{"id":7489,"date":"2010-10-23T10:35:15","date_gmt":"2010-10-23T14:35:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/?p=7489"},"modified":"2010-10-23T10:35:15","modified_gmt":"2010-10-23T14:35:15","slug":"british-french-definitions-of-%e2%80%98liberty%e2%80%99","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/7489\/british-french-definitions-of-%e2%80%98liberty%e2%80%99\/","title":{"rendered":"British &#038; French Definitions of \u2018Liberty\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Today\u2019s <em>New York Times <\/em>draws out an <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2010\/10\/23\/world\/europe\/23iht-letter.html\" target=\"_blank\">helpful distinction between British and French notions of liberty<\/a>.\u00a0 The context is each country\u2019s reaction to the growing public sector spending crisis.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\u201cFrance\u2019s problem is that, for too long, the economy has been run as a kind of job club for French workers,\u201d said an editorial in The Spectator, a conservative British magazine. \u201cBritain and France believe in liberty, but have different definitions of it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>While the British believe in \u201cliberty from government,\u201d the editorial said, the French \u201cstill like the big state and squeal at the prospect of being removed from its teat.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The French also pay higher club dues and expect commensurate rewards. French pensions can reach three-quarters of a working wage, compared with just over two-fifths in Britain. So, if French workers and teenagers strike over their pensions, there\u2019s plenty to protest about.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>One of the consequences of France\u2019s keener devotion to socialism is a reduced sense of class conflict.\u00a0 Not so in Britain.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>If Britain falls prey to protest, there will be sharper overtones of class struggle than solidarity. Britain is a more divided society than France. Wealth is more ostentatious, poverty more visible. People in Britain have learned to have sharper elbows in pursuit of individual gain, while France prides itself on a broader concordat.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSocial confrontation is part of our democracy,\u201d said Prime Minister Fran\u00e7ois Fillon, \u201cbut social consensus is, as well.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>How each country\u2019s government handles the coming backlash to \u2018austerity\u2019 in public spending will do much to define the future of freedom for their respective citizens.\u00a0 Hopefully, they can make a credible argument that limited government and greater individual opportunity go hand-in-hand instead of coming to blows.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Today\u2019s New York Times draws out an helpful distinction between British and French notions of liberty.\u00a0 The context is each country\u2019s reaction to the growing public sector spending crisis. \u201cFrance\u2019s problem is that, for too long, the economy has been run as a kind of job club for French workers,\u201d said an editorial in The [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1104,1606,405,1836,1993,1992,61],"class_list":["post-7489","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-posts","tag-activist","tag-austerity","tag-britain","tag-france","tag-protest","tag-socialism","tag-spending"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7489","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7489"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7489\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7490,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7489\/revisions\/7490"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7489"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7489"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7489"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}