Amid important issues of pension, taxation, jobs, Ukraine war and immigration, people in France are voting to elect their next government on 30 June and 7 July.
The two-round election is being held much ahead of its original schedule – it was actually due in 2027.
But French President Emmanuel Macron took a surprise decision to hold “snap elections” after a stunning defeat in the recently held European Union (EU) elections.
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“I cannot act as if nothing happened,” Macron said on national TV, after his centrist Renew alliance was trounced by the far-right National Rally (abbreviated RN for French “Rassemblement National”) party.
Macron said it’s time for France’s people and politicians to build a new coalition if they do not align with the far-right “extremist fever”.
However, it’s a strange time for France to hold a snap election, while the country is in the middle of preparing to host the Paris Olympics from 26 July to 11 August.
Moreover, opinion polls are indicating a clear lead for the far-right RN party, hinting that France is heading towards a complete political paralysis.
Rough road ahead for Macron
Macron’s defeat is very much a given, according to the French press and election watchers.
“The (truth) is that in seven years, the presidential party has gone from having the largest majority in the National Assembly in 2017, to a relative majority in 2022, and now a possible move into opposition,”
Julien Robin, French parliament specialist.
“We will have to see what happens after these general elections,” Robin told The Conversation in an interview. “Right now, the four blocs dominating French politics are the traditional left and right, the Macronian centrism and the far-right RN.”
But why is France headed towards a fractured parliament?
France has a unique system of governance described as a “hybrid regime” with a president but also a powerful prime minister.
This is unlike the UK, India, or Bangladesh, where the head of state is elected directly by the people, giving the head of state visibility and legitimacy.
In France, the system is more presidential, but is also governed by a strong parliament.
So, if the new prime minister gets chosen from the RN party – as the polls are predicting – it would mean two completely clashing ideologies governing France: RN is far-right, while the president’s Renaissance party is centrist.
“France is going to become ungovernable,” according to most French newspapers.
President Macron has even warned of “civil war” if far-right wins.
The far-right “reduces people to their religion or origin… pushing them towards civil war,” Macron said in an interview with the podcast Generation Do It Yourself.
Likely scenarios
An analysis by the Swiss Lombard Odier private investment bank predicts that there is a 75% chance that France will see a hung parliament after the 2024 snap elections.
There could be a minority government led by the RN party, which essentially means that the domestic policy would get gridlocked.
The RN party has particularly strong views on immigration, and openly supports “national preference”. It wants to repeal the only health insurance available to undocumented migrants and cut any spending that “favours immigration”.
“It’s been 30 years the French have not been listened to on this subject (of curbing immigration),” said the RN party’s 28-year-old president John Bardella at a recent press conference.
Bardella is poised to become the next prime minister of France if the first scenario plays out.
The second scenario with a 15-20% chance given by the Lombard Odier analysis, is a coalition government led by RN. Even in this case, immigration and border controls would gain prominence.
Economically, a far-right led coalition government could also result in trade frictions and negative impact on markets.
See the whole analysis here.
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Muslims fear far-right election win
According to local French media, fear is growing among the Muslim community in France if the RN party comes to war.
“The RN has made no secret of its hostility to ritual slaughter, which would effectively ban halal and kosher meat,” reports the state-owned Radio France Internationale (RFI). “A bill it tabled in 2021 called for bans on ‘Islamist ideologies’ and on the wearing of headscarves in all public places.”
The most likely next prime minister of France, Bardella said this week on French TV that his party “wanted to ban the wearing of the Muslim headscarf in public and described the hijab ‘as a tool of discrimination’ between men and women and not desirable in our society.”
For many, even these polices do not come into effect immediately, it would mean a “legitimisation” of hostility against Muslims in the French society.
“If there is an openly racist party in charge of the state, Islamophobic acts will multiply,” RFI report notes.
France is home to one of Europe’s largest Muslim communities, with around six million people of Islamic faith or background.
What happens next?
There are 577 seats in the National Assembly. For an absolute majority a party needs 289.
On the first round of the elections on 30 June, French voters will choose one of the candidates running in their constituency.
If a candidate manages to get more than 50% of the votes with at least 25% of voters registered, they automatically win.
But if no candidate wins an absolute majority, a second round is organised for 7 July.
The candidate with the most votes in the second round wins a seat in the National Assembly.
Whoever wins, Macron has said he will not resign as president, as these are not presidential elections and his term continues till 2027.
If Macron’s party loses, and either National Rally (far-right) or the New Popular Front (left) win, then France would enter into the system known as “cohabitation”, or power-sharing, when the president of one party heads the state and another party runs the government.
This is what leads to trouble in governing the country, as the prime minister and the cabinet take care of domestic policy, while the president is responsible for foreign and defence policy.
Centrist, far-right cohabitation
In the past few years, there has been growing influence of the far-right in French politics.
The RN party is led by Bardella and represented in parliament by Marine Le Pen, who has fought for the presidency three times but lost – even though each time, she gained more votes.
Now her party is projected to become the biggest in France, even if it doesn’t achieve an absolute majority.
The RN party has capitalized on a wave of discontent among voters who are dissatisfied with the state of economic development and immigration, among other issues.
So, if there is a cohabitation of a centrist and far-right governance, then Bardella and Le Pen will be in the driver’s seat at the parliament.
It is crucial for them to keep up their performance till the 2027 elections.
Macron still gets to decide who will be the prime minister, according to the Constitution. But his decision needs to suitably reflect the majority make-up of the new Assembly. So he will find it hard to choose someone other than Bardella as the prime minister.
Bardella however, has said openly he “doesn’t want to be the president’s assistant”, stressing that he would strive hard for his party’s absolute majority.
So even before the cohabitation can be worked out, it is finding itself in troubled waters.
What it brings for Macron and the future of France will remain to be seen once the results come out on the evening of 7 July after the second round of voting.
Till then, the shape of the new government hangs in the balance.
