In the seven years since he swept to power on a mission to rejuvenate France’s jaded political landscape, President Emmanuel Macron has developed a reputation for risk-taking.
But in calling snap legislative elections after a trouncing in the European elections at the hands of the far-right National Rally (RN) he has taken his biggest gamble yet.
And one, according to analysts and opinion polls, which risks not paying off at all.
“History will see this as one of the most absurd and unconsidered decisions in the history of the (post-war) Fifth Republic,” Vincent Martigny, professor of political science at Nice University, told AFP.
“I think it’s going to be an absolute disaster,” he added, comparing it to former British prime minister David Cameron’s infamous decision to hold a Brexit referendum in 2016 to try tamp down euroscepticism in his party, which ended up in Britain voting to leave the European Union.
Seeking ‘silent majority’
Within Macron’s own camp, the shockwaves are still reverberating following his decision to dissolve parliament which he took with only a handful of advisors, informing his Prime Minister Gabriel Attal at the last minute.
“It was a senseless decision,” the former head of Macron’s parliamentary party, Gilles Le Gendre, told Le Monde this week, calling it “risky, needless and dangerous.”
Macron, who had struggled to implement his agenda since losing his parliamentary majority in June 2022 elections, defended the move as necessary to achieve a “clarification” of the political landscape.
On Tuesday, he again expressed confidence that a “silent majority” of voters would back his candidates to prevent “disorder.”
According to an IFOP poll for the LCI television channel, the RN would take 33% of the vote in the first round of the election on June 30, the New Popular Front (NFP) left-wing alliance 28% and Macron’s ruling centrists just 18%.
The Elysee’s strategy appears staked on the two-round system for French legislative elections, hoping voters will rally against extremes in the run-offs on July 7 after the initial voting on June 30.
It remains uncertain — although not excluded — that the RN can win an absolute majority of the 577 seats in the National Assembly.
A hung parliament is another possible outcome and that could, under some scenarios, allow Macron to benefit from the ensuing chaos.
‘Trap of own making’
But Macron, who prides himself on being a “maitre des horloges” (a “master of clocks” who sets the agenda at a time of his choosing), may have miscalculated.
He gambled that the left, riven with in-fighting over the war in Gaza before the European elections, would not be able to mend fences in time for the parliamentary election. That would allow his centrists to present themselves as the best bulwark against the far-right.
But by trying to trip up his rivals, the president “fell into a trap of his own making,” Le Monde wrote on June 14.
Four days after he called the election, the centre-left spurned Macron’s overtures to join the hard-left France Unbowed in the NFP, which polls suggest now represents the strongest redoubt against the far-right.
Macron’s response has been to reach for his 2017 playbook, presenting the hard left and far right as two sides of the same “extremist” coin and warning that economic chaos looms in the event of his party’s defeat.
French political analyst Chloe Morin said the two-round nature of the system could in the end work against Macron if he fails to rally moderate voters in round one.
“This could lead them having to decide between the left and the RN in the second round, giving the RN a chance for an absolute majority,” she told L’Opinion journal.
France braces as election campaign begins with a bangFrance braces as election campaign begins with a bang
‘Nothing short of a miracle’
Attal is leading the government’s campaign, with the far less popular Macron taking a back seat. Candidates from his Renaissance party have opted not to put his picture on their campaign material.
“We need nothing short of a miracle” to win, a campaign official from Renaissance told AFP.
According to Le Monde, tensions are rising in the Elysee Palace with Macron railing against the “spirit of defeat” he sees coming from some staff members.
Martigny said he saw “no chance at all for Macron to win.”
Macron has ruled out resigning whatever the outcome but in the event of the RN emerging the clear winner, Martigny said, “we can imagine that it might be his only honourable option.”
