Cogito Ergo Non Serviam

Macron, Le Pen in French Presidency Second Round

The first round of voting in the French presidential election was yesterday, and the results are exceedingly bad for the established political parties. Emmanuel Macron, who started his own political grouping a year or so ago, garnered the most votes with 23.9% of the ballots cast. Marine Le Pen of the fascist Front National was second with a troubling 21.4%. They will advance to the second round in thirteen days' time. For the first time since 1965, no established party of the right, center or left will be involved in the run-off. The next French revolution is underway.

The election of Mr. Macron, former member of the Socialist Party and minister under President Hollande, is almost insured thanks to the quick endorsements from other candidates. The conservative Francois Fillon (who won 19.9% for third place) has already told his supporters to back Mr. Macron. Benoit Hamon of the Socialist Party got 6.3% of the vote and finished fifth endorsed Mr. Macron. Cecile Duflot, a politician of the Popular Green Party (EELV), will back Mr. Macron "without hesitation." While the communist Jean-Luc Melanchon declined to endorse anyone, only the xenophobic part of the workers' movement will wind up voting FN. Although two weeks of campaigning remain, pollsters are comfortable predicting a 2-to-1 victory for Mr. Macron.

So, the establishment will rally around someone who is of the establishment but who saw the handwriting on the wall and set up his own shop. Where is the revolution? That comes not in two weeks but in June when the French elect a new National Assembly. As things stand right now, Mr. Macron's En Marche movement and Ms. Le Pen's Front National command three seats in the national legislature, which has 577 members. The revolution will come in figuring out how such a president, either Mr. Macron or Ms. Le Pen, can govern with such poor support in the legislature.

The 577 members will be chosen just as the president is, in a two-round vote where the top two vote-getters move onto the run-off (plus any other candidate who gets above 12.5% of the vote). Because Mr. Macron has no real party apparatus behind him, one wonders if his supporters can even field 577 candidates. So toxic is the FN in many places that the last elections in 2012 saw the Socialists withdrawing candidates in the first round to ensure a conservative, non-FN win in many districts. So, despite getting around 13% of the vote in 2012, the FN got just 2 seats. More tactical voting now will ensure the same kind of result.

With the FN held to a minimum of seats, if Ms. Le Pen were to win, her program would inevitably come up short of what her die-hard supporters want. There might be a referendum on the EU, and their might be a tightening of immigration rules and enforcement, but it is hard to see how a legislature dominated by parties so opposed to hers would let much that she wants to occur.

As for Mr. Macron, the Socialists and the Republicans (what used to be the Union pour un Mouvement Populaire) have national machines prepared for the campaign with candidates, field workers and the infrastructure to turn out the voters. En Marche has a great deal of enthusiasm but that doesn't translate into votes without a great deal of organization behind it. It remains to be seen whether his supporters can win even 100 seats.

So France will embark on another round of cohabitation, where the president is of one party or movement and the government is of another (or a coalition). The revolution is in the passing of the left-right divide in France, Europe and the world. Instead, there are internationalists and nationalists, people who support open societies and those who oppose them.

© Copyright 2017 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Ubuntu Linux.



Kensington Review Home