Category: articles
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49. French government intervenes to save iconic Alstom industrial plant from closure
Sarkozy’s “affairs” and Hollande’s book are certainly interesting and entertaining for those interested in French politics. The “big issue” of September, though, is the planned closure of Alstom’s TGV industrial plant in Belfort in 2018. The announcement of Alstom has forced almost all political actors to make resolutions. And the government came up with a…
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48. Disappointing growth, suffering tourism
Economic success would be necessary for President François Hollande to reduce unemployment and to legitimate his 2017’s re-election bid (and people also want that growth badly – for obvious reasons). But outstanding economic growth remains a mere dream. As it recently turned out, GDP growth (on a year-on-year basis) was exactly zero in the second…
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47. State of emergency and other proposals: this is where we are
Parliament extended the state of emergency until 2017. Six more months. Meanwhile, the situation have become more complicated, because more and more concrete anti-terrorism proposals come to light. The debate about political responsibility after Nice goes on.
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46. Governance is like Nutella
Many people think that public health taxes are good and useful. After all, people do not need that much refined sugar – moreover, the health care system does not need those diabetic patients either. The so-called Nutella tax also belongs to this group. The French, for their part, really wanted to tax palm oil, the…
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44. Labor Code: now everyone’s unhappy
President Hollande’s effort to overhaul the Labor Code does not go according to plan. Opinion polls and facts show that the French are rather against the modifications proposed by the government, trade unions alike. And now, ladies and gentlemen, employers also join them in contestation.
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43. 10 extra hard questions to ask after the Paris terrorist attacks
It is no small task to write a reliable political analysis just three days after the last Friday’s series of Paris terrorist attacks. This is a time for security advisors: they are the ones to talk about how mass murderers manage to go about freely, armed with AK-47s, in the citadel of European culture, the…