| Abstract |
"To anyone familiar with the French political scene, the 2017 election season felt atypical. Normally, during these moments of intense attention on politics, the main issues often revolve around broader issues. Security, taxation, immigration, or more recently the environment, are more likely to capture the public's attention than the careers of political representatives. But not in 2017. That year the attention was focused on the biography of the political personnel, and the term "les professionnel de la politique" [professional politicians] became a ubiquitous insult in public debate. But neither in France nor abroad was this attention to the political elite fully unprecedented. Rather, it marked the latest revival of an insult that is as old as the compensation of politicians for their work. The criticism of professional politicians had been widely revived over the previous decade. An apparently trivial example provides a good illustration of this. In blog post from September 2014, Michèle Delaunay, a former Socialist MP, lamented the arrival of a new generation into politics. According to her, those moving into national politics in the 2010s shared one trait: the vast majority of them had had no professional experience outside this milieu. Although she did not use the term "professional" or "career politicians", as such, her target was clear. "They graduate from Sciences Po [the school of the political elite], take an administrative exam, or not, they look around ... Then they get a position as a staffer or a local government job. The luckiest, or cleverest of them end up as a top aide to a cabinet member. In this ever so slightly limited world, they catch the bug." Describing the stages in a well-oiled career, Delaunay, a former oncologist, observed at the end of her career that her youngest colleagues had less and less experience outside politics. The image she used is telling. She wrote that "they go into the tunnel early and never come out." According to her, the consequences are immense. Once they set out on this path, these ambitious young people "lose touch with reality and the sense of the common good." As they get older, they behave as if they are "beyond even the most basic rules""-- Provided by publisher. |
