French politics goes upside down
FRANCE: Trust the French to make things complicated.
The result in the first round of the presidential election is a political earthquake, that will most likely result in a win for the most status-quo candidate.
It is a triumph for the far Right, that will probably expose them as still fundamentally unelectable.
The country’s two major political parties, who have shared power for more than three decades, won barely a quarter of the vote between them.
But by the end of the year one of them could, effectively, be back running the country.
Some more excitable commentators say the result means an end to French politics as we know it: the death of the Left/right divide, and the birth of a new nationalist/ globalist axis.
Well, maybe. I’m not going to nail my colours to the mast here; there have been too many twists and turns in recent votes around the world to really be confident about anything.
But remember that Benoit Hamon, the Socialist candidate, was a terrible choice by his party: too Left-wing, too meek, an unknown picked to replace a Socialist president wallowing in historically low popularity.
And remember that Republican Francois Fillon was another terrible choice: more Right-wing than the alternative choices for his party, then abruptly mired in a corruption scandal that didn’t just fail to go away: it got worse.
His base gritted its teeth and backed him, because he looked and sounded like a president, but the electorate knew he smelt bad.
The French, who have put up with Establishment corruption for years, just couldn’t stomach it any more.
In two weeks it is very likely Macron will win. The French polls seem to have been pretty accurate, and they have Macron 20 per cent – at least – in front of Le Pen.
He was the candidate she least wanted to fight. She had a much better chance against Fillon (whom the Left would have found unpalatable and stayed home) or Melenchon (some of whose extreme policies would have made hers seem reasonable).
Both the establishment party candidates, Hamon and Fillon, have encouraged their supporters to vote for Macron – in order to defeat Le Pen. They have more than half an eye on the long game. In the short term it’s a disaster.
Republicans just can’t remember the last time they weren’t in the second round of the election. And the Socialists were deserted by almost the entire population – their credibility as a major party has been cracked.
But in a few months there will be the parliamentary elections.
Macron, assuming he is president, faces the Everest of building his En Marche! movement, which didn’t exist a year ago, into a party with candidates who can win electorates all over the country.
It seems more likely the Republicans will win control of the National Assembly and the prime ministership.
That would mean a power struggle between the two (probably) men, a struggle that could end with Macron getting his way on international, external affairs, but the prime minister with control of domestic policy.
This is all supposition on extrapolation upon projection. Trust the French to make things complicated. – Fairfax