, contributing greatly to the nation's constant instability, leading to the collapse of its past four regimes. One should keep in mind that the Fifth Republic is not even 40 years old.
And the most dangerous aspect of the French mob mentality is that it has deteriorated more sophisticated forces of social cohesion, namely well-established legal institutions, that any diverse country must possess. The reason the Americans, for instance, despite their diversity, have never experienced the level of religious and class conflicts seen in European history is that they have rigorously defined and abided by their judicial system.
At a first glance of French politics, one should immediately learn how fractured, perhaps even more so than America, France is. Despite its electoral system -- a two-ballot process requiring parties to obtain at least 12.5 percent of the national support to advance to the second round -- designed to weaken extremists, France, until recent years, had four strong parties spanning between the Communists and the Gaullists. Culturally, as well, the French are fragmented, composed of numerous ethnic groups including Alsatians, Basques, Corsicans, Occitanians, etc. Such a country must have sophisticated institutions to bind its people, whose mob mentality has often plagued their reasoning. Considering the dictator-like legal power conferred to the French president, who can easily annul the rights of his/her people, I have to conclude that France is devoid of those legal institutions for social cohesion.
Ms. Daniel uses the Americans' unwillingness to protest against their government in a budget impasse as an example of their lack of unity. I see it as proof that the Americans are together to sacrifice themselves for the well-being of the future generation and to condone the stupidity that once in a while comes out of political games. Contrary to every other advanced countries, which are reducing their federal deficits only because of international political pressures, the U.S. has attempted to do so unilaterally; no nation can initiate such a daunting task without social consensus. I hope that the French will progress culturally to become like America and attain a true "unity of spirit."
