What could have in common a text about the "method of judging our good judgment and seeking the truth in science," published in 1637, and the social movement that has risen France for a few good months in this 21st century?
The smallest common denominator would be France, René Descartes' home, as well as this "strange revolution." Of course, it cannot be just that! The history that drifts under our eyes has surprised everyone. First and foremost, of course, the political world. Neither of us nor the "Corfiots of social science" have predicted, in their scholarly calculations, the coming of the comet. Explanations are missing! However, the political class is surprisingly surprised by all: wars, revolutions, riots, economic crises, ecological crises, plagues or any other major social impact events. Instead of rhythm, history is shaken by syncope. The two electoral victories of the young and unknown Emanuel Macron, presidential-legislative, every year in the Bonapartist style Austerliz-Iena, should have announced the dawn of a resurrection not only of politics but of the "Destiny of France" of its role in supporting and relaunching the European Project, and beyond it, in the great balance of power of the world.
When everyone believed that "History was moving", suddenly, the painting decomposed, melted like a famous Dali cloth ("The Persistence of Memory"), and France is covered by the lurch of a disputed movement, whose power casts doubt not only on the mandate of Macron but on the constitutional foundations of the Fifth Republic, the direction of the movement of society and its political and moral fundamentals.
Signs of the question raised by the movement of yellow reflective vests go far beyond the history and destiny of France. A fundamental equation of governance is under the magnificence of Cartesian research: that between the state and the citizen. It is, of course, a modern state built on the monopoly of violence and supported by the authority of taxation. Few people today know how close the connection between these two premises was, at origins. The high state tax was justified and intended, primarily and most of all, to support the army and the state war effort! The development of modern statehood not only did not impose limits on the consequences of these two premises but on the contrary freed them almost entirely from any constraints. The state can raise/impose today, no matter how many taxes it would pass on to one's mind; the armies can have any dimension and benefit from any level of endowment, at a limit containing, not metaphorically, the entire population of the state and mobilizing all available financial resources now and/or in the future. As Hegel said: In the dialectics of History, the tool has taken the place of the master! The citizen is no longer the organizer and controller of the actions of the state, the beneficiary of the fundamental services necessary for the social and individual development, but his subject, crushed by obligations and deprived of more of the attributes of his natural freedom.
2024 ©