Emmanuel Macron was re-elected president of France last May on a platform of reform and renewal of French domestic politics and institutions. Achieving those objectives depended on him securing a compliant parliamentary majority to push his policies through in the established manner. Failure to do so in June, when his centrist alliance fell short of a majority by 38 seats, has hobbled his platform.
The older pattern of centre-left and centre -right party competition has been supplanted by more radical and polarised parties determined to make their mark. Current events show no opposition party is willing to make enduring or even short-lived alliances with Macron.
Faced with thousands of amendments to his budget, Macron has used a rare constitutional article to force it through by decree, perhaps triggering a no confidence motion from the opposition. That is made more likely by splits in his own ranks over a proposed tax on super-profits in the energy sector arising from the war in Ukraine, which his finance minister has insisted on opposing. The manoeuvre comes as his government struggles to face down strikes by strategic refinery workers as energy inflation mounts. Meanwhile wider cost of living demonstrations recall the Yellow Vest protests which disrupted his first term.
The new left-wing alliance, Nupes, led by Jean-Luc Melenchon, is encouraging these demonstrations and hoping to harness them politically, while Marine Le Pen’s National Rally identifies with their opposition to Macron’s efforts on budgetary consolidation. Both will oppose his long-standing proposals to raise the pension age from 62 to 65, which he had hoped to bring forward this autumn.
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The wind is currently more in the left’s sails as these protest movements develop. Their importance is partly explained by the National Assembly’s weakness in the French political system. The new left and right-wing politics seek social bases in these extra-parliamentary movements. Macron’s approach is being directly challenged and he has yet to find a coherent answer.