French politician Francois Hollande won a runoff election and became the main candidate against the incumbent French President Nicolas Sarkozy. While this doesn’t seem like anything special, there are two things to note here.
First, Hollande is running as the Socialist Party’s candidate against Sarkozy and his conservative policies.
Secondly and more importantly, he seems to have the public’s support to win.
This atmosphere is different than a few years ago, when we saw conservative politicians winning elections in many European countries, such as France, England and Germany.
Unsurprisingly, I’m ecstatic at the thought of a more left-leaning Europe.
With these events and the current rise of the occupy movement, it seems we may be seeing one of my favorite historical ideas in action.
Whether it’s the often recited cyclical nature of history or the realization that history was written by the victors, many events throughout civilization help lend themselves to overarching ideas.
One such idea is the concept of the political pendulum, which looks at the back-and-forth pattern between political trends. We can see this happening from constant back-and-forth elections between Republican and Democratic politicians.
While the country may have been more conservative or liberal at the start of a president’s term, it usually isn’t long before the pendulum starts to swing back toward the other end of the political spectrum.
It makes sense. There will always be strict ideologues on both sides of the politics. Whether it’s the Libertarian who wants little government intervention or the Socialist who wants as much as possible, there will be people who won’t have their political beliefs challenged.
The general population can be swayed either way for the most part. Most evident in swing voters — many of which helped push President Obama into office in 2008 — is that it also takes place on a much grander scale.
One of the points which best illustrates this is a theory many people bring up about Ronald Reagan. Although he is revered almost like a God to some Republicans, he might have not stood a chance at getting elected had he run today.
Our country has been swinging up towards the conservative end of the spectrum for quite some time. A 2009 Gallup Poll found that 39 percent of Americans said their political views had become more conservative, compared to only 18 percent who said the opposite.
We even saw the Tea Party movement, which protested against current conservatives for not being conservative enough. Should some of these Tea Party politicians come to important offices in the 2012 election, we will see the pendulum start its swing back left in reaction.
The easiest way to disillusion someone about some of their political beliefs is to let their politicians have a shot. When we see them not live up to the hype or their promises, it’s easy to second guess your beliefs.
Undoubtedly, this is partially the case for the difference between the celebration of Obama being elected and his current 41 percent approval rating.
This seems to be the basic underlying cause of such a pendulum effect, and the reason it will continue to occur. Currently there seem to be many signs pointing to such a change, though this could be wishful thinking.
With conservative politicians coming up with horrible ideas like flat taxes, cutbacks on public services on one hand, and the occupy movement on the other, one can only wonder what we’ll have to wait for if this isn’t enough.
 
Zachary Davis is a 20-year-old history junior from Warsaw, Poland. Follow him on Twitter @TDR_zdavis.
 
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Contact Zachary Davis at [email protected]