French economist Thomas Piketty has turned down the Legion of Honor, the country’s highest distinction, on the grounds that the government should not decide who is honorable.
Piketty, author of the bestselling Capital in the Twenty-First Century, which has become compulsory reading for world leaders, added: “They’d be better off concentrating on boosting growth in France and Europe.”
Piketty, 43, made the comments to reporters after learning that he had been nominated for the rank of chevalier, the Legion’s top rank which rewards “eminent merit” demonstrated over more than 25 years’ professional activity.
“I don’t believe it’s the role of the government to decide who is honorable,” he said.
Others who received the Legion of Honor in the New Year’s Day announcement included French novelist Patrick Modiano, who won the 2013 Nobel Prize in Literature.
Piketty is not alone in rejecting the award, which has been turned down by many illustrious personalities including Albert Camus, Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir. Former leader of the pro-Socialist CFDT union Edmond Maire used language similar to Piketty of his own refusal: “It’s not up to the state to decide who is honourable or not.”
In the past, Piketty has described French President Francois Hollande, who on Wednesday night boasted that the government had undertaken “grand reforms” in 2013, as “rather bad.” In his New Year’s Eve message, Hollande urged French citizens to seize the initiative and bring down unemployment while liberalizing reforms are implemented.
Addressing the business community, Hollande said: “Our joint obligation is to fight unemployment.”
In his latest work, the economist addresses the roots and consequences of inequality.
Modern capitalism leads to unsustainable levels of inequality, which then undermine the meritocratic values on which democratic societies are based, he said, and that concentrated wealth would increasingly be in the hands of those who already have capital in free-market economies, with potentially explosive social consequences.
Piketty was economic adviser to Hollande’s ex-partner and former French presidential candidate Segolene Royal in 2007.
However, during a red-carpet visit to Washington in April he complained that his ideas were better received outside France than in his homeland where he said he received a “narrowly political reception.”
Capital in the Twenty-First Century was named business book of last year by the Financial Times, and described by New York Times columnist Paul Krugman as “the most important economics book of the year, and maybe of the decade.”
However, the economist’s personal life also made headlines last year.
It emerged last May that his ex-partner, novelist and former French minister of culture and communications Aurelie Filippetti, had lodged a complaint with police which led to him being investigated for domestic violence while they were in a relationship in 2009.
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