Here are Macron’s next moves after the win against Le Pen
Macron's challenges and plans after his victory in the presidential ballot. Enrico Martial's point
“ The blow passed so close that he dropped his hat ”: the sentence is from Victor Hugo and reappeared in Emmanuel Macron's 58.54% comments in the presidential elections in France on April 24th. In the messages of the European and Western heads of state and government, we read the narrow escape, for " The nightmare Le Pen ", as the headline of the Frankfurter Allgemeine . The latest polls – released by the Belgian media – were reassuring, but close to the first round the outcome was not a foregone conclusion. Arguments and anger recalled certain moments of Brexit or the assault on the Capitol in Washington, of Orban's Hungary or of populism and nationalism in Italy at least of the first Conte government. Elite against the people, city against campaign, social media against newspapers, with impulses in various countries, from the yellow vests to the attack on the rule of law in Poland, from the AFD in Germany to the government of Janez Janša in Slovenia, which by combination has lost just last Sunday elections.
Until last February, before the invasion of Ukraine, it seemed a European and Western phenomenon, with a serious but only complementary contribution from the Russian side. Today the perception is different, with the war directly the issues of national, European and Western security come into play. Almost all the newspapers hailed Macron's victory as a factor of stability and security for the whole West and for Europe.
Emmanuel Macron begins his second term with this advantage, with Marine Le Pen's far right placed by the international context outside any possibility of government, as a subject too close to Putin's Russia. These are sufficient arguments to draw a line, as did for example on August 20, 2019 theWashington Examiner (conservative and often on neo-populist or Trumpian lines) regarding Matteo Salvini.
However, this advantageous element is confronted with a French political and social landscape as stretched as the string of a violin, all to be reassembled. Marine Le Pen in the second round obtained 41.46% of the votes, with a majority in 30 departments, compared to two in 2017. France has social and territorial divisions, between executives and employees, between city and countryside, between north-east and west. In the first round of elections, in the political debate even more radical ideas and themes began to circulate with Eric Zemmour than the Lepenian ones, a result certainly more important than the 7% obtained in the votes. They found space in CNews , the French-style Fox news of the very rich Vincent Bolloré, who is repositioning to the right, even in a radical key, various French media, from Europe 1 to the Journal du Dimanche .
On the other hand, there is a strong radicalism on the left, which gathered around Jean-Luc Mélenchon, who in the first round reached 21.95% of the votes, 7.7 million. Marine Le Pen sought consensus for the second round also in that area, in the rejection at all costs of the outgoing president.
Emmanuel Macron – like all European and Western countries by now – will have to manage and perhaps de-mine the political and social field, with its anger and drifts. In the last two weeks, only a few hints have been heard: “leave no one behind”, invent a new political approach, listen and involve.
We see a resumption of dialogue with intermediate bodies (for example the trade unions), interventions on incomes, perhaps coalition approaches, to remedy the lack of representation in the territory of his party, La République en Marche. Perhaps it is still too little. Legislative elections will take place on 12 and 19 June next, in which a new majority of the president must be built. Marine Le Pen will try to elect its own patrol, for the moment without the contribution of Eric Zemmour, while Jean-Luc Mélenchon intends to renew the basis for a frontal opposition to the president, if not to reach its own, but unlikely, majority of left, to be imposed in cohabitation with the president.
For Macron, the first "construction site" appears to be economic and social. In favor of "purchasing power", from the summer there will be increases in pensions, in the salaries of the civil service, in social minimums, the confirmation of interventions on energy costs. In addition to short-term measures, reforms will continue. Some in implementation help to reduce tensions, such as the differentiated autonomy of the "3Ds" law (to be studied also in Italy), the local service counter, born in response to the yellow vests, a certain activism of the current minister for cohesion Joël Giraud, various territorial projects of the French PNRR. Others are in preparation, on school, health, justice, a bit like in every member country, including Italy. Perhaps participation exercises will return, similar to the 2019 post-yellow vest dialogue, or on the type of the civic convention on climate. The reform that intends to move the retirement age to 65 will be soft and step-by-step, but will allow for further anger.
The second construction site will be political, and it has been noted how much they are all very buttoned up about it. Meanwhile, the positioning of Nicolas Sarkozy in favor of Macron seemed a signal both for the Républicains to disengage at least from the extreme or lepene impulses, which emerged clearly with Eric Ciotti, and for Vincent Bolloré , at least for the relationship established with Eric Zemmour.
In early May Macron will appoint the new government. There is talk of two connoisseurs of the state machine, Elisabeth Borne (now minister of labor) or Julien Denormandie (now of agriculture): still an executive government, with expertise in sectors where tensions are high. The secretaries of state (our undersecretaries) would be appointed after the legislative.
Emmanuel Macron hinted at "new formulas", in discontinuity with the first five years, there was talk of coalitions. In the background, the upcoming presidential elections, in which the same risk scenario could be repeated.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/mondo/ecco-le-prossime-mosse-di-macron-dopo-la-vittoria-contro-le-pen/ on Mon, 25 Apr 2022 18:35:46 +0000.