France Votes: The Election of François Hollande

France Votes analyzes the French elections of 2012 in the context of a France and Europe in crisis. With regard to the economy, Irwin Wall describes the ways in which the country's adherence to the common currency in the Eurozone has stripped France of its freedom of manouver. France Votes shows how a European-wide economic crisis was reflected in political crisis at home and the rise of new political extremism combined with mass disaffection from politics altogether. The result of all of this, posits Wall, is that France has become a no-choice democracy. See more