[supergarfield]

Not the OP---I agree they're very different, but there's a striking resemblance in how both countries think their political and intellectual culture is civilization's crowning achievement and the entire world should adopt it. (Of course, the US has been more able to do export theirs than France in recent decades.) IMO this shapes both countries' relationships to the rest of the world.

I have less first hand experience, but I also think the level of distrust in the government (esp. central / federal) among rural populations is particularly high in both countries by developed nation standards.

[PoignardAzur]

> I have less first hand experience, but I also think the level of distrust in the government (esp. central / federal) among rural populations is particularly high in both countries by developed nation standards.

I don't think they're really comparable.

The most obvious example is policing. In the US, local law enforcement has a lot of independence and discretion, to the point "sheriff has to grudgingly cooperate with out-of-touch FBI guy" is a literary cliché. In France, in rural areas the default expectation is that gendarmerie (basically centralized military police) will handle most serious problems.

In France the central state is pervasive in a lot of areas that are either local or privatized in the US.

[dudul]

I couldn't disagree more. International policies are completely different in the US and in France. The US are extremely interventionist and some may say "aggressive", this is not at all the French doctrine. It was very clearly apparent during the 2nd war in Iraq. France ignored NATO for decades until recently.

As for a more philosophical point of view, again, disagree. Universalism is indeed a concept of the French Republic while the US vision is exceptionalism. These are complete opposite.

Finally, I guess there is a certain amount of distrust of the government in rural areas (is it specific to France and the US?) but where in the US the expectation is that the government should be doing as little as possible, in France the expectation is that it should do much more to help/support people. The relationships of Americans and French to their respective government are complete opposite again. In France, people expect a lot from the government who is supposed to be the great equalizer.