There’s a university in Paris that churns outEuropean bureaucrats. It describes itself as theHarvard of Europe. Studying there on exchange twoyears ago, I impressed a lot of people in cafés withthe name of my school.

But the southern village where I’d lived yearsearlier was a totally different world. When, duringthe winter holidays, I visited and told old friends Iwas attending Sciences-Po, they said, “What’s that? Never heard of it.”

That’s when I first grasped the isolation andarrogance of Parisian élites — the key toFrance’s rejection of the proposed European Union (EU) constitution in the referendum last Sunday.

Let’s start with some basics. The text ishundreds of pages long and written in legalese. Itreads more like a trade treaty than a constitution.Beyond rights and principles it includes technicalguidelines on topics ranging from asylum policy tovocational training.

Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, who chaired the EUconvention charged with drafting the text, concededthat reading it is better for insomnia than mostsleeping pills.

France’s mainstream political parties and mediaall urged a “yes” vote. The message was,This is the next logical step in European integration,which is great; it’s a good compromise betweenlots of positions; if you vote “no” therewill be a crisis; there’s really no need to gointo details.

French President Jacques Chirac said you can’tcall yourself a European and vote “no,”while others accused “no” campaigners ofxenophobic racism.

The fuzzy-feeling-tinged-with-fear campaign backfired.French voters, defying their political and mediamasters, engaged in a spirited debate.

Tom Malleson, a young Canadian teaching English inParis, wrote in an email last week “howincredibly politicized it is here in stark contrast tothe Canadian norm. 22-year-olds stop their drinking toask each other how they’ll vote. ‘Yes’ and’no’ graffiti and posters are absolutelyeverywhere. Cafés are bubbling with politicaldiscourse.” The 70 per cent turnout on Sunday was thehighest for a French vote in years.

Rejection of élites cuts across party lines

At the root of these quarrels lies a deeper question.Not a referendum on European identity — most“no” voters describe themselves aspro-Europe — but a referendum on the French andEuropean leaderships. Have these élites earned thetrust of French voters or do they need 15 minutesin the corner to reconsider their actions?

The vote breakdown is telling. Polls say those mostlikely to have voted “yes” are the old,the rich, and members of what one poll called the“intellectual” professions. In sum, theélite. “No” voters were more oftenwage-earners and rurally based. (A newspaper opinionpiece warned readers not to mock “no”militants for their rustic accents.)

In the referendum, this division between haves andhave-nots — insiders and outsiders — cutacross ideological lines.

Extreme right voters — racist, xenophobic andpowerless — united predictably behind anationalist “no.” The schism on the left,with over 60 per cent of left-wingers choosing“no,” is more interesting.

The left’s mainstream organs, the SocialistParty and to a lesser extent the Green Party, bothadvocated a “yes” vote. Their leaders saidthe constitution would erect a rampart against“ultralibéralisme,” or unrestrained freemarkets.

But a handful of party dissidents, led by the slickopportunist Laurent Fabius, convinced most leftwingvoters of the opposite. Fabius said a constitutionshould be a political document, whereas this onefocused on free trade. This, he claimed, would lead tothe destruction of French social protections, whereasa “no” vote would force EU member statesto renegotiate a better, more “social”treaty.

Pro-“yes” socialists conceded the text wasimperfect. But they praised its charter of fundamentalrights as a one-off chance to make future socialreforms more likely. They insisted no renegotiationwas possible: a “no” vote would isolateFrance in a weaker Europe less able to shield it fromglobalization.

To most, this came off as unprincipled salesmanship — denying any alternative, asking too muchtrust. What’s more, the French left had lostfaith in the salesman.

Their “no” vote, really a rejection of thewhole political élite, is largely grounded in their concrete experience of the EU. While most are happywith European integration in general, they haveproblems with the specifics.

In France, the adoption of the single currency — the euro — has lowered prices for expensivegoods but raised the cost of basic necessities.It’s made it easier to hop from Paris to Berlinto Madrid — which is irrelevant toFrance’s workers and villagers.

Another EU program fostering a continental élite,Erasmus subsidizes exchange programs for universitystudents within Europe. But the fixed monthly stipendis low. It helps many in the middle-class but is toolittle for working-class students who need the mosthelp to study abroad.

As a political structure, Europe has alsodisappointed. At Sciences-Po, we talked endlesslyabout Europe’s democratic deficit: bureaucratsin Brussels have incredible power, the Europeanparliament is weak, and no one takes the idea of adirectly elected president seriously. Yet theconstitution does little to address these problems.

In the end, the majority of French voters think thisconstitution would entrench, not solve Europe’sproblems. They believe Europe can do better. And theyfear the text before them could dissolve the welfarestate they fought so hard to build.

Black sheep on a mission

As the “yes” campaign collapsed, PresidentChirac declared that if France voted “no”it would become the black sheep of Europe. Inresponse, a plucky folk song appeared called“The Black Sheep.” Its chorus goes,“Ãe prendre des gens pour des moutons, on seprend des retours de batons” — take peoplefor sheep and you’ll get nailed with a stick.

Granted, the witticism gets lost in translation. The55 per cent “no” vote, on the other hand, is clearin all European languages. The constitution, whichneeds the approval of all 25 member-states to becomelaw, is now dead.

It’s time for those seeking a new Europe builtfrom below to prove they can come up with somethingbetter. That could take a while.