page_title: Nicolas Sarkozy
section_title: Public image
hierarchical_section_title: Nicolas Sarkozy / Public image
caption_attribution_description: Русский: В перерыве матча Президент России Владимир Путин кратко пообщался с иностранными гостями, прибывшими на Чемпионат мира по футболу 2018 года
context_page_description: Nicolas Paul Stéphane Sarközy de Nagy-Bocsa is a retired French politician who served as President of France and ex officio Co-Prince of Andorra from 16 May 2007 until 15 May 2012.
  Born in Paris, he is of 1/2 Hungarian Protestant, 1/4 Greek Jewish, and 1/4 French Catholic origin. Mayor of Neuilly-sur-Seine from 1983 to 2002, he was Minister of the Budget under Prime Minister Édouard Balladur during François Mitterrand's second term. During Jacques Chirac's second presidential term he served as Minister of the Interior and as Minister of Finances. He was the leader of the Union for a Popular Movement party from 2004 to 2007.
  He won the 2007 French presidential election by a 53.1% to 46.9% margin to Socialist Ségolène Royal. During his term, he faced the late-2000s financial crisis, the Russo-Georgian War and the Arab Spring. He initiated the reform of French universities and the pension reform. He married Italian-French singer-songwriter Carla Bruni in 2008 at the Élysée Palace in Paris.
  In the 2012 election, François Hollande, candidate of the Socialist Party, defeated Sarkozy by a 3.2% margin.
context_section_description: Sarkozy was named the 68th best-dressed person in the world by Vanity Fair, alongside David Beckham and Brad Pitt. However, Sarkozy has also been named as the third worst-dressed person in the world by GQ, a listing that has been disputed. Beside publicising, at times, and at others, refusing to publicise his ex-wife Cécilia Ciganer-Albéniz's image, Sarkozy takes care of his own personal image, sometimes to the point of censorship—such as in the Paris Match affair, when he allegedly forced its director to resign following an article on his ex-wife and her affair with Publicis executive Richard Attias, or pressures exercised on the Journal du dimanche, which was preparing to publish an article concerning Ciganer-Albéniz's decision not to vote in the second round of the 2007 presidential election. In its edition of 9 August 2007, Paris Match retouched a photo of Sarkozy in order to erase a love handle. His official portrait destined for all French town halls was done by Sipa Press photographer Philippe Warrin, better known for his paparazzi work.
  Former Daily Telegraph journalist Colin Randall has highlighted Sarkozy's tighter control of his image and frequent interventions in the media: "he censors a book, or fires the chief editor of a weekly." Sarkozy is reported by Reuters to be sensitive about his height (believed to be 165 cm (5 ft 5 in)). The French media have pointed out that Carla Bruni frequently wears flats when in public with him. In 2009, a worker at a factory where Sarkozy gave a speech said she was asked to stand next to him because she was of a similar height to Sarkozy. (This story was corroborated by some trade union officials.) This was the subject of a political row: the president's office called the accusation "completely absurd and grotesque", while the Socialist Party mocked his fastidious preparation.
  Sarkozy lost a suit against a manufacturer of Sarkozy voodoo dolls, in which he claimed that he had a right to his own image.
  Sarkozy was nicknamed as Hyper-president or hyperpresident  by some French media after his 2007 election as president. It is a portmanteau of hyper and president to insist on the desire of Sarkozy to control everything. Whereas in the history of the Fifth Republic, the successive presidents were traditionally focused on the foreign policy of the country and on international relations, leaving the Prime Minister and the government to determine the domestic policy, as the Constitution states it, Nicolas Sarkozy appeared to determine both the foreign and domestic policy. Some compared Nicolas Sarkozy to Napoléon Bonaparte and Louis XIV. Indeed, he appointed a very close friend of his, François Fillon, as a Prime Minister. François Fillon was accused of being an instrument of the President's power.
  The biopic The Conquest is a 2011 film that dramatizes Sarkozy's rise to power, with candid portrayals of Sarkozy himself, Chirac and Villepin. It was shown at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival.
caption: Sarkozy with Mohammad bin Salman, Gianni Infantino and Juan Carlos Varela at the FIFA World Cup in Russia, 14 June 2018
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