Amongst economic powers, France is the country where reality is most at odds with appearances.

To believe their rhetoric, the French are disdainful of free markets, reluctant modernists still attached to 19th century ideals of egalitarian social collectivism. Belying this image, though, are the facts: France is the world's fifth-largest economy (with productivity higher than that of the United States as measured by the World Bank), and, rather than the victim of globalization, one of its prime players (witness the recent Alactel “merger” with Lucent).

The mass demonstrations throughout France this spring which successfully blocked changes in national labor law were a measure of how divergent these two points of view are.

In this, France is not alone. A resentment for the ongoing transformations caused by globalization (in some cases the actual loss of jobs, in others the disappearance of a romanticized way of life) is a potent political undercurrent worldwide, including the U.S.

Such sentiments, and the reactionary backlash they could trigger, need to be addressed before they seriously threaten the prevailing consensus that under girds liberalized trade policies. How? The French response is instructive.

One answer French technocrats have chosen as a route to job creation, in addition to more flexible hiring practices, is assertively to pursue foreign direct investment. There's nothing new about this (au contraire, France ranks in the first tier of FDI in the EU) but, where before there was a certain reluctance to be too public or aggressive in seeking the interest of foreign investors, today there is no such inhibition.

I was in Paris last month, between the first and second general strikes, to call upon Invest in France, the agency charged with this mission. In their offices, in a grand 18th century gilded townhouse on a private street, there was no sense of crisis. If anything, the concern expressed by press officer Cynthia Odsi, was just the opposite.

“The French people are always a bit late in implementing something, but once they decide they go quickly.” She notes two examples: cell phones and Internet broadband, technologies the French were slow to adopt but, in a matter of several years, have become leaders. In infrastructure, the French are reaping rewards today from big bets made several decades back on nuclear power and national highway networks.

Such upbeat patter is what you expect from economic development-types. What I wasn't expecting, was the quiet but unmistakable sub-text in Madam Odsi's commentary: that the debate about how France should position itself for the future was pretty much over, at least amongst the technocrats. The new rules of the game-privatization of the great state firms, pension reform, social security reforms, and tax incentives skewed to nurture innovative companies and reward investors-are largely in place.

The technocrats may know what needs to be done but the same can't yet be said for the politicians. Or the electorate.

If the roadmap has been staked out, getting there requires political leadership (“we need some courageous guy”). The people say they are not opposed to reform in general, but “when you want to touch something it's very sensitive,” says Madam Odsi (pointing out the chauvinistic outcry that blocked the Swiss company Nestle from acquiring native Danone, the manufacturer of the yogurt that has nourished French babies for generations).

Yet even the French, who disdain illogic but take pride in their cultural uniqueness, acknowledge that the era of protected markets (and social classes living off them) is fast being rendered untenable by globalization. The question is whether they have the courage to act on that realization.