My response to Bernard Poignant on the issue of autonomy. If the person concerned felt compelled to label Brittany's autonomy as unrealistic in a column in Le Télégramme this summer, it is because we have won the cultural battle. Bernard Poignant is the symbol of the PS power networks, those who have harmed us so much in Brittany and who still pull the strings, in the region and elsewhere.
To read the recent column by Bernard Poignant "Regionalist Claims: The Art of Impossible Projects," I felt a great resignation for Brittany.
This column expresses a lack of hope far from the socialist slogan "change life" from a certain May '81. It reflects the emptiness of the thought of the PS system that currently prevails in Brittany. This political formation thus has nothing to propose other than the maintenance of dominant positions and its opposition to any innovative project.
It would therefore be impossible to establish a new institutional framework or even a new constitution that finally rebalances the relations between Paris and the rest of France. For him, it is unthinkable to organize "the Girondin revolution," which prominent progressive intellectuals had already envisioned throughout the 19th century: Mistral, Proudhon... thus offering this country a framework that prioritizes the responsibility of citizens while we sink deeper into a terrifying financial and political crisis.
The arguments that Bernard Poignant opposes to this project are not credible. "Federalism would favor Île-de-France?" On the contrary, we cannot be more crushed than we currently are by the centrality that continues to progress, as the excellent journalist Francis Brochet very well explains in a recent and relevant work "When Parisianism Crushes France" (1).
Let us finally put an end to the great lie that claims the State serves the equality of the French. The State is monopolized by a segment of the population and embodies only the territorial domination of Paris over the rest of the hexagon.
The autonomy of regions does not prevent financial equalization and redistribution mechanisms as in Germany. There is more equality across the Rhine between territories than within our "egalitarian" republic.
This column by Bernard Poignant does not open any perspective "on the scale of the next five-year terms." Without a rapidly changing world, are we doomed to immobility and decline?
"Federalism and autonomy" would be an impossible project for Breton, Corsican, Basque, Alsatian "regionalists"... Yet they are the natural mode of organization of the states that surround us: Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Spain...
This idea is gaining traction in people's minds. It returns power to citizens who aspire to be responsible and to pragmatically manage the destiny of Brittany.
The Brittany region manages only 2% of the taxes of Bretons in 2026. The German länder manage 50% of the taxes of their residents.
Let us imagine for a moment what we would be capable of doing with the product of our taxes: interrupting the degradation of public services, restoring health to good functioning, improving education and stimulating research in connection with our territory, implementing a genuine linguistic policy that would give a future to our languages and provide meaning to the equality of opportunity that no longer exists today...
There is now urgency; France is unraveling. It is crossed by multiple fractures. It certainly does not need authoritarianism and the status quo but rather openness and trust to avoid disintegration.
(1) The Dawn 2026
Yvon Ollivier
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