Subject: National Front Multiculturalism
From: EurActiv <[email-masked]>
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Date: Fri, 24 Feb 2017 11:01:46 +0000

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    <http://eurac.tv/6KCM?sid=33541>    This week in Europe 24.02.2017,
noon

       *NATIONAL FRONT MULTICULTURALISM*

  Marine Le Pen in Lebanon? <http://eurac.tv/6KCi?sid=33541> The idea is
almost preposterous. But, it’s an election year in France, and, taboo
breaker that she is, the National Front chief made the trip this week,
albeit with the expected controversies, pimping Assad, and offending the
grand mufti by refusing to meet him over the headscarf requirement.

 What gives? As a number of commentators have conjectured, Len Pen is
seeking the support of wealthy expats from the former colonial holding,
which France ran between 1923 and 1946, 250,000 or so of which call the
country their home.

 Still, the idea surprises. How could a right-wing icon, like Le Pen, who
has compared the Muslim presence in France to the Nazi occupation,
reconcile herself to the idea that she must visit an Arab country? You
could call her an interfaith populist, who seeks to govern from the centre,
on the basis of defining subordinate identities.

 Especially if you consider the fact that 5-7% of France’s population is
estimated to be Muslim. Surely, there are some National Front voters there,
of the family values voting sorts, who join other nominally Catholic,
right-wing protests when it suits them, such as the  Manif Pour Tous
<http://eurac.tv/6KCj?sid=33541> *demonstrations of 2015.*

 *Consisting of anti-gay, family values demonstrations in Paris and Lyon,
the protests brought together an unlikely diverse coalition of communities,
ranging from hard-line Islamists to neo-Nazis chanting racist slogans.*

 *The events were an eye-opener given the ethnic and religious boundaries
they crossed. Might they represent the genesis of a new right, one that
transcended the narrow nationalism of the European right?*

 The Manif Pour Tous demos have not repeated themselves. Perhaps, if there
had been no  Charlie Hebdo <http://eurac.tv/6KCk?sid=33541> or  Nice
<http://eurac.tv/6KCl?sid=33541> attacks, the cultural synthesis they
represent would have developed further. As the National Front’s growing
prominence suggests, non-Muslims are indeed less tolerant than ever. That
window, at least for now, is closed.

 Still, it’s impossible to not think of them, when trying to understand
why Marine Len Pen’s trip to Lebanon makes sense. At it’s most
fundamental, the gesture is similarly extreme, insofar as it violates the
common sense of the growing apartheid-like environment in France, in which
Arabs and Muslims are viewed as foreign.

 On the other hand, despite what would be Len Pen’s protestations to the
contrary, the visit heralds an evolving right-wing sensibility, one which
accepts diversity, albeit a hierarchical one. As long as Muslims know their
place in French society, they will not try to place demands on it, such as
that women wear headscarves.

 To defy such a convention in a country as deeply religious as Lebanon was
a deeply offensive gesture. It was not so much a declaration of Le Pen’s
feminism, or support for *laïcité*, as much as it was an assertion of
European hegemony.

 That is what her trip communicated, internally, within France. She just
had to go to the Mideast to make it clear. Under President Len Pen, Muslims
are just going to have to reconcile themselves to that.

 *The Inside Track*

 Socialism still matters. Martin Schulz has a real chance of becoming
Germany’s next chancellor, political consultant Michael Spreng told 
WirtschaftsWoch <http://eurac.tv/6KCm?sid=33541>e, as Angela Merkel
struggles to appeal to the right.

 German officials have proposed that the EU  relax some human rights
safeguards <http://eurac.tv/6KCn?sid=33541> so that more asylum seekers can
be deported while awaiting the outcome of their cases, according to a
working paper seen by Reuters.

 Hence populism. According to  a new German study
<http://eurac.tv/6KCo?sid=33541>, many member states are too slow to
implement socio-political reforms in crucial sectors like education.
Migrants and refugees are particularly affected.

  Bullshit detector. <http://eurac.tv/6KCp?sid=33541> “I never made any
(‘Grexit’) threats,” Schäuble told ARD just before the network
played recent comments in which he said Greece was “not yet over the
hill” and the “pressure needed to stay on” Greece or it “couldn’t
stay in the currency union”.

 Even the IMF agrees. The Eurogroup took a small step on Monday towards the
completion of the 2nd review of Greece’s €86 billion bailout programme,
 according to Jorge Valero <http://eurac.tv/6KCq?sid=33541>, emphasising
reforms *not austerity.*

 Greece can still take the rap. Corina CreÈ›u is extremely dissatisfied
with the performance of the Adriatic-Ionian Strategy.  Aria Koutra
<http://eurac.tv/6KCr?sid=33541>, on the Romanian Commissioner’s
criticisms, and why she’s not scheduled its next meeting.

 The song remains the same. The European Commission warned Italy on
Wednesday it  risked disciplinary action <http://eurac.tv/6KCs?sid=33541>
if it did not adopt promised measures to cut its deficit.

 Moldovan media reports that the country could take advantage of
Transnistria’s uncertain future and bring the disputed territory back
under its control. But, mindful of Moscow,  ChiÈ™inÄƒu
<http://eurac.tv/6KCt?sid=33541> insists it’d prefer to remain neutral.

 Accession is not just about new markets. After ten months, and no judicial
progress, lawmakers in the European Parliament are  discussing the
destruction <http://eurac.tv/6KCu?sid=33541> of privately owned buildings
in the centre of Belgrade last year.

 In the year since Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) submitted its formal
application to join the European Union,  little has gone according to plan
<http://eurac.tv/6KCv?sid=33541> for the fragile Balkan confederation,
according to Sanford Henry.

  Nostalgia for the Soviet era <http://eurac.tv/6KCw?sid=33541>, *sans* the
Soviets. Reporters Without Borders has called on the Commission to defend
press freedom in Poland, after the country fell 29 places in the RWB’s
global ranking.

 The Americans are  an equal challenge. <http://eurac.tv/6KCx?sid=33541>
The election of Donald Trump is posing unique challenges to the Czech
Republic. Local concerns are logically focused on security, business, and
diplomatic relations.

 An Austrian court on Tuesday approved the  extradition of Ukrainian
businessman Dmytro Firtash <http://eurac.tv/6KCy?sid=33541> to the United
States in a bribery case, overturning an earlier ruling that had said the
US request was politically motivated, as Firtash links Trump to Putin.

  Don’t call it the zeitgeist. <http://eurac.tv/6KCz?sid=33541> Dutch
voters will go to the polls on 15 March to elect their new MPs, in what
many observers see as a dry run for the French presidential election one
month later.

  The hard left. <http://eurac.tv/6KCA?sid=33541> Despite signs of
rapprochement between the Socialist Benoît Hamon and far-left candidate
Jean-Luc Mélenchon in recent weeks, hopes of a political partnership
between the two look increasingly fragile.

 *Share TEE on  Twitter <http://eurac.tv/6KCN?sid=33541>,  Facebook
<http://eurac.tv/6KCO>,  LinkedIn <http://eurac.tv/6KCP>*

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