Pi-Consulting

Whoever said the French are shoulder-shrugging cynics who dismiss new developments with a non-committal murmur of “Bof!” (French for “Who cares?”)? If they really were that world-weary and cynical, they wouldn’t bother to vote, right? We should therefore ponder the fact that the recent French general election, (which picked right-of-center Nicolas Sarkozy over left-of-center Segolene Royal), logged an astonishing 84% voter turnout. Britain and America barely scrape past the 60% level when it comes to turning out the vote. Given that this was the first time a female candidate had made the second-round run-off poll, it was interesting that Mr. Sarkozy not only scored 53% of the vote overall, but 52% of the female vote. So much for “women rallying behind one of their own”. Hillary-fanciers for the US 2008 election, please note. And Happy Bastille Day to all our French and French Canadian readers. Source: The Economist, Pi.