DEMOSCIOCRATIE

Translation of the French article by Jacques Rouchaud

A demonstration begins. A few hours later, shop windows are smashed, stores emptied, shopkeepers ruined. The next day, politicians take turns in front of the cameras, promise firmness, then nothing more. And the scene repeats itself at the next demonstration, in France as in many other countries.

We must dare to ask the question: why? This ransacking does not fall from the sky. It is the fruit of fifty years of poorly thought-out decisions, successive abandonments and a political power that has always preferred to manage emotion rather than address the causes.

1. Fifty years of immigration without an integration policy

It all began more than fifty years ago. After the election of Valéry Giscard d’Estaing in 1974, France suspended labour immigration but opened, with family reunification, a settlement immigration. Entire families arrived. That choice could be defended; what cannot be defended is what followed.

For no government, whether of the right or the left, built the reception and integration policy that should have gone with it: language learning, support for families, real access to employment, social mix in neighbourhoods. The newcomers were concentrated in the same housing estates, and then things were left to drift. Fifty years later, we are reaping what we sowed: entire neighbourhoods where the State no longer really enters and where other rules have taken hold.

2. Children left to fend for themselves from the age of 10 or 11

That is the heart of the problem. In these neighbourhoods, too many children are turned loose on the street from the age of 10 or 11. Sometimes because the parents are overwhelmed, absent or themselves lost; sometimes because a boy of that age is led to believe he is already “a man” and no longer has to answer to anyone.

The school, overwhelmed, cannot make up for what the family no longer passes on. Youth workers are lacking, clubs are closing, adult role models are disappearing. A child without a framework, without bearings and without a visible future becomes prey.

3. The dealers, the first “school” of the street

The drug networks spot this prey immediately. Lookout at 11, dealer at 14: trafficking offers what society no longer gives — easy money, a place, a status. The child learns very early that the law does not apply, that one can earn in a day what his father earns in a month, and that violence pays.

Those who do not fall into trafficking often slide into a life of easy ways and petty theft. The ground is ready for what comes next.

4. Demonstrations, a ground for looting

Every major demonstration then becomes an opportunity. The black blocs open the way: they smash shop windows, confront the police and create disorder. Behind them, gangs who have come to loot multiply their thefts. People no longer ransack to make demands; they ransack the better to steal.

The first victims are not the powerful. They are the shopkeepers, the craftsmen, the small business owners who spent a whole life building their business, and the honest demonstrators, whose cause is tarnished and smothered by the images of destruction. The people pay twice: through the damage, then through the taxes that repair it.

5. The powerlessness of the princes of the Republic

Why does nothing change? Because the current political system has no interest in tackling the problem at its root. Terms of office are short, decisions are taken far from the ground, and each government blames the previous one. Plans are announced, riot police are sent in, one more law is passed — and everyone waits for the next flare-up.

Those who decide do not live in these neighbourhoods, do not run these shops and are never really held accountable. It is this political incapacity that turns a social problem into a permanent tragedy.

6. What demosciocracy would change

Demosciocracy does not promise miracles. It proposes another organisation, applicable in every country, which places responsibility where the problems are: in the territory.

• The Territorial Council sees at once. Its 40 members — 20 representatives of the people and 20 representatives of the corporations, drawn from the 20 districts — meet every week. A neighbourhood going adrift, a trafficking network setting up, children dropping out: the information comes up immediately, instead of getting lost in the offices of a ministry.
• Security and justice as close as possible to the population. Article 9 of the Demosciocratic Constitution says it clearly: the territory participates directly in their organisation and has the necessary means. No more need to wait for a national decision to act.
• The territory manages education, prevention and social life. It is the territory that can put adults, youth workers and activities back where children are left to the street, and truly support families.
• Shopkeepers have a voice. Half of the Council represents trades and activities. Those who suffer the looting take part in the decisions themselves.
• Whoever fails is replaced. The Director General of the territory can be dismissed at any time in the event of mismanagement. No official can hide behind a five-year term.
• Emulation between territories. Security, quality of life, satisfaction of the population: the 352 territories are assessed on the same criteria, and the five best are rewarded. Letting a neighbourhood rot no longer pays.

Conclusion

Looting and ransacking are not inevitable. They are the result of abandonment: abandonment of children, abandonment of neighbourhoods, abandonment of shopkeepers, by a power that decides from afar and answers for nothing. As long as these problems are entrusted to the same princes of the Republic, we will get the same results.

Demosciocracy gives power back to the territory, management to competence and control to the people. It is there, as close as possible to real life, that we can once again protect children, families and those who work.

Liberty — Equality — Truth

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