Explaining the 'Anglosphere'

Guardian Unlimited | US elections 2004 | Explaining the 'Anglosphere'

The great US/France schism is fascinating, particularly when subjected to some rather juvenile right-wing analysis. I love Glen Reynolds: he has lots to say, appears to be well read, yet still manages to produce the most amazing volume of incoherent pseudo-theory.

The US and France are very much alike, two peas in a pod almost - they are both the first-born progeny of the 18th century's most important social advances: the Scottish and French enlightenments. And like most siblings, they spend too much time squabbling over irrelevances.

The differing ways in which they've dealt with this birthright is, of course, the crux of their differences today. Both are liberal democracies - a fact celebrated in France, the source of much angst in the US, where the singular cultural divide is between those who believe in the [generally liberal] aims of the US Constitution [even if they'd rather die than call themselves 'liberal'], and those who want to make the US the type of [large C] conservative [large R] religious state that the Constitution was specifically designed against.

Even ignoring the myriad cultural differences between the two [and the fact that the French, like the Canadians, recognise that "culture" needs to be protected from the "market"] there is one principle fault line: religion. Or, more to the point, the lack of it in France. Now we all know about the cathedral of Notre Dame, Cardinal Richlieu and all that: it's not the existence of religion in France, and to a wider degree Europe that's the issue - it's the role of religion and how it shapes national identity.

France is, arguably, one of the most secular countries in Europe. Secular, and to a considerable degree, highly technocratic. Could there be a first-world country more unlike the US? And one that reflects wider European attitudes towards the US and its Empire in ways which are not recognised/associated with the rest of Europe. Americans expect France to be anti-US and the rest of Europe to be pro-US, and tend to ignore evidence to the contrary.

Few things in life are as entertaining as watching an American talk with almost total ignorance about Canada. Canada, like France, is a country that marches to the beat of its own drum, and that drives Americans absolutely spare. As a country Canada thinks wars aren't cool, realises that almost all of the military/economic/political/cultural threats it faces come from its neighbour to the south, and as a rule it cares passionately about peace-keeping and nation-building, both seemingly profoundly un- [or at best non-] American concepts.

What this is really about though, is criticism. Certain segments of the US seem to believe they have inherited/developed a divine right of sorts - they are the modern oracles, and god help those who criticise them.