Gauche caviar

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Gauche caviar ("Caviar left") is a pejorative

socialist while living in a way that contradicts socialist values. The expression is a political neologism dating from the 1980s and implies a degree of hypocrisy.[citation needed] The dictionary Petit Larousse defines left caviar as a pejorative expression for a "Progressivism combined with a taste for society life and its accoutrements".[1][clarification needed] One description referred to it as "the free-thinking, authority-hating, individualistic, tolerant, socialist position... which shaded into a bohemian, existential, communitarian, fairly depressed" worldview espoused by people with money and good clothes.[2]

The concept is broadly similar to the English

Bolshevik
.

Usage

The term was once prevalent in Parisian circles, applied deprecatingly to those who professed allegiance to the Socialist Party, but who maintained a far from proletarian lifestyle that distinguished them from the working-class base of the French Socialist Party. A more explicit reference identified this group as left-wingers who speak with great passion about the plight of the poor while eating caviar in their spectacular Parisian duplex apartment.[3]

The label was also employed by detractors to describe François Mitterrand.[4][5] This was further reinforced by the fact that several members of his administration were identified as part of the gauche caviar such as Jack Lang, who was the culture minister.[6]

In early 2007,

IMF managing director, and his wife, the journalist Anne Sinclair, heiress to much of the fortune of her maternal grandfather, the art dealer Paul Rosenberg. It is said that around 2015, the gauche caviar supported also the Greek government of SYRIZA and PM Tsipras, "desperate for a new 'anti-imperialist hero' after Hugo Chavez's death".[9]

Similarly,

right wing policies. Since the beginning of his term, these accusations have contributed to a growth in his unpopularity. [citation needed
]

The weekly news magazine,

Le Nouvel Observateur, has been described as the "quasi-official organ of France's 'gauche caviar'".[10]

Regardless of whether gauche caviar is accepted by those given such label, politicians who fit this classification wield power in the French polity. For instance, during the administration of Mitterrand, a number of policies were adopted to avoid offending this group, which included the Gais pour la liberte (Gays for freedom).[11]

See also

References

  1. ^ http://www.larousse.fr : under Caviar: Gauche caviar, gauche dont le progressisme s'allie au goût des mondanités et des situations acquises
  2. ISBN 9781476762944
    .
  3. ISBN 9781569756584
    .
  4. ISBN 0-85323-568-6
    . Retrieved 2008-09-12.
  5. ISBN 0-415-94399-X
    . Retrieved 2008-09-12.
  6. ISBN 0415943981
    .
  7. ^ Allen, Peter (January 18, 2007). "French Socialist Is Accused Of Failing To Pay Her Taxes". The Daily Telegraph - republished by The New York Sun. Retrieved 2008-09-11. Segolene Royal, the doyenne of the French left, suffered an embarrassing blow to her image as a presidential candidate yesterday when she was accused of tax dodging. Faced with taunts about being a gauche caviar, the Gallic equivalent of a champagne socialist, she denied being rich, instead claiming that she was just "well-off."
  8. ^ Sciolino, Elaine (May 18, 2007). "A Surprising Choice for France's Foreign Minister". The New York Times. Retrieved 2008-09-12. Elegant and dapper, with movie-star looks despite his age, Mr. Kouchner is half of one of France's leading power couples. His longtime partner, Christine Ockrent, is probably France's best-known television journalist. They entertain regularly from their grand duplex apartment overlooking the Luxembourg Gardens; they always get the best restaurant tables. They have been tarred with the label "gauche caviar," champagne-and-caviar socialism at its worst.
  9. ^ Cas Mudde, "SYRIZA: The Failure of the Populist Promise", Springer, 2016, p. 16, 23
  10. ^ Vinocur, John (June 20, 2006). "Chirac's Potential Heirs Keeping Change Hidden". International Herald Tribune, republished by The New york Times. Retrieved 2008-09-12.
  11. ISBN 0853235686
    .

Further reading

  • Joffrin, Laurent (2006). Histoire de la gauche caviar. Paris: Éditions Robert Laffont.
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