France: promise them anything
Promise her anything, ran the perfume ad when I was a kid, but give her Arpege.
Now the intersection of a highly media-genic sleep-in and a looming political campaign have combined to goad
“Should” as a verb exasperates me in policy terms. What does it mean? Is it a commitment?
As Master Yoda said, “Do or do not. There is no try.”
Often it’s the ersatz version, the Walrus’s concern:
“I weep for you,” the Walrus said, “I deeply sympathize.”
With sobs and tears he sorted out, those of the largest size
Holding his pocket handkerchief, before his streaming eyes.
“The Children of Don Quixote” initiated the current debate when it set up dozens of red tents along
Worthy of Christo, n’est-ce pas? Tents along the canal
Great bit of media stage play.
The issue has dominated the news and forced politicians from all main parties to promise more help for those without a roof over their heads.
Meanwhile, the cutely name Quixotans are themselves engaging in a particularly French version of political theater: the scheduled spontaneous political action. (On our various trips to
The government has already promised more money and longer opening hours for shelters, but the Don Quixote group has said that is not enough, calling on authorities to open shelters 24 hours a day throughout the year and to build more public housing.
“All this is heading in the right direction,” Don Quixote’s president, Jean-Baptiste Legrand, said after the government’s announcement yesterday. “We have won part of the battle, but everything will depend on how quickly these measures are implemented,” he said, adding that the tents it had set up would be moved if the measures were implemented quickly.
Jean Baptiste Legrand, who’s won part of the battle
How nice that those protesting homelessness have nice homes to which they can return at any time. Camping for a cause is a holiday; homelessness is not.
The politicians, faced with a symbolic protest and in the runup to a critical election, have elected to offer what appears (to a cynical reader) to be a symbolic pledge:
A draft law, which would enable those without decent housing to seek legal redress, should be passed by parliament before the end of February, a source close to Villepin said.
As I suggested regarding Los Angeles’s homeless situation, one can imagine a court ruling that a government must house its homeless, although in the
No, really, we’re seriously scary politicians.
“It will be possible to implement the legal right to housing from the end of 2008 for people in the most difficult situations, notably the homeless but also poor workers and isolated women with children,” Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin of
Conveniently after the upcoming Presidential election, and hence safely after the Political Promise Event Horizon.
(To many a politician, an election is like a cold reboot; it resets all his promises to zero and returns him to his natural pre-pledge amnesiac state. “Circumstances have changed,” he declares, or as Harold Macmillan once phrased it, “Events, dear boy, events.”)
“
The right would be extended to other people, such as those in inadequate public housing, in 2012, Villepin said.
Five years from now, well beyond the Political Promise Event Horizon. Meanwhile, M. de Villepin proposes to tackle the ‘worst first’:
About 86,500 people are homeless in
Should housing programs tackle the worst first, or the easiest first? Policy theorists [Like who? — Ed. Like me — Auth.] can make plausible cases for either.
Both paths lead to more housing
The worst have the greatest needs, but in an environment of limited resources, any given sum of money will help more families if one tackles the easiest.
However, politically worst first is appealing, because one can keep shrinking the number eligible until it fits the available funding, whereas tackling those with a legitimate need will break the bank:
Aid groups say more than 3 million people have serious housing problems — living on the street, in shabby hotels, caravans [Euro-speak for ‘trailer’ — Ed.], or in flats without bathrooms or heating.
That doesn’t count any of those in France’s dreadful high-rise public housing cites, the slums inside and out of sight, which went up in flames fifteen months ago, heard many splendid promises, including those from the Sons of ‘68, and still stand unfixed and ignored, tinder waiting for its match.
Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy, the conservative candidate, has vowed that no homeless person would have to sleep outside within two years of his taking office.
Safe enough pledge, conditionally beyond the Political Promise Event Horizon.
Oh, like that’ll happen
The Socialists’ Segolene Royal has called for a “vast plan to fight against economic insecurity”.
This recent confab seems merely the next in a series of grand housing-reform promises made by
A greater commitment to housing — anywhere in the housing continuum — would be welcome, but two issues loom:
- It has the feel of political vaporware. The French, one may recall, signed up to the ERM stability pact, and have been among its worst miscreants, consistently missing their budget deficit targets and doing nothing about it. (Still, a willingness to incur massive deficits with other people’s Euros may bode well J rather than poorly L for the chances of this initiative being funded.)
Just keep printing, just keep printing …
- What about the Muslims living in the high-rises? If you lived in a French high-rise, what would you conclude from the complete absence of movement despite the brave promises of a year ago? And if you saw that it took only a few quintessentially French advocates pitching tents along the Canal San Martin to get a legal right to housing, what would you think? What would you do?
Meanwhile, back in the political spotlight:
Villepin also received a report yesterday from Xavier Emmanuelli, founder of the Samu Social support group for the homeless, on a law enshrining the right to housing.
Writing “this fundamental reform into law . . . will put the right to housing on one level with the right to medical care or education,” Emmanuelli told Liberation daily, saying that implementing such a law would take years.
And billions of Euros, which
