World News: A Francophile's view of the U.S. Presidential Election

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Category: World News - Europe

Published on Monday, 04 November 2024 08:47

Written by Olivier Longhi

A few days before the American presidential election, it is obvious that the election fascinates a Europe fascinated, and irritated, by the United States, like a twin brother that one cannot live without despite its flaws.

Every four years, Europe, and in particular France because of its common history (to be put into perspective, however), are both passionate about the presidential election that renews the occupant of the White House. Whether Republican or Democratic, the United States exerts a power of attraction on the Old Continent that even thousand-year-old China cannot match.

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Much younger than the largest Asian or European nation, the United States has an image in Europe made up of fascination and irritation, annoyance and connivance, an image that structures the relations between the two continents.

Condescension

If the second, namely Europe, is clearly loyal to and dependent on the United States, the second, likes to take on the role of protective and moralizing big brother, often rightly, but always perceived, wrongly by the way, as a form of contemptuous condescension. Between the quarrel between the moderns and the ancients, the European romantics but Cartesians, and the pragmatic but exuberant North Americans, it is not always easy to understand the relations that unite these two continents

Perhaps we should look for an explanation in a form of vicarious success embodied by the United States, where the Europeans of past and present centuries have failed. History would take a long time to write, but it is almost certain that Europeans see in the United States something different, bigger, more ambitious and even more energizing.

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World Powers

To realize this, it is enough to skim the European newspapers that give a little more space every day to the election of the future president of the United States, while few European elections are capable of exciting the American people.

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It is the strength of the world powers (hyper-powers as the political scientist Francis Fukuyama described them) that of concentrating passions and interests on them, despite their defects, that Europe and its political alliance, praiseworthy, heavy and essential to the world economy or to geopolitical balances, does not manage to impose itself on a global scale,  the Ukrainian and Palestinian examples demonstrate this a little more every day.

In any case, on the morning of November 6, Europe and France will discover feverish and impatient the new representative of Uncle Sam, knowing one thing, namely that relations will not necessarily be easier with one or the other candidate. This is the lot of long-standing relationships rooted in history.

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Bio: Olivier Longhi has extensive experience in European history. A seasoned journalist with fifteen years of experience, he is currently a professor of history and geography in the Toulouse region of France. He has held a variety of publishing positions, including Head of Agency and Chief of Publishing. A journalist and recognized blogger, editor, and editorial project manager, he has trained and managed editorial teams, worked as a journalist for various local radio stations, was a press and publishing consultant, and was a communications consultant.