Ambition is never modest. If modesty means to have middling success, then I can only say: I'm not interested.

What we learn from the past is that you cannot make peace against people by interfering and - and just launching a war and trying to change a regime without any political solution. So my role is first to avoid any war and try to - to frame the discussion in order to create peace and have a comprehensive peace process and preserve unintelligible and especially in this Middle East region. That's what I tried to do in Lebanon, for instance, by negotiating both with M.B.S., with the Lebanese government.

I go out and I say and do what I want - even if people may find that shocking. One could, of course, decide to be suffocated by all the pomp here in Élysée Palace. But if you decide to resist it, then you won't be suffocated.

Georg Hegel viewed the "great men" as instruments of something far greater. Hegel believes that an individual can indeed embody the zeitgeist for a moment, but also that the individual isn't always clear they are doing so.

I titled my book "Revolution." And that is exactly what it is. France is experiencing a time of transformation - in education, on the labor market and in the pensions system. We're talking about a cultural revolution.

We aren't protecting the people who most need it when those who can contribute to the country's success emigrate. Contrary to what some claim, I am not getting rid of the wealth tax to help the rich.

Germany is different from France. You are more Protestant, which results in a significant difference. Through the church, through Catholicism, French society was structured vertically, from top to bottom. I am convinced that it has remained so until today.