Talk:Manuel Valls

Rewriting work

I have started rewriting the article based on French article and references. The ref to the book of María Preckler has the ISBN code inside but it appears as wrong at the bottom page (despite it is ok in French page). Can sb correct it?
"Origins and family" and "Political orientations" section are done at this time Pierre.alix (talk) 18:41, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

English proofreading

Hi Pierre - I am going through this (albeit slowly) and tidying up some of the English expressions (I'm a native English speaker). As my knowledge of French politics is practically non-existent, I cannot comment on the veracity of the content - just on the language itself.

I will aim to proofread the whole article this week :-) Piccolapixxie (talk) 20:24, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

Religion

The article states Manuel Valls is Roman Catholic, but there is no reference in the text to his religious denomination. French socialists tend to be secularist unless declared otherwise; there is a section in the text about Secularism in fact. He has public declarations regarding his position on "demanding secularism" and has been accused of being a hard-liner on secularism (see: ). I think the Roman Catholic item should be removed because (1) it does not appear in the original French page, (2) his political orientation seems secular so ew need som proof about being Catholic before stating this as a fact (3) the only Catholic reference is the text is about his grandfather and being born in Barcelona does not mean, statistically, you are automatically a Catholic (only 59 % of Catalans practice some religion). — Preceding unsigned comment added by Enric (talk • contribs) 12:17, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

Politics and religion are truly separate in France. I'm guessing that by "secularism", you're confusing two separate things, non-religion/atheism with Laïcité. Many French politicians, just like many French people, are atheist/agnostic, but this has nothing to do with Laïcité, and in fact some religious politicians are fierce defenders of Laïcité (sometimes because they feel it helps their own religion), especially on the right. There is an article on Laïcité, but basically it means that religion has no place in politics and in public generally. Even mentioning ones religion can be considered as "crossing the line" by some, and when Nicolas Sarkozy was president, the few things he did as a Catholic (like go see the Pope, or saying a priest could teach things a teacher couldn't) were hugely controversial.

To go back to the religion of Valls, many a French will say they're Catholic while in practice never praying, never setting foot in a church, never abiding by any Catholic rule. I think mentioning the religion of French politicians or French people in general is very "unFrench", but if you want to do it, a direct quote is needed. Aesma (talk) 14:10, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Confused

The opening of the article states that he's from the social-liberal wing of the French Socialist Party, but later in the article, it lists his views on social issues, and they seem anything but on quite a few of the highlighted issues. He sounds like a centrist to me, at best. --Criticalthinker (talk) 05:40, 22 July 2013 (UTC)

It's certainly debatable, and there is no denying that he is well liked by centrist politicians, while some in the PS doubt his leftism. However he supports many socialist things that we have in France (welfare state, socialized medicine, socialized pensions, socialized unemployment, etc.) that centrists are usually keen to radically reform. As Mitterrand said, centrists in France are neither from the left, nor from the left, so someone with these views will always end up as a socialist or a radical-socialist. Aesma (talk) 13:48, 21 September 2013 (UTC)

You need to understand that "liberal" is a centrist or even right-wing approach in Europe. Calling him a liberal means he is on the right-wing of the French Socialist Party.

82.224.103.123 (talk) 21:18, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

I am quite confused by his comparison to Scandinavian social democracy. He is a centre-right Third Way-style social democrat and has virtually nothing in common with traditional Scandinavian social democracy. (and yes, I mean to call him centre-right) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.81.75.121 (talk) 00:36, 5 March 2014 (UTC)

This is kind of what I was getting at. Here in the United States, he'd probably be somewhere on the left to center on certain issues, but on many of our social issues, he'd be firmly within the center of right-wing Republican thought (rule of law/public safety, immigration, Israel/Palestine, marijuana legalization, etc...). This stuff would make him unfit as a leader in the mainstream Democratic Party. Hell, the article even says that he refered to himself as a "Blairite" or "Clintonien". I'm not even sure how one could describe him as a "social-liberal" by even European standards save for a few key issues. I still argue it'd be best to take out that description, as it's HIGHLY debatable. --Criticalthinker (talk) 03:04, 1 April 2014 (UTC)

And what does supporting Israel have to do with being right-wing? It's about what is morally just, not conservatism. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.168.150.252 (talk) 04:29, 1 April 2014 (UTC)

You can't take just a couple of answers to issues and decide the camp in which it puts a politician, especially if it's not the camp he's claiming to be a member of, furthermore when he's the Prime Minister ! The Israeli–Palestinian conflict is not a right or left issue in France and governments support both sides, but really it's mostly a non-issue in everyday politics (or a taboo, you decide). Law and order, definitively a right vs left issue in the past, but it has cost at least one presidential election to the Socialists (2002) so now they're starting to understand that people don't see it as a political issue, Valls just happen to have understood it long before most, but Hollande campaigned on it too. Immigration, more complicated still, discourse versus reality, Valls did something that should satisfy both camps, result both camps cry fool : he made the rules to get papers/asylum/nationality clearer, leading both to the quicker deportation of people not meeting the criteria, and to more naturalizations. A mass regularization like had happened in the past was never in the books, in fact no Socialist candidate in the primary dared to propose such a politically suicidal idea, this isn't the 80's for sure ! Lastly marijuana, this is a minor issue for several reasons, the main one being that nobody is arrested over smoking some, France is the first or close to in terms of percentage of population consuming cannabis, so really legalizing it, removing the laws banning it, or similar propositions, wouldn't make much of a difference. His position is more a part of his communication (trying to appeal to the right/older people/conservatives) than something that defines him (and again, the president holds the same line). As for the Scandinavian model, read what I answered the first time, France isn't a Scandinavian country, but it's far from having work rules similar to Germany or the UK (or even Italy or Spain, now), very very far, unemployment benefits are the most generous in the world, health care is close to free (totally free for the poorest people), etc. Valls has shown no intention to change these facts by more than a few inches. Aesma (talk) 22:58, 16 May 2014 (UTC)

Mistake

"Valls has always been a supporter of Israel in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict". This is actually wrong. Valls is currently a strong supporter of Israel but a few years ago he was a true supporter of Palestine. There are a lot of testimonials, videos, and articles about it. There's also a journalist investigation on it (a book has be released). On the other hand, I can't find much information about why he did change side or if he fakes one of the two alliances.