How Do You Say “Déjà Vu” in French?
A Primer on Tomorrow’s French Presidential Election
Tomorrow, people will line up at the polls to choose between two strikingly different futures for themselves and their countrymen. One future, championed by the populist candidate of the far-right endorsed by the Kremlin, would turn back the clock to a time of isolationism. Their foil, a centrist who is criticized for being too close to the banks and has the blessing of Barack Obama, believes the way onward for the country is globalization.
Don’t worry, you aren’t reliving the U.S. presidential election all over again à la Bill Murray in “Groundhog Day.” This is actually the story of the 2017 French presidential election. The names and faces may be different, but the narrative remains the same.
The Candidates
Marine Le Pen
Party: Front National
Age: 48
“In any fashion, France will soon be governed by a woman, either me or Mrs. Merkel.”
The woman in the above photo is Front National (National Front) candidate Marine Le Pen, who if elected, would become the first female president in France’s history.
The FN is a far-right populist and nationalist party founded in the early 1970s by Le Pen’s father, Jean-Marie. Presently, the FN is anti-immigrant and opposed to globalization. It believes multiculturalism has failed and seeks to remove France from the world order. Under Marine’s leadership, it has worked hard to scrub its Nazi, anti-Semitic, and homophobic past, but many French voters are old enough to remember its radical fringe history.
Unlike her rival, Le Pen is no stranger to French politics. She’s a lawyer by trade, but has been involved with her father’s party since she was 18 and eventually replaced him as its leader in 2011. However, she recently stepped down in order to focus on the election.
Emmanuel Macron
Party: En Marche!
Age: 39
“We can decide each day to spread bad news and say that France is lost. We remain a big economic and industrial power. We are in a difficult situation, we shouldn’t deny it, we should fight it. But that won’t be done against part of our own side, or against part of the French people. It will be done using all our energy.”
Marine Le Pen’s centrist rival is Emmanuel Macron, leader of the En Marche! (Onward!) political party.
En Marche! was founded in April 2016, four months before Macron stepped down from his role as Minister of Economy in President François Hollande’s administration. An independent, Macron established En Marche! as a “centrist yet socially liberal” movement aimed at transcending the traditional political divides in French politics and has been endorsed by former President Barack Obama.
Macron is a relative newcomer to politics at the young age of 39, having spent several years as a civil servant in posts such as Finance Inspector. He considers his 64 year-old wife as his closest adviser.
Where They Stand
The biggest issues that have marked the French election this year have been the stagnating economy, national security in the face of ISIS-inspired terrorism, and the future of the European Union.
On the economy, Le Pen and Macron do not necessarily diverge in any significant way. Mr. Macron, who is seen as too close to the financial sector, has ambitious plans to overhaul the French economy. Ms. Le Pen plans to set the retirement age at 60 following 40 years of work.
However, the two candidates could not be further apart on the issues related to national security and foreign policy. Le Pen’s biggest platform plank is liberating France from the European Union. She would also implement a moratorium on legal immigration, disallow illegal immigrants from legal residency, and reduce government benefits for immigrants. She is a staunch critic of NATO and seeks better relations with Russia.
In sharp contrast to his opponent, Mr. Macron is ardently pro-European and believes that France should be welcoming refugees like their neighbors in Germany. He seeks a different approach to combating terrorism in France, focusing more on community policing and encouraging the youth to explore the country’s rich culture.
What’s At Stake?
To put it bluntly, the fate of the European Union depends on the results of this election. As mentioned earlier, Marine Le Pen’s most dangerous campaign pledge calls for France exiting the Eurozone and for a referendum on leaving the European Union entirely. She has also talked about leaving NATO.
Were Marine Le Pen to win tomorrow and France to embark on egress from the European Union, the future of the European project will become significantly more nebulous. A French exit (or “Frexit”) from the EU would leave Germany as the uncontested leader of Europe — but it would also leave Angela Merkel very lonely, as no other country in Europe matches the geopolitical importance that France or even the United Kingdom hold.
Furthermore, the hypothetical Frexit would embolden Russian President Vladimir Putin in his efforts to destabilize and undermine both the European Union and NATO.
And all of this is without getting into the financial ramifications of France’s potential departure.
As of now, polls have Macron with a 61%-39% edge over Le Pen. The real worry among French analysts the impact of a high abstention rate. Voter turnout is usually very high during French elections, but this year the mood has been less enthusiastic. Two-thirds of supporters of far-left candidate Jean-Luc Mélenchon — who some in the media have nicknamed the “French Bernie Sanders” — are expected to abstain instead of supporting Macron. A quarter of the supporters of conservative candidate François Fillon are expected to do the same.
In the eyes of many French citizens, this is a choice between the lesser of two evils. They will be casting their votes against a candidate rather than for them.
By one estimate, Le Pen would need a 50% voter turnout instead of the projected 75% in order to win.
In the words of one French sour, “Le Pen doesn’t need people voting for her, she needs people not voting.”
B-B-But His Emails!
In yet another in a serial echo of the controversial 2016 U.S. presidential election, a massive hack of emails from the Macron campaign were leaked on the Internet on Friday less than 48 hours before French citizens cast their final votes.
Polls will close and the second round of voting will come to an end at 2PM EST (8PM in Paris). We recommend staying tuned to France24’s coverage of the election tomorrow as exit polls and results begin to come in. For further analysis, we recommend this excellent piece from The Economist and this user analysis on Reddit.
