Vive la France?

Pardon my Anglophilia, but I always find it amusing when the French get up on their pedestal and proclaim their world-historical superiority (or at least their pretension to superiority). They do that periodically, as you may know, often when they're feeling ignored, when they sense that history has passed them by, when they need to feel good about themselves. And, really, can you blame them? History has largely passed them by, they're largely ignored outside of Europe (where all they have left is to try to boss their way around the E.U., and, after last fall's riots and this spring's protests, they surely can't have much of a positive self-image anymore.

So, yes, they're back, according to Chirac, as we discover at Guardian Unlimited: "The French president, Jacques Chirac, yesterday unveiled what he hopes will be his great legacy to France's struggle against the global dominance of the US: a series of technological projects including a European search engine to rival Google.

Oooh. Can you feel the excitement? Here's more: "The project was one of six unveiled yesterday by Mr Chirac. A plan for delivering high-quality television to mobile phones, a project for refineries to turn cereals into chemicals, a new light train system, and diesel and electric cars are to be part-funded by the Agency for Industrial Innovation, set up by Mr Chirac. German companies and scientists will work with French industry on the projects."

All of which means what exactly? That France intends to compete with Silicon Valley entrepreneurship, with the culture of Intel and Cisco, with the spirit of progress that drives so much of American life, through high-profile, government-sponsored efforts compete with America. As if government heavy-handedness can possibly rival the innovative aspirations of the high-tech dreamers who built Silicon Valley and who populate it, and many other places like it, today.

How French.

It's not that I object to the technology itself. The search engine seems a tad redundant, but there'd be nothing wrong with a bio-refinery, an automatic metro, energy-efficient buildings, and new hybrid vehicles. It's just that the spirit isn't really one of innovation but of nationalism. The French are known for their obnoxious cultural and intellectual nationalism, but now they're veering desperately into technological nationalism.

But, then again, is this really about technology? One wonders. Is it not really about France's historical slide into mediocrity and obscurity, about France's fragile sense of self in a global community that no longer cares about the story of 1789 and France's self-glorified history on the world stage? Is it not really an implicit admission, however unintended, that France has already lost?