French Election: Discontent, Baggage and Re-alignment

By Henry Srebrnik, [Halifax, NS] Chronicle Herald

Emmanuel Macron beat Marine Le Pen in the run-off French presidential election May 7, by the wide margin of 66 to 34 per cent.

I see two lessons from this outcome.

First of all, one third of French voters either abstained or turned in blank ballots. The turnout of about 75 per cent was the worst since 1969.

These are by definition not happy campers; most are probably left-wing people, especially those who voted for Jean-Luc Mélenchon in the first round. They are unhappy with Macron’s globalist, big business vision, but would not cast a ballot for a perceived fascist.

Of those who did cast ballots, more than one third supported a far-right party linked by its opponents to anti-Semitism, xenophobia, the collaborationist Second World War Vichy regime, and so on.

This couldn't have happened without the post-2008 economic crisis in Europe that is making so many people desperate.

Macron won by a landslide in Paris and its affluent suburbs, but Le Pen’s anti-globalization platform was popular in places where deindustrialization has led to high poverty, low wages, and unemployment. It’s a warning the victors would be wise not to ignore as they celebrate.

Secondly, if an anti-globalist, anti-European Union party wants to win the next French presidential election five years from now -- assuming Macron doesn't do much to improve things -- the National Front needs to be dissolved.

It carries too much baggage, including Marine Le Pen’s own name. Her father, Jean-Marie Le Pen, who founded the party in 1972, was virtually a Holocaust denier.

In Macron, the centrist political establishment came up with a new face, a supposed independent, in effect jettisoning both the Socialists and Gaullists; the right has to do likewise.

After all, unlike in Anglo-Saxon states, in France parties are less stable and their names mean far less. The Gaullists have had a number of different party names since the founding of the Fifth Republic in 1958.

Mélenchon also created a new movement, though it was just another political version of the old Communist Party, which backed him.

Donald Trump couldn’t have beaten Hillary Clinton if he could have been actually linked to, say, historically segregationist parties.

Without the names Le Pen and National Front, but with much of the same geist and political agenda, the result might have been much closer, perhaps no more than 55-45 per cent for Macron. The opposition couldn’t have as effectively attacked someone with no “past” the same way they did with Marine Le Pen.

Macron now faces a new hurdle: Under the French semi-presidential system, he must share power with the National Assembly. Elections for that body are scheduled for June 11 and 18; like the presidential election, it’s a two-round system.

At the moment, five parliamentary groupings hold seats, along with 25 independents. Macron’s new “En Marche!” movement must somehow gain enough seats in the 577-seat chamber to govern effectively. As of now, he has none.