It is now
almost four months since Emmanuel Macron was elected President of France. On
Friday of last week he signed the executive orders reforming the French labour code
that he promised during his campaign and that his government has been preparing
all summer. The opposition parties are still struggling to find their feet after their
defeat at the presidential and parliamentary elections and events of the
past week have only made their divisions more visible.
This Sunday,
September 24th, as Germany goes to the polls to elect its new parliament,
it is worth noting that the French government under Edouard Philippe, unusually
for France, looks a lot like Angela Merkel’s grand coalition that has governed
Germany for the past four years. After
splitting both the traditional left and right-wing parties and bringing together
the moderates of both, Emmanuel Macron is governing from the centre in much the
same way.
For the
moment, the forces opposed to him are still reeling from their defeat in the
elections. The Parti Socialiste, after
failing miserably to make the run-off in the presidential election and losing a
considerable number of MPs in the parliamentary elections, has been reduced to
putting its now oversized headquarters up for sale and is ruled by a 16-person
committee. It has said nothing of note about labour market reform. On the
radical left, Jean-Luc Mélenchon has styled himself as the only real opposition
to Macron and has been attracting media attention by gimmicky tactics in parliament
and outlandish statements to the party faithful. Just four months after a hotly
contested set of democratic elections, he rallied supporters in a street demonstration
in Paris on Saturday and claimed, in all seriousness, that true democracy was
only expressed in the street because it was protestors in the streets who had
toppled the Kings of France and the Nazis! Until he can find something more credible
to say, he is unlikely to mobilise many voters beyond his hard core of unquestioning
supporters.
The Front National, that could have been
expected to form an opposition from the far right, is also in disarray, unsure
of if its future path and leadership and riven by ideological divisions. Florian
Philippot, its number 2 until the end of last week and the architect of the
party’s newly won respectability, but also its ill fated “ditch the Euro” platform
at the presidential election, announced his departure from the party on Friday
after being stripped of his powers as vice-president. A lot of the party’s rank
and file was never happy with the ideological shift that he persuaded Marine le
Pen to adopt and wants to revert to its former focus on identity and
immigration. The fact that Philippot is gay never endeared him to many party activists
either, whose xenophobic, homophobic and anti-elitist leanings were naturally
antagonistic to a gay, ENA-educated and media-savvy vice-president. Many activists and voters would like nothing more
than for Marine Le Pen’s niece, Marion Maréchal le Pen, to lead the party into
the next elections. However, having announced just three months ago that she is
leaving politics altogether, it is doubtful she will oblige, at least not yet. This
being said, Marine Le Pen’s disastrous performance in the run-off presidential debate
in May still rankles and has surely compromised her chances of contesting the
next presidential election in 2022, especially if Emmanuel Macron stands for a
second term.
Which
leaves the rest of the right-wing opposition of “Les Républicains”. Now that three of its leading members are pillars
of the government, the party is in the throes of redefining itself and seems to
have split three ways. Some members have
formed what they call a “constructive” wing, offering qualified support for the
government’s reform programme. Others have formed up behind Valérie Pécresse, current
President of the Ile-de-France regional council and call themselves “Free” (Libres). It is not yet clear how they
wish to differentiate themselves from the other parts of their party. The more
hard-line members consider that only a resolutely right-wing opposition party
can be a credible alternative to government.
Their standard bearer is Laurent Wauquiez, who passes for a disciple of
Nicolas Sarkozy and who is likely to be elected to lead the party at their forthcoming
congress in December. It will be interesting to see what the party’s attitude
will be to those of its members who are now government ministers.
Whether
this clarification, when it comes, will lead to greater permeability between Les Républicains and the Front National remains to be seen, and
ultimately of course, it is voters who will decide. But as the next national elections
are not until 2019 and 2020, there will be a lot of manoeuvring between now
and then, starting with the parliamentary debates on next year’s budget in
October.
For the
moment though, it looks as if Macron and Philippe have a firm hold on the centre
ground, both in government and in parliament, with opposition from all sides
either muted or lacking credibility.
Notwithstanding Mélenchon’s more outrageous statements, there will surely
be challenges in the streets to the forthcoming announced reforms of unemployment
insurance and vocational training, not to speak of the highly contentious issue
of pensions. All three could be explosive. As often happens in France, a spark
from an unexpected quarter could ignite huge popular protests. The government
is said to fear more than anything demonstrations by university and high-school
students or protesting lorry drivers blocking the country's roads and motorways. Macron’s future - and the future path of France - will depend crucially
on whether he can exploit the window of opportunity that has opened
up before him and demonstrate the necessary political skills to coax through the
reforms on which he has staked his reputation.