3rd Assignment: Is our democracy turning into an oligarchy?

Today we’re going to talk about politics. The article I choose is from The Guardian and has been published on Friday 9 October 2009. It deals with Jean Sarkozy, who is Nicolas Sarkozy (French president) son, being nominated for a high positioned position. Indeed, Jean Sarkozy is nominated to be the head of the EPAD which is the public agency for the development of La Défense, the Europe biggest business district based in one of the richest area of France.

The issue here is to determinate whether Jean Sarkozy is the right person to carry this position or not. In spite of his lack of political experience, he has been nominated for this “top post”. We can wonder if his nomination is due to his skills or to his father’s position and influence. As far as I’m concerned, Jean Sarkozy shouldn’t’ be appointed to the post for the three following reasons.

First of all we’re talking about a 23 year old young man who is still fulfilling his university degree. Jean’s nomination is supported by the outgoing head of the development agency Patrick Devedjian (key figure in Sarkozy's centre-right ruling UMP party) to justify his choice he quoted El Cid: "In souls nobly born, valour does not depend upon age." Which mean that the age is not an issue. The real issue is the lack of legitimacy of Jean Sarkozy. Indeed, he won (thanks to his father influence) a seat in the Neuilly sur Seine city council, a wealthy suburb in the Hauts-de-Seine. However, being a local councillor has nothing to do with running the EPAD, which is not an easy task as it concentrates a lot of headquarters of powerful companies. Furthermore, even the political class agree that Jean has no legitimacy and no qualifications for such a post.

Secondly we can also see this nomination as a way to concentrate the power in the hands of the Sarkozys. Let me remind you that Nicolas Sarkozy himself has been the head of the agency, and if his son gets the position Nicolas Sarkozy will obviously influence the decisions taken about the development of Le Defence which is a way to maintain the power in their “clan”. This affair will clearly lead to an accusation of dynasty building by Nicola Sarkozy.

To finish, if Jean Sarkozy gets the position, we will obviously deal with a case of nepotism as it’s stated in the article. Nepotism by definition is “is favouritism granted to relatives or friends, without regard to their merit” this is exactly what we’re dealing with. We can also see that the case is a example of an oligarchy which is “a form of government in which power effectively rests with a small elite segment of society distinguished by royal, wealth, intellectual, family, military, or religious hegemony […] Such states are often controlled by politically powerful families whose children are heavily conditioned and mentored to be heirs of the power of the oligarchy”.

To conclude I’d say that Jean Sarkozy should retire himself from the race to obtain this post in order to prove that we’re still in a democracy and no in an oligarchy.

to view the article, click on the image or follow this link