The Curious Defeat of Emmanuel Macron

According to Bruno Cautrès and Luc Rouban, CNRS-affiliated researchers at the CEVIPOF, disenchantment with political personnel has never before been as pronounced as it has been since the election of Emmanuel Macron in 2017. They draw on the 12th wave of the annual “France Divided” survey to deliver their analysis. The survey was carried out by Ipsos for the Cevipof, the Fondation Jean Jaurès, the Institut Montaigne and the newspaper, Le Monde.

A strange paradox has become apparent as the French political crisis deepens: not since the Yellow Vests movement has Emmanuel Macron been so unpopular and so politically fragile. And yet, events today seem to validate his initial diagnosis in 2017. At that time, Macron was elected on the basis of a promise he made to go beyond traditional political cleavages, together with the wish he expressed to reform a political class and intermediary bodies deemed at that time to be ineffective in dealing with the expectations of the French public. Seven years later, the French find themselves confronted with a dysfunctional Fifth Republic: a parliament that remains a central player at the heart of the system but that is nonetheless incapable of forming stable majorities; a government forced to adjust its draft budget at the whim of the Rassemblement National's threats of censorship; a deeply divided Left struggling to capitalize on the momentum of the Nouveau Front Populaire and a fragile “common base” that governs without its choices having been validated upstream by the sovereign people. 

The unexpected effects of the dissolution thus give disturbing resonance to Emmanuel Macron's initial analysis that it is politics itself that is holding France back, and politics which lies at the heart of the national drama. The latest wave of the France Divided survey shows that in the eyes of French citizens, it is indeed the political system, and particularly the political class, that has become the main problem in France. Not since 2017 have political figures been so disavowed by public opinion: 83% of those surveyed believe that politicians act primarily for their own personal interests, and 78% believe that their own ideas as voters are not adequately represented.  Disapproval of how political parties in the Assemblée Nationale behave is strong. With an approval rating of 37% the Rassemblement National fares best on this indicator, ahead of Les Ecologistes (32%), Les Républicains and the Parti Socialiste (30% each), Renaissance (24%), the PCF and Horizons (22% each) and finally, the party that garners the highest rate of disapproval, La France Insoumise (19%).

Emmanuel Macron could certainly be criticized for dissolving the Assemblée Nationale at the wrong time, and/or without well-founded motives, for having chosen a presidential reading of the Fifth Republic that favours vertical power and for having fermented political chaos. However, another reading is also possible: that of Macron as a Socrates-style leader giving birth to a taboo in French society - that of a political class incapable of changing the country for the better, of facing up to the challenges of globalization, global warming, new technologies and migration. Without stretching the data processed from the France Divided survey too far, the image of the country's political personnel and parties can be summed up as that of a caste that spends its time talking the talk without providing solutions, without acknowledging its mistakes and without being able to change the everyday life of ordinary citizens. A gesturing caste pointing to the France of the Olympic Games or the restoration of Notre-Dame, both of which demonstrated the country’s ability to “to form a nation” and achieve concrete, visible, empirical results. Paradoxically, these two non-political events best embody Macron’s promise of effective French savoir-faire, transcending all divisions.

On the other hand, the failure of Macronism to transform the political arena is now obvious. The France Divided survey shows the extent to which his electorate remains highly distinctive, standing out as it does from all others. This is the only electorate to believe that globalization represents an opportunity for France (62% vs. 36% on average), that France is not in decline (41% vs. 13%), and that its future is full of new possibilities (66% vs. 40%). It is also the only electorate that combines a type of economic liberalism that is more moderate than that of Les Républicains voters with a cultural liberalism close to that of the Left, particularly on the issue of immigration. However, this search for an original equilibrium has not won over the working or middle classes. It appeals to university graduates and executive classes alone.

The democratic stakes of the 2024 electoral sequence are thus extraordinary in the full sense of the term. The question of whether public action is effective or not has made a comeback, fuelling the advance of the Rassemblement National and the vacillations of Michel Barnier. The France Divided survey shows that the idea of a relative majority in the Assemblée, which would enable real debate and compromise, has lost its appeal: it was originally supported by 70% of respondents in 2022 and subsequently by just 53% in 2024, with a preference today for an absolute majority deemed to be faster and more efficient. This is precisely the kind of result that Macronism was all about. A strange defeat for Emmanuel Macron, who has finally forced France to look at itself.

Analysis published in Le Monde on December 4, 2024