Why Marine Le Pen won't be the next French President
- Christopher Prince
- Mar 14, 2017
- 5 min read
The first round of the French presidential election will be held in 40 days now and the results are still very uncertain. This election is one of the most unpredictable in history and the campaign has delivered a lot of surprises no one would have imagined only six months ago.
The favourites, Alain Juppé and former President Nicolas Sarkozy, have both been wiped out in the primaries of the right-wing party Les Républicains in November to clear the way for the third man, François Fillon. In December, current President François Hollande also forfeited to leave to its party to nominate his candidate. Here again, electors of the left chose the third man, Benoît Hamon, against front runners Manuel Valls (former Prime Minister) and Arnaud Montebourg.
Three months ago, all odds were predicting for an election of François Fillon but now nothing could be less certain. In late January, the fiercely independent satirical newspaper Le Canard enchaîné revealed that Fillon, a champion of integrity in his campaign, had paid his wife more than €900,000 over more than ten years to do nothing with his parliamentary expenses. The week later, it disclosed that he did the same with two of his children even before they were graduated and that they transferred part of that money to their parents. Recently, the newspaper also disclosed that he failed to declare a €50,000 loan without interest and that he never paid for €48,500 worth of luxury suits offered to him by a mysterious “friend”. This would have been enough to disqualify him in some other countries but not in France where electors can sometimes be very forgiving. However he is no longer a front runner in the race and is very largely distanced now by both Le Pen and Macron. Moreover, he has a very conservative and rigorous pro-business agenda that few French would be willing to accept.
Now, in spite of all the uncertainties and the high probability that Marine Le Pen will be ahead in the first round, she has very slim chances to become France’s next President.
Marine Le Pen won’t be elected because French are not Britons nor Americans
First, the French elections are done in two rounds. It is not enough to be ahead in the first round, the candidate has to win an absolute majority in the second round to win. And that is very unlikely to happen for Marine Le Pen. As the say goes, “In the first round we choose, in the second round we eliminate”. And a large majority of French from the left or the right alike are ready to join to eliminate Le Pen. In all polls, more than 60% of French say they would never vote for her.
Second, French electors are not English or American electors who recently chose Brexit and Trump. France has lived through an extreme-right regime between 1940 and 1944 imposed by the German Nazis and even though most French living today were not born at that time, it is deeply rooted in the collective unconscious. They all have grandparents who told them about this terrible time. And all attempts from Marine Le Pen to “de-demonize” her party haven’t succeeded.
Marine Le Pen won’t be elected because 72% of French want to keep the euro
If we look at the ideas, it is true that Le Pen’s ideas are appealing to the “left-behind” of the globalisation: retailers, sole traders, unemployed, pensioners, young school leavers, and it is a new phenomenon: farmers and minor civil servants, and more so in the eastern fringes of the country: the north-east devastated by the closure of the mining, steel and automobile industries and the south-east were immigration is crawling.
However, Marine Le Pen wants to drop the euro currency and return to the franc to regain national sovereignty and also to have a weaker currency. But everyone knows that a franc would be devaluated by at least 30% against the euro, and that would mean a higher debt to repay and an impoverishment for all of at least 30%. She is far from having a majority for this as actually a recent poll showed that 72% of French want to keep the euro (according to a Elabe poll done on 7 and 8 March 2017 for Les Echos).
The current favourite, Emmanuel Macron, remains a mystery
So European counterparts of France can sleep (relatively) quiet as the Le Pen cataclysm of a Frexit is very unlikely.
As certain as it is she will be in the second round, as certain it is whoever will be her contender will be elected President. And that person is Emmanuel Macron as he considers himself as not being from the left nor the right, so he can gather people from both sides, he is a newcomer and not involved in affairs like Fillon.
However he is a relatively newcomer on the French politics as he was not a public figure only two and half years ago when President Hollande appointed him Minister of the Economy and his personality as well as his programme remain mysterious to many. His meetings and rallies are always a success for some question the commitment of his followers, as some come just out of curiosity.
The French people in their large majority want more involvement of the government and yet it seems they are going to elect the most free-market candidate
Another striking note is that French people in their large majority, from the left and from the right, are heirs of Jacobinism and call for more involvement of the government in the economy and in their affairs and blame liberalism and free-market economy for most of their troubles.
It is quite paradoxical in a time when the criticism of liberalism and its stronger supporter in the eyes of the French, the European Union, is so high that French are going to elect the candidate with the most liberal and Europhile agenda.
Another surprise is still not out of the way and could come from another side than expected
Hence the bets are still on and another surprise is still possible. And that surprise, as most surprise, cannot be read in the polls and could come from another side than expected.
To the left of the French political spectrum are two candidates that we could describe them as “false twins”, Hamon and Mélenchon. Both are mostly ignored by the international media because their scores in the polls, between 12 and 15%, disqualify them from being in the second round. However, their combined score is higher than Le Pen’s score or any of their contenders. And their ideas are much more in resonance with the times than those of Macron. They both want a 6th Republic to get rid of corruption, a transition toward renewable energy, the end of nuclear, more welfare and even a guaranteed minimum income for all for Hamon. They both criticise the European Union for its rigid economic dogmas but want to remain in it, except for Mélenchon who considers leaving it he does not get his way. Hamon has already secured support from the Greens and one cannot rule out one desisting for the other at the last minute or electors from the left doing tactical voting to qualify one of them.
So, even if Macron is still the safe bet, one cannot rule out a last surprise in this election, decidedly not like any other.
https://www.lesechos.fr/elections/marine-le-pen/0211864164061-trois-francais-sur-quatre-opposes-a-une-sortie-de-leuro-2071073.php
Source: Ouest France, 11 March 2017 poll, evolution from 4 March 2017
