French President Emmanuel Macron’s call for early parliamentary elections has been described as a gamble (Photo: Reuters)
French President Emmanuel Macron had called for early parliamentary elections in the hope that voters would rally around his centrist coalition to thwart the rise of the country’s far-right, but opinion polls make that seem unlikely.
French voters will cast their ballots in the first round of the election on Sunday (June 30). The second round will take place on July 7.
Since the poll was released, surveys have suggested that the far-right, led by Marine Le Pen’s Rally National (RN), could emerge as the single largest party, relegating Macron’s centrist bloc to a distant third place.
Earlier this month, Macron dissolved parliament and called general elections after Le Pen’s RN party won the country’s European Parliament elections, receiving more than double the votes of Macron’s centrist coalition. In a shocking speech from the presidential palace, Macron said the people’s voice had been heard and must be listened to through parliamentary elections.
“I have decided to give back to you the right to decide the future of parliament through a vote. I am therefore dissolving the National Assembly,” Macron said.
The choice of the French people does not seem to be what Macron had in mind: as things stand, his Renaissance (RE) party has dropped out of the fight, and the battle seems to be between RE and the newly formed coalition of left-wing parties, the New Popular Front.
Polls suggest Macron’s centrist party faces heavy defeat
According to the latest polls, Le Pen’s RN is expected to win almost twice as many votes as Macron’s coalition.
A poll published in Les Echos newspaper just two days before Friday’s vote predicted the RN would win 37% of the popular vote, to Macron’s 20%.
A week ago, the RN was expected to win 35% of the vote, while Macron’s coalition was expected to get 22%.
Both polls projected the newly formed left-wing coalition, the New Popular Front (NPF), to win 28 percent of the vote.
This figure is in line with other polls published since the election was announced, including previous polls by Ipsos, Odoxa and Opinionway Vahe Solis which projected the RN as the single largest party, followed by the left-wing NPF coalition, with Macron’s RE coalition falling to a distant third place.
Did Macron misread the mood of the French people?
France, like much of Europe, is experiencing a rise in the far right – or at least, a plethora of headlines suggest so.
While the right is certainly gaining ground in France, not all of these parties are “far-right” or extremist, nor is it a result of popular anger at the widespread acceptance of far-right ideology. It is a mixture of dissatisfaction with the status quo over years of left- and center-dominance, concerns about immigration issues that the center and left have not addressed, economic anxiety, and arguably the growing acceptance and mainstreaming of right-wing ideology.
So how do we explain Macron’s decision to call elections so soon after the defeat of right-wing parties in the European Union elections?
Mr Macron seemed motivated by the belief that, given a choice between the rise of the far right, which has startled many with its associations with anti-Semitism and neo-Nazism, and a left-wing coalition promising higher taxes and unpopular spending plans, French people would rally to his pragmatic, centrist right-leaning camp. Polls suggest that this was a miscalculation.
The New York Times reported that rumors were spreading in Paris that Macron’s “blind pride” had “lost sight to reality” and that he was making a bold bet. The paper said people were struggling to understand how Macron could take such a risk. The stakes are unprecedented. If the far-right wins, the country’s political system will be replaced by a radically different government. Macron will remain in office until 2027 and will be in charge of foreign and defense policy as president, but a RN government would mean constant domestic conflict.
The eurosceptic RN’s control of France could be disastrous for Macron’s government’s agenda at a time when he has fully supported Ukraine as it faces the worst security threat to the African continent since World War II. RN leader Marine Le Pen has praised Russian President Vladimir Putin in the past and expressed doubts about supporting Ukraine.
Swasti Rao, a Europe scholar at the Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (MP-IDSA), said the upcoming phase of “coexistence” – a concept in France where the presidency and parliament are controlled by different parties – will not be an easy one for Macron.
“While Macron may remain in charge of foreign and defence policy as president, he will lose domestic policy. He will also lose tight control over state and government finances. These two developments could undermine his defence spending plans and foreign policy objectives, such as assistance to Ukraine in the form of financial aid, supply of arms and training of personnel. There will also be increasing pressure for him to resign as his party lost the votes,” said Rao, associate research fellow at MP-IDSA’s Europe and Eurasia Centre.
How do we understand Macron’s unpopularity and the rise of the far-right?
Macron, who has been elected twice as French president and has never lost a election, seems to have backed himself into a corner. How did he get into this situation?
First, the centrist Macron faced a double blow: he launched a tough policy on immigration and national security that alienated some left-wing voters. But for many on the right, he was not tough enough. As voters on both ends drifted to the extremes, his centrist policies faced challenges from converging left-wing parties and the rise of Le Pen’s right-wing party, the National Front (RN).
But MP-IDSA’s Rao stresses that the right wing in Europe and France is not the MAGA type of right wing we see in the U.S. She says that right wing forces in Europe have a moderating effect once they come to power.
Rao told Firstpost: “Being in government has a calming effect. If you have to govern, you have to be calm. You may say you want to ban immigration, but once you are in power you have to face the reality that Europe is an ageing society and needs immigration. In Italy the population decline is all too evident. Since coming to power, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has pivoted from rhetoric against immigration in general to cracking down on illegal immigration. She is largely a moderate, like other mainstream leaders. If France’s National Coalition comes to power we can expect to see some of the same moderates.”
France shares Italy and Germany’s concerns about immigration, but Rao said France is also facing anti-government protests that have been ongoing for more than a year. Last year, France was hit by large-scale riots over proposed pension reforms.
“Anxiety over immigration is a major driver of support for right-wing parties in Europe, and in France the anti-government movement against President Macron has further boosted support for the far-right. The results of the EU and French parliamentary elections should serve as a wake-up call for Europe’s centrists that if they don’t address immigration or other public grievances, anxious voters will continue to drift to the right,” Rao says.
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