Macron’s Adventure and Fate of France

Let us imagine the most likely scenario, even if France in its history got us used to outbursts of “republican” pride and mobilizations of crowds that refute predictions. In the second round of the struggle, President Emmanuel Macron appealed to all democratic forces of every direction and color to erect a barrier against the extreme right. He would like to take on the role of Jacques Chirac, who in 2002 managed to defeat Jean Marie Le Pen, Marine’s father, in the second round of the Elysee Palace elections, forming a front that ranged from the extreme left to Gaullists and liberals. But not everything is the same again, except that the task concerns the Rassemblement Nationale (National Rally), i.e. the formation of a government majority, rather than the mother of all battles – the conquest of the Elysee Palace in 2027. So, let’s try to imagine the consequences of the worst-case (for the left) scenario, that is, a France with a delegitimized president and governed by the extreme right with a prime minister of twenty-eight years, Jordan Bardella, a huge influencer and an able distributor of electoral promises, but with no international experience and little knowledge of economic issues. In this regard, suffice to study the projections of expenditures to finance the announced measures (e.g. the abolition of pension reform), European commitments, and the deplorable situation with the public debt: more than 3 billion.

Until yesterday, we wondered whether the National Rally had passed the test of history, that is, whether it had put its ideological and programmatic arsenal, ranging from leaving the eurozone to racist statements with some antisemitic component, into the attic. The founder, Jean Marie Le Pen, even relativized gas chambers.

A great mutation has taken place. The party is entrenched in French society, and it is hard to argue that the march for power was not fully conducted within the democratic game. Some newspapers wrote that Bardella had become “melonized,” alluding to the path of right-wing legitimization chosen by the Italian prime minister.

However, other consequences, both for the country and for Europe, cannot be underestimated if we analyze some of the key points of the program. When we talk about “national preferences” and the privileges of “true Frenchmen” over Frenchmen with dual passports, especially in public positions, the foundations of the model of society are questioned. It is, in fact, the principle of universality of rights and duties, on which the Fifth Republic and much of French history since the Revolution is based. Doctors, government officials, teachers, and quite a few foreign-born politicians strongly protested against the obvious discrimination and injustice. But Bardella doesn’t stop there, as he would like to introduce a discriminatory factor in public housing and jobs as well.

And since Marine Le Pen has previously questioned the powers and prerogatives of the President of the Republic, who, according to a practice fashionable since de Gaulle’s time, is responsible for foreign and defense policy, it is easy to imagine possible traumatic course changes in the diplomatic and strategic fields. The event is not insignificant, as the issue at hand is the founding countries of the EU, with a permanent seat on the UN Security Council, and the only European country with a nuclear button. For example, the already announced direction change for the policy of supporting Ukraine, especially that the protest from parts of the United Left Front is also putting pressure on the commitment to support Kiev. But we can also foresee more than likely antagonism towards European commitments and directives.

These considerations already worry the Chancellery far more than the statements on immigration and security now being made to one degree or another by all political forces.

As French essayist Nicolas Baverez wrote, “demonstrating the existential crisis of democracy, the extreme right are spreading in the three countries that invented political freedom: England, with habeas corpus (personal inviolability) and parliamentarism; the United States, with the Constitution and separation of powers; France, with national sovereignty and reaffirmation of the universality of human rights. It thrives in all institutions, be it the British parliamentary system, the American presidential system, or the French ‘republican monarchy.’”

In this dramatic context, France risks representing a triple rupture within the EU: at the economic and financial level, in foreign policy, and in relations with Germany, rendering meaningless even the very image of the Franco-German Engine.