Redefining Europe?

In a historic moment, this weekend saw a new president elected in France. But this is not a simple handover from one leader to another. French politics has been shaken and the results are clear to see.

Francois Hollande received around 52% of the vote to wave Sarkozy from office. But Hollande rise to President-elect was anything but smooth: yet perhaps the most overwhelming hurdle was the inherent psychology of French citizens, apparently predisposed in favour of right-wing politicians.

Sarkozy’s Union for a Popular Movement (UPM) party was a centre right organisation, and ever since the 90s, the French presidency has exclusively belonged to the right. More so, there is only one blemish on the right’s record of power since 1958: Francois Mitterrand, who served the country as president from the 80s till the mid-90s, is the only left wing leader in more than half a century. On top of that, Sarkozy is the first French president not to have won a second term in over thirty years. Certainly, the statistics were stalked in the incumbent head-of-state’s favour.

Therefore, whilst the media may be drawing attention to numerous bits of luck on the part of the incoming president, and a multitude of misfortune on the part of the departing, there was first and foremost a seeming political allegiance, a political bond, between president and people that needed to be severed.

Perhaps the legacy of Mitterrand still holds coinage with voters in the European country. After all, Francois successfully deployed a substantial economic turnaround, made sweeping technology changes, supported various activist movements and carefully balanced the power of France within Europe and the world. His period of power produced a France that was not only one of the strongest countries at the close of the twentieth century, but in its strongest position across the century as a whole.

As such, in times of similar economic failings, a possible identity crisis and continued French resistance and demonstrations against French rulings, Hollande appears a candidate very much in touch with his people, dubbed Francois II (signifying him as the second coming of Mitterrand). Other headlines proclaim him as ‘Mr Normal’.

Indeed, French presidencies of the late twentieth century were either held by old, hardened politicians, or apparent upstarts who had rose through their party ranks too quick for sufficient experience.  Here is an elect who not only has the fine-balance of experience and youth on his side, but is so seemingly straight-forward, if not a little reserved, that he has won the French people with his honesty and genuine persona.

A front-page "Letter to Mr President" by Francois-Regis Hutin in Ouest France wishes Mr Hollande "good luck". The paper says that "we count on you to arouse the dynamism of all the French... to reconcile the French, to help overcome the split between the included and the excluded, young people and old people, town and country, workers and pensioners, rich people and poor people."

Of course, this tackles the failings that are laid at the steps of Sarkozy’s regime. He was either despised as a friend of the rich by the left, or seen as the man that broke his word by the right, or by most as the man that promised reform, began to make steps in that direction and stopped far short of completion.

These issues need be addressed by the new President for sure. His period in charge will prove pivotal certainly to the shape of the French twenty-first century, if not for the most part of the next millennia. Hollande will govern a country where, as the historian and economist Nicolas Baverez says, "By 2025, we will know if France still ranks as a leading nation in the world."

Yet despite the new appeal of Hollande’s practicality and placidness, his offer of change and consolidation, there is remarkably little difference between the centre left and centre right candidacy campaigns. The deficit will be tackled slower under Hollande, and with more dependence on taxes, but otherwise, there is not too much that would rock the boat about this leader.

His trail, though igniting people with the promise of a zero deficit by 2017, has left little impression of the long term policies and positions of the President: rather, people have been swept along with the fervour of change, the promise of Mr Normal. After all, Hollande appeared less focussed on austerity measures that were favoured by his predecessor and Merkel. And with their policies only bringing about rising unemployment and debts, the public support has suddenly dried up for their strict measures.

All that is sure of Hollande’s term is that his decisions will carve out the path of future France: either rising like the beacon of the Eiffel from the storm of the Seine, or reaffirm dwindling power that would leave French surrendering to the mercy of Germans and Britons alike for the third time in a century.

What happened to the spread of Kony 2012?

Two weeks ago, the Kony 2012 campaign became a viral sensation around the globe, really capitalising on what the video itself describes as a unique moment in human history, through galvanising its audience to share the short film through Facebook and Twitter.

Overnight, news feeds became awash with a youth army ready to take up virtual arms against a Ugandan war lord that the overwhelming majority had never heard of but 24 hours previous.

Posters for the campaign:
http://yinnyang.co.uk/2012/03/kony-2012/kony-2012/

With the exponential growth in online activism that followed, all aspects of Joseph Kony, the LRA, Uganda and Invisible Children were suddenly subjects of furious debate between the social networking community; questions of the charity’s integrity came to light, alongside other information that made the bewitching film appear all too simplistic and ensnaring.

I was surprised, when raising the subject with my parents, to find that neither of them had the faintest inclination of the events in motion. Considering this point, I quickly realised that the movement had generated little interest beyond the online domain. Newspapers and news channels proffered minimal to non-existent coverage of the campaign in question. Chat programmes and daytime television barely brushed upon the issue.

Then it occurred to me that the unusual beauty of the Kony campaign was that it had incited to action young people, young adults, just as Joseph Kony himself has plucked children from their homes.

Awakening these youths to new ideas, the movement seemingly managed to take a hold of the logic of the 13-25 age population of Facebook. These users account for approximately half of all subscribers to the service and are the generation that effortlessly pivot and gravitate around ideas through peer sharing.

Revolutions worldwide this past year have been driven by young, incensed persons ready to create change; from Egypt, to Syria, from protests against University tuition fees, to London riots.

Within the first couple of minutes of the video, director Jason Russell describes this particular campaign as an ‘experiment’. Over and above the sheer number of ‘friends’ who had shared the video, this single statement made me wary of the film’s intentions. Instead of watching the following thirty minutes of footage with disbelief, I held this phrase in mind and scrutinised the methods by which the video moves to incite the emotions and lay the foundations for a mass, united uprising.

Essentially, all those who share the video prove that the correct application of social media can provide the leverage and manipulation required to garner the support of an entire cross-section of society.

However, the recent riots and violent unrest around the globe are the product of anger provoked by those whose voices that have gone unheard. The under-25 group remain largely outside of Western democracy decisions. They are not high ranking figures, not barristers, bankers, or law-makers at Westminster. For that reason, the video itself targets these types of influential peoples.

 

Yet, this creates a discord and disjunction between practice and plight. Whilst the objective to overthrow a fierce dictator (with numerous crimes against humanity to his name) is a fine goal, the dependence on the co-operation of these different groups is flawed.

The film itself highlights the difficulties in acquiring support of the American government and the cover the night campaign is further testament to the continued troubles of retaining that backing. Without the constant aid from these people in power, there can be no dedicated search for Kony.

Yet, many youngsters sharing the video appeared oblivious to this fact. They spread the film in order to feel as though they had contributed to the downfall of a dictator, without much physical campaign following.

Writing a fortnight after the initial onslaught of Kony challengers, it is difficult to see what this first stage of the campaign has achieved outside of the blogosphere of social websites. Already, the presence of the Kony 2012 activism is fading just as dramatically as it inundated accounts at the start of March.

Youngsters, eager but inexperienced in politics, feel that their work in the process has been achieved. The elder enfranchised, still counting for 50% of Facebook users and a far higher percentage of voters, remain oblivious to the fighting efforts of their online compatriots.

Supporters of Invisible Children, largely youngsters,
sleeping outside in Portland in 2006 to symbolise the
situation of children in Uganda, who gather in large groups
at night to avoid the Lord's Resistance Army.

Jon Madrigal:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/dr_love/137744885/

Certainly, the ‘Cover the Night’ movement on 20^th April could reverse this decline, and make Kony a public figure, but it depends on the continued support of a virtual world of campaigners. After all, Invisible Children Inc has released a campaign video on similar topical issues for almost a decade now and this is the first time that any of their films has received widespread recognition. Simply hitting the ‘share’ or ‘retweet’ buttons has rocketed the programme to ‘en vogue’ status amongst young adults, but this youth demographic continues to be one of the most volatile and shifting segments of society. Unless this group of people remain behind the Kony ideal, the whole project will collapse as a result of teenage passivity and apathy. Without spreading the idea to elder generations, there is serious threat of the cause falling-in on itself through lack of diverse support.

Twitter stands as the possible frontier by which to make or break the project. The age range with the most active users is the 35-44 group, with 25-34 year olds not too far behind. Together, these users make up 55% of the Twitter population. Whilst this certainly promotes Twitter as the domain to reach respectable, middle-class people, the most frequent users still fall in the under 24 age range.

Even with the support of some elder public figures, the active Kony demographic remains predominantly under the age of 25. Cover the Night may act to sway other social groups; however, it is likely that whilst the posters will generate some interest and attention, the middle-class workers with money may view the campaign as ‘fly-posting’, and look at the mass posters as graffiti, as defacing their town and city. With busy lives, jobs and commitments, it may take much stronger, persistent action to convince and coerce the over 25s into support. Struggling to find a way to get these people involved is a crucial stumbling block.

“Nothing is more powerful than an idea whose time has come” opens the short film, but the idea of Kony, the experiment of Kony, already appears to have had its time. Whilst the video has received over 80 million hits globally at the time of writing, its Youtube statistics stand to reiterate that it is ‘most popular with 13-24 year olds’. In the past week, viewing of the video has comparatively ground to a halt.

The campaign is experimental because, whilst it begins as a viral, it needs to continue to manifest itself to generate a presence in the real world. The use of social media to incite revolution is not experimental so much as a proven tool for change, following Egyptian action last year. The real experiment is keeping these Western youngsters, who have never had to fight for democracy, interested and involved.

On 21^st April, still a month away, the experiment will either ultimately fail or succeed in making Kony famous by culminating in ‘Cover the Night’. However, with four weeks for support to dwindle, it is concerning that “an idea whose time has come” is being put on hold for so long.

After all, you cannot overthrow a Ugandan dictator by simply sharing a video…