Former French president Charles de Gaulle, who led France during World War II, asked a famous question: “How can anyone rule a country with 246 cheese varieties?”
More than 60 years later, the answer seems to be: no one.
With another government on the edge of the abyss, France seems to have become ingratable. On Monday (8), François Bayrou, less than a year old, could become the fourth prime minister to leave office in less than two years. The fate of his government depends on a vote of confidence in Parliament that, if lost, would leave the president of the country, Emmanuel Macron, weaker than ever.
Bayrou summoned the vote on an attempt to approve an unpopular 44 billion euros spending cut plan, which includes the cancellation of two holidays and the freezing of expenses. He says it is a matter of “national survival”, warning that France should control its debt, which has increased “12 million euros every hour in the last 20 years.”
These can be alarmist words to stimulate the country’s rebellious political classes to take urgent measures, although budgetary reform was precisely what overthrow the predecessor, Michel Barnier. He lasted only three months in office and could not convince the French to accept radical cuts in expenses.
With France, increasingly plunged into political instability, the costs of their loans are rising. Treasury securities’ income for 10 years exceeded those of Spain, Portugal and Greece – countries that have been at the center of the eurozone debt crisis – and approach those of Italy. The economy faces growing pressure, which contradicts the image of a strong man that Macron wants to project.
And yet current instability can be attributed to Macron’s dramatic decision to call early elections last year.
Uncomfortable by the remarkable results of the May 2024 European elections, the French President summoned a parliamentary vote that led his party to lose seats to the ultra right and radical left, leaving France with a divided assembly.
But it didn’t need to be so. The fifth Republic, founded by the president of Gaulle in 1958, was designed to end the chronic instability that plagued France in the early 20th century. The new constitution gave the executive ample powers and created a majority system to avoid short -term governments. As a result, for decades, two dominant left and right parties alternated in power.
Macron exploded this order in 2017, when he became the first president -elect without the support of any of the main political parties established. Reelected in 2022, he quickly lost the parliamentary majority as voters migrated to the extremes.
After that, it was two years of fragile government, in which Macron was forced to invoke Article 49.3 of the Constitution to pass laws without vote of the Assembly. This has increased discontent between opposition parliamentarians and much of the French audience.
In the early 2024 elections, the left won the largest number of seats in the second round, but has not yet achieved the majority. The hopes of forming a minority government ended when Macron refused to accept the choice of the left to the position of Prime Minister.
Contrary to Germany or Italy, France has no tradition of forming coalitions, as politics has been shaped for more than 60 years by a system dominated by the presidency.
What happens now?
If I fell to fall, the pressure for Macron to resign will increase, although the president promised to fulfill the full mandate. Dissolve Parliament, but new elections would likely strengthen her party, the National Union, and further divide the Assembly.
Another way would be Macron to name a provisional government while evaluating a successor. The Minister of the Armed Forces, Sébastien Leconnu, and the Minister of Justice, Gérald Darmanin, would be the main quotes.
The problem is that after three failed centrist ministers, opposition parties are not willing to give one more opportunity. Both the ultra -right and the radical left signaled that they would ask for a vote of distrust immediately.
Another option would be to appoint a prime minister to the extreme of the political spectrum, but a choice of right-wing premie would be blocked on the left and vice versa.
The political climate is dark. In the case of another early parliamentary election, a recent ELABE survey suggests that the National Union would go over, with the left in second place and the center in third, far behind.
Many believe that the ultra -right will eventually gain power – if not now, then in the next presidential elections in 2027, but with little expectations that this would solve turbulence. Public trust in the political class collapsed, and the anger will be reflected in the streets on September 10, with national protests under the Bloquons Tout flag (“Let’s stop everything”).
All this happens at the worst possible time, in the means to wars in Ukraine and the Middle East. Instability in Paris is a gift for both Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Donald Trump who mock Europe’s weaknesses.
Dominique Moïsi, senior analyst of the Think Tank Institut Montaigne, based in Paris, says he doesn’t remember such a deep impasse in the fifth republic.
“De Gaulle survived the assassination attempts, there was the Algerian War, in May 1968 the slogan was ‘La France S’ennuie’ (France is bored). But today France is frustrated, furious, full of hatred against the elite,” he told to CNN.
“It seems that a change is inevitable, but I can’t see how it will happen and who will do the work. We’re in a transition phase between a system that no longer works and a system that no one can imagine.”
De Gaulle was the president who, despite his questions about cheese, inaugurated a period of relative stability in 1958 in France, with the beginning of the fifth republic. The question now is if Macron will be the president who ended everything.
