tag:theconversation.com,2011:/ca/topics/jacques-chirac-76718/articlesJacques Chirac – The Conversation2022-01-18T18:26:05Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1750932022-01-18T18:26:05Z2022-01-18T18:26:05ZWill a surprise candidate shake up the French election?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/441147/original/file-20220117-17-65np2k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=20%2C0%2C4467%2C2993&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/fr/image-photo/mulhouse-france-19-december-2021-torned-2093250544">NeydtStock/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In the history of French presidential elections under the Fifth Republic, no candidate has ever managed to gather <a href="https://halshs.archives-ouvertes.fr/halshs-00238459/">more than 50% of the votes in the first round</a> of voting and accede to power without having to get through a second round.</p>
<p>Until recently, the vote for a new president was perceived as an expected duel between the two favourites usually representing the right and the left (De Gaulle/Mitterrand in 1965, Giscard d’Estaing/Mitterrand in 1974 and 1981, Chirac/Mitterrand in 1988, Chirac/Jospin in 1995, Sarkozy/Royal in 2007, Sarkozy/Hollande in 2012).</p>
<p>After departures from this norm in 1969 and 2002, the consensus was again upturned in 2017 with the victory of centrist Emmanuel Macron over far-right Marine Le Pen, neither of whom represented the two major parties who have held the presidency since 1958.</p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/macrons-2017-victory-was-supposed-to-usher-in-a-new-politics-instead-france-remains-gripped-by-political-crisis-174089">Macron’s 2017 victory was supposed to usher in a new politics – instead, France remains gripped by political crisis</a>
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<p><a href="https://www.lesechos.fr/elections/sondages/sondage-presidentielle-2022-lanalyse-de-la-semaine-1379320">According to the current opinion polls</a>, 2022 will be different again: alongside Macron, two frontrunner candidates representing nationalist and extreme right ideas (<a href="https://www.lefigaro.fr/elections/presidentielles/le-pen-zemmour-l-avenir-du-camp-nationaliste-en-jeu-20220102">Marine Le Pen and Eric Zemmour</a>) could potentially receive 30% of the votes; a traditional right-wing candidate (<a href="https://www.franceculture.fr/emissions/journal-de-18h/journal-de-18h00-par-laura-dulieu-du-samedi-04-decembre-2021">Valérie Pécresse</a>) is in a position to reach the second round again; meanwhile, <a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/election-presidentielle-2022/article/2022/01/12/election-presidentielle-2022-la-gauche-face-au-mur-de-la-division-pecresse-attaque-le-quasi-candidat-macron-le-recap-politique-du-jour_6109223_6059010.html">the left has never been so divided</a>.</p>
<p>As always in France, there is the possibility of a surprise additional candidate shaking things up at the last minute. Could that happen in 2022? A look back at history can help us understand how things might pan out this year.</p>
<h2>De Gaulle’s new republic</h2>
<p>In 1958, thirteen years after France’s liberation at the end of the Second World War, <a href="https://books.google.fr/books?hl=fr&lr=&id=93hNBQAAQBAJ">Charles de Gaulle returned to the French political stage and to power</a>. He had been a fierce critic of the Fourth Republic, created in 1945, a regime characterised by the dominance of political parties over individual candidates. The conflict in Algeria handed De Gaulle the role of saviour of France once again.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/441149/original/file-20220117-13-19sccim.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Black and white photograph of Charles de Gaulle delivering a speech" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/441149/original/file-20220117-13-19sccim.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/441149/original/file-20220117-13-19sccim.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=959&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/441149/original/file-20220117-13-19sccim.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=959&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/441149/original/file-20220117-13-19sccim.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=959&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/441149/original/file-20220117-13-19sccim.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1206&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/441149/original/file-20220117-13-19sccim.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1206&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/441149/original/file-20220117-13-19sccim.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1206&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Charles de Gaulle delivers his famous speech on constitutional reform in Bayeux, 1946.</span>
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<p>The constitution of the Fifth Republic was inspired by his famous <a href="https://www.elysee.fr/la-presidence/le-discours-de-bayeux-194">1946 speech</a> in Bayeux, and was largely written by Michel Debré, one of De Gaulle’s closest aides who would become his first prime minister. Under this new constitution, the president was elected by indirect universal suffrage – that is, via an electoral college, as in the US today.</p>
<p>In 1962, convinced that the president’s legitimacy had to be further strengthened, De Gaulle initiated a successful referendum to introduce a system of <a href="https://www.conseil-constitutionnel.fr/les-revisions-constitutionnelles/loi-n-62-1292-du-6-novembre-1962">direct universal suffrage</a>, where citizens vote for individual candidates.</p>
<p>This act thoroughly changed the political logic of France and its balance of power. Instead of voting for a party, people had to vote directly for a person. Instead of voting for a program, they had to vote for a leader. The French presidential election thus <a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/election-presidentielle-2017/article/2017/03/07/la-rencontre-d-un-homme-et-d-un-peuple-histoire-d-un-mythe_5090440_4854003.html">became hailed</a> as an “encounter between a man and the people”.</p>
<h2>The potential of a third candidate</h2>
<p>In 1965, De Gaulle became the first president of the Fifth Republic to be elected by direct universal suffrage. He had to face a second round against <a href="https://books.google.fr/books?hl=fr&lr=&id=9FzCCgAAQBAJ">the left-wing candidate François Mitterrand</a>. De Gaulle won with 55.2% of the votes to Mitterand’s 44.8%.</p>
<p>De Gaulle’s new system also created a space for the emergence of a potential third candidate like <a href="https://books.google.fr/books?hl=fr&lr=&id=coxUEAAAQBAJ">Jean Lecanuet</a> in 1965 or <a href="https://www.cairn.info/revue-commentaire-2007-3-page-721.htm">François Bayrou</a> in 2007. These are usually symbolic, <a href="https://journals.openedition.org/histoirepolitique/1047">“small” candidates</a> who have little chance of becoming president.</p>
<p>But the multiplication of these candidacies can still upset the battle between the two main frontrunners. In 1969, despite having five candidates out of seven in total, the left did not make it to the second round of voting. Instead, <a href="https://www.persee.fr/doc/rfsp_0035-2950_1970_num_20_2_393223">Georges Pompidou</a>, De Gaulle’s former prime minister, won against the centre-right candidate Alain Poher, the leader of the senate who was serving as temporary president following De Gaulle’s resignation.</p>
<p>In 2002, the whole country expected a second round between the right-wing incumbent, Jacques Chirac, and the left-wing Lionel Jospin, Chirac’s prime minister, whom the president was forced to appoint after losing his majority at the Assemblée Nationale in legislative elections.</p>
<p>Early opinion polls introduced a “third man”, <a href="https://www.berghahnjournals.com/view/journals/fpcs/22/1/fpcs220105.xml">Jean-Pierre Chevènement</a> a left-wing candidate who had served as a minister under Mitterrand and Jospin. He eventually received 5.33% of the votes in the first round with a modest sixth position.</p>
<p>Despite late opinion polls showing narrow difference between Jospin and Jean-Marie Le Pen, the far-right candidate, many potential left-wing voters decided to cast ballots for minor left-wing candidates or to wait for the second round to take part in the election, assuming the second round would be a run-off between Jospin and Chirac.</p>
<p>But Jospin came in third with 16.18% of the vote while <a href="https://academic.oup.com/poq/article-abstract/68/4/602/1884181">Le Pen scored 16.86%</a>. Chirac eventually won the second round with <a href="https://www.vie-publique.fr/eclairage/21968-election-presidentielle-2002-resultats-des-deux-tours">82% of the vote</a>.</p>
<h2>Fragile legitimacy</h2>
<p>In 2007 and 2012, presidential elections seemed to be back to normal with second rounds coming down to a contest between Nicolas Sarkozy, the right-wing candidate, and left-wing candidates <a href="https://journals.openedition.org/mots/18763">Ségolène Royal in 2007</a> and <a href="https://books.google.fr/books?hl=fr&lr=&id=_NlNktQGlMQC">François Hollande in 2012</a>.</p>
<p>But the 2017 presidential election marked a turning point. As in 2002, the extreme right candidate, Jean-Marie’s daughter Marine Le Pen, managed to <a href="https://www.cairn.info/load_pdf.php?ID_ARTICLE=SCPO_PERRI_2017_02_0251&download=1">reach the second round</a>. But Le Pen’s presence at this stage of the final presidential race did not produce the national crisis witnessed by her father’s success in 2002, showing how the far-right had become normalised in the intervening years. None of the traditional French political parties reached the second round and <a href="https://www.manchesterhive.com/view/9781526153463/9781526153463.xml">Emmanuel Macron was able to win without their support</a>.</p>
<p>With four candidates (Emmanuel Macron, Marine Le Pen, François Fillon, Jean-Luc Mélenchon) receiving between 20% and 24% of the votes in the first round of the 2017 election, the legitimacy that De Gaulle wanted to give to the direct universal suffrage process <a href="https://www.cairn.info/load_pdf.php?ID_ARTICLE=ARCO_FRINA_2021_01_0111&download=1">appeared fragile</a> and has been highly contested since by Macron’s opponents.</p>
<h2>The limits of direct universal suffrage</h2>
<p>What will happen this year? It seems that 2022 might reinforce the trend set up in the last presidential election. With none of the left-wing candidates in a position to compete for the two top spots and the spread of extreme-right ideas among the voters, the traditional right v left opposition seems a distant memory. A candidate defending nationalist far-right ideas could reach the second round for the second time in a row.</p>
<p>On one hand, the 2017 and 2022 elections call into question the system inspired by De Gaulle and the legitimacy of the president in a system where the splintering of traditional parties has led the concept of a “third man” or “third woman” to become obsolete.</p>
<p>On the other, a candidate positioned outside of the main French political parties can be carried to a presidential victory and a majority at the Assemblée Nationale just as Macron did in 2017, which could be seen as the ultimate vindication of the third candidate theory.</p>
<p>If calls for a change of the system of <a href="https://laviedesidees.fr/IMG/pdf/20111004_presidentielle.pdf">direct universal suffrage</a> and for <a href="https://www.cairn.info/revue-pouvoirs-2018-3-page-139.htm">a Sixth Republic</a> regularly bubble up, French people’s aspiration to a more participatory democracy seems to show their limits when it comes to electing their president.</p>
<p>Ultimately, while French people may want to have their say about everything, they also want a leader who decides, takes responsibility and makes decisions. Despite the fluctuations within the political system of recent years, the tradition instigated by De Gaulle back in 1962 remains strong to this day, even if the main players are different.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/175093/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Olivier Guyottot ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>Charles de Gaulle created a system where a surprise candidate can upend the presidential elections in France. Will it happen in 2022?Olivier Guyottot, Enseignant-chercheur en stratégie et en sciences politiques, INSEEC Grande ÉcoleLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1746482022-01-11T13:34:27Z2022-01-11T13:34:27ZProsecuting Trump would inevitably be political – and other countries have had mixed success in holding ex-presidents accountable<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/440123/original/file-20220110-27-1uvbc7i.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=9%2C9%2C3086%2C2051&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A man protesting in New York City one year after the violent insurrection in Washington, D.C. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/participant-holding-a-sign-reading-indict-donald-trump-at-news-photo/1237580013?adppopup=true">Erik McGregor/LightRocket via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>When Attorney General Merrick Garland <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/garland-jan-6-investigate-crimes/2022/01/05/3c11854a-6db4-11ec-a5d2-7712163262f0_story.html">said on Jan. 5, 2022, that he would prosecute anyone involved in the Capitol riots</a>, he was not only laying out his approach to the sprawling investigation of that attack. He also appeared to be responding to a growing number of people who have <a href="https://theweek.com/donald-trump/1008120/a-plea-to-merrick-garland-for-the-future-of-our-republic">pressured him to announce he would criminally charge former President Donald Trump</a> for the role he played in the day’s events.</p>
<p>“The Justice Department remains committed to holding all January 6th perpetrators, at any level, accountable under law — whether they were present that day or were otherwise criminally responsible for the assault on our democracy,” <a href="https://www.justice.gov/opa/speech/attorney-general-merrick-b-garland-delivers-remarks-first-anniversary-attack-capitol">said Garland</a>. “We will follow the facts wherever they lead.”</p>
<p><a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/10/case-criminally-investigating-ex-president/616804/">No U.S. ex-president has ever been criminally charged</a>. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.economist.com/europe/2021/03/01/nicolas-sarkozys-jail-sentence-shocks-frances-political-class">Prosecuting current or past top officials</a> accused of illegal conduct seems like an obvious decision for a democracy – everyone should be held accountable and subject to the rule of law.</p>
<p>But there are consequences to prosecutions of these officials – not just for them, but for their countries. </p>
<p>Presidents and prime ministers aren’t just anyone. </p>
<p>They are chosen by a nation’s citizens or their parties to lead. They are often popular, sometimes revered. So judicial proceedings against them are <a href="https://cpb-us-w2.wpmucdn.com/voices.uchicago.edu/dist/5/539/files/2017/05/AJPS-2021_Pol-Scandal.pdf">inevitably perceived as political</a> and become divisive. </p>
<h2>Destabilizing prosecutions</h2>
<p>Other countries’ former presidents are <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/24758118?seq=1">being investigated, prosecuted</a> and even jailed worldwide.</p>
<p>In Bolivia, ex-President Jeanine Áñez was <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2021/03/13/americas/bolivia-arrested-interim-president/">arrested on</a> terrorism, conspiracy and sedition charges on March 13, 2021, and is headed to trial soon. A week before, former French President <a href="https://apnews.com/article/nicolas-sarkozy-convincted-corruption-france-6ee89cb03ba8f3888ac64447ebf61f28">Nicolas Sarkozy was sentenced to prison</a> for corruption and influence peddling. </p>
<p>Israel’s former Prime Minister <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/08/world/middleeast/benjamin-netanyahu-trial.html">Benjamin Netanyahu</a> is currently on trial for corruption. Jacob Zuma, the <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/a8b04d55-e9df-425b-b461-bdccceff9dff">former president of South Africa, is in a prolonged fight against corruption charges</a> and <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2021/12/15/africa/south-africa-zuma-prison-intl/index.html">was sentenced to 15 months in jail for contempt of court</a>. </p>
<p>If the prosecution of past leaders is brought by a political rival, it can lead to a cycle of prosecutorial retaliation. Despite the independence of the U.S. Justice Department, headed by Garland, a prosecution of Trump could be seen as political since Garland was appointed by President Joe Biden.</p>
<p>This is partly why <a href="https://www.fordlibrarymuseum.gov/library/document/0019/4520699.pdf">U.S. President Gerald Ford pardoned</a> Richard Nixon, his predecessor, in 1974. Despite clear evidence of criminal wrongdoing in the Watergate scandal, <a href="https://www.fordlibrarymuseum.gov/library/document/0019/4520699.pdf">Ford feared</a> the country “would needlessly be diverted from meeting (our) challenges if we as a people were to remain sharply divided over” punishing the ex-president. </p>
<p>Public reaction <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1974/09/09/archives/reaction-to-pardon-of-nixon-is-divided-but-not-entirely-along-party.html">at the time</a> was divided along party lines. But many people <a href="https://constitutioncenter.org/blog/the-nixon-pardon-in-retrospect">now see</a> absolving Nixon as necessary to <a href="https://www.abebooks.com/book-search/title/time-to-heal/author/gerald-ford/signed/">heal the U.S.</a></p>
<p><a href="https://sites.uw.edu/uwpoliticaleconomy/">Our research</a> on prosecuting world leaders finds that both sweeping immunity and overzealous prosecutions can undermine democracy. But such prosecutions pose different risks for mature democracies like France than they do in nascent democracies like Bolivia. </p>
<h2>Mature democracies</h2>
<p>Strong democracies are usually competent enough – and the judicial system independent enough – to go after <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-trumps-challenges-to-democracy-will-be-a-big-problem-for-biden-152218">politicians who misbehave</a>, including top leaders. Sarkozy is France’s second modern president to be found guilty of corruption, after <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-16194089">Jacques Chirac in 2011</a>. The country didn’t fall apart after Chirac’s conviction.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/389912/original/file-20210316-22-770jnb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Sarkozy, wearing a face mask, walks through a glass building, trailed by another man in a suit. A police officer salutes." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/389912/original/file-20210316-22-770jnb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/389912/original/file-20210316-22-770jnb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=403&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/389912/original/file-20210316-22-770jnb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=403&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/389912/original/file-20210316-22-770jnb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=403&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/389912/original/file-20210316-22-770jnb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=506&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/389912/original/file-20210316-22-770jnb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=506&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/389912/original/file-20210316-22-770jnb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=506&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Former French President Nicolas Sarkozy leaves court after being found guilty of corruption and influence peddling, March 1, 2021.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/former-french-president-nicolas-sarkozy-leaves-court-after-news-photo/1304713844?adppopup=true">Kiran Ridley/Getty Images</a></span>
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<p>In mature democracies, prosecutions can <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2017/05/10/south-korea-just-showed-the-world-how-to-do-democracy/">hold leaders accountable</a> and solidify the rule of law. South Korea <a href="https://www.economist.com/asia/2020/01/16/south-koreas-president-curbs-the-power-of-prosecutors">investigated and convicted</a> five former presidents starting in the 1990s, a wave of political prosecutions that culminated in the <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-37971085">2018 impeachment of President Park Geun-hye</a>. </p>
<p>But even in mature democracies, prosecutors or judges can weaponize prosecutions. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/nicolas-sarkozy-jail-sentence-corruption/">Some observers say</a> the three-year prison sentence handed down to France’s Sarkozy – whose corruption conviction involves kickbacks and an attempt to bribe a magistrate – was too harsh. </p>
<h2>Overzealous prosecution versus rule of law</h2>
<p>Overzealous political prosecution is more likely, and potentially more damaging, in emerging democracies where courts and other public institutions may be <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/106591290605900306">insufficiently independent from politics</a>. The weaker and more beholden the judiciary, the easier it is for leaders to exploit the system, either to expand their own power or to take down an opponent.</p>
<p>Brazil embodies this dilemma. </p>
<p>Ex-President <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-brazil-politics-lula/brazil-judge-annuls-lulas-convictions-opens-door-to-2022-run-idUSKBN2B02F0">Luiz Inácio “Lula” da Silva</a>, a former <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/20180405-brazil-lula-suffers-downfall-stunning-rise">shoeshine boy turned popular leftist</a>, was jailed in 2018 for accepting bribes in what many Brazilians felt was a politicized effort to end his career. </p>
<p>A year later, the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/21/brazils-former-president-michel-temer-arrested-in-corruption-investigation">same prosecutorial team</a> accused the conservative former President Michel Temer of accepting millions in bribes. After his term ended in 2019, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/21/world/americas/michel-temer-arrested-prisao.html">he was arrested</a>; his trial <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-41755666">was later suspended</a>. </p>
<p>Both Brazilian presidents’ prosecutions are part of a <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-brazil-is-winning-its-fight-against-corruption-71968">years-long sweeping anti-corruption probe by the courts</a> that has jailed dozens of politicians. Even the probe’s lead prosecutor is <a href="https://theconversation.com/brazils-operation-car-wash-a-corruption-investigator-is-accused-of-his-own-misdeeds-118889">accused of corruption</a>. </p>
<p>Brazil’s crisis either <a href="https://www.economist.com/the-americas/2021/02/27/the-sad-quiet-death-of-brazils-anti-corruption-task-force">shows nobody is above the law</a> – or tells the public that their government is incorrigibly corrupt. When that happens, it becomes easier for politicians and voters to view leaders’ transgressions as a normal cost of doing business. </p>
<p>For Lula, a conviction didn’t necessarily end his career. He was released from jail in 2019 and in March 2021 the Supreme Court annulled his conviction. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jan/03/luiz-inacio-lula-da-silva-brazilian-former-president-mission-to-defeat-bolsonaro">He is now running to reclaim the presidency</a>. </p>
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<h2>Stability versus accountability</h2>
<p>Mexico has a different approach to prosecuting past presidents: It doesn’t do it.</p>
<p>During the 20th century, Mexico’s ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, established a system of <a href="https://themonkeycage.org/2012/12/what-do-legislatures-in-authoritarian-regimes-do/">patronage and corruption</a> that <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/voting-for-autocracy/F6671D230EC7C458A30035ADB20F9289">kept members</a> in power and other parties in the minority. While making a show of <a href="https://www.economist.com/the-americas/2020/08/27/a-former-official-fires-a-legal-missile-at-mexicos-political-class">going after</a> smaller fish for corruption and other indiscretions, the PRI-run legal system <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=XljPDwAAQBAJ&pg=PT237&lpg=PT237&dq=PRI+impunidad+sistema+legal+autocracia&source=bl&ots=ORccgnvCG2&sig=ACfU3U27BRKEFgK9IFuutq6v4vVLYghRzg&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiwgf-4uLXvAhWRs54KHaj9CjYQ6AEwB3oECA8QAw#v=onepage&q=PRI%20impunidad%20sistema%20legal%20autocracia&f=false">wouldn’t touch top party officials</a>, even the most openly corrupt.</p>
<p>Impunity kept Mexico stable during its transition to democracy in the 1990s by placating PRI members’ fears of prosecution after leaving office. But <a href="https://theconversation.com/governors-gone-wild-mexico-faces-a-lost-generation-of-corrupt-leaders-76858">government corruption flourished</a>, and with it, organized crime. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/389913/original/file-20210316-20-1x4b7d8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Man in face mask and face shield holds a sign reading 'trials for ex-presidents - sign here'" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/389913/original/file-20210316-20-1x4b7d8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/389913/original/file-20210316-20-1x4b7d8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/389913/original/file-20210316-20-1x4b7d8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/389913/original/file-20210316-20-1x4b7d8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/389913/original/file-20210316-20-1x4b7d8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/389913/original/file-20210316-20-1x4b7d8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/389913/original/file-20210316-20-1x4b7d8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">A protester in Mexico City IN 2020 called for prosecution of several former presidents implicated in a corruption scandal involving Mexico’s state oil company, PEMEX.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/an-activist-displays-a-banner-during-the-collection-of-news-photo/1228287609?adppopup=true">Pedro Pardo/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
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<p>Mexico is far from the only country to overlook the bad deeds of past leaders, including those who oversaw human rights violations. Our research finds that just <a href="https://faculty.washington.edu/vmenaldo/Articles%20in%20Journals/ISQ%20Article.pdf">23% of countries that transitioned to democracy between 1885 and 2004</a> charged former leaders with crimes after democratization. </p>
<p>Protecting authoritarians may seem contrary to democratic values, but many transitional governments have decided it is necessary for democracy to take root. </p>
<p>That’s the bargain South Africa struck as apartheid ended after decades of segregation and human rights abuses. South Africa’s white-dominated government <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=zsdJDwAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=Albertus+Menaldo#v=onepage&q&f=false">negotiated with Nelson Mandela’s Black-led African National Congress</a> to ensure they would avoid prosecution and keep their wealth. </p>
<p>This strategy <a href="https://anchor.fm/political-economy-forum/episodes/Karen-Ferree-Are-Voters-Tribal-er4u0q">helped the country transition to majority Black rule in 1994 and avoid</a> a civil war. But it hurt efforts to create a more equal South Africa: It still has one of the <a href="https://time.com/longform/south-africa-unequal-country/">world’s highest racial wealth gaps</a>. </p>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/why-growing-corruption-is-a-threat-to-south-africas-national-security-74110">Corruption is a problem</a>, too, as former President Zuma’s prosecution for lavish personal use of public funds shows. But South Africa has a famously independent judiciary, and Zuma’s prosecution is <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-south-africas-president-stands-on-solid-ground-in-the-fight-against-corruption-150305">supported by the current president</a>. It may yet deter future misdeeds. </p>
<p>Israel didn’t wait for Prime Minister Netanyahu to leave office to investigate wrongdoing. He was <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-major-democracy-fights-to-maintain-the-rule-of-law-this-time-its-israel-127584">indicted in 2019 for breaches of trust, bribery and fraud</a>; his trial is underway. </p>
<p>But it was fraught with delays, in part because as prime minister, Netanyahu used the power of the state to resist what he called a “<a href="https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/18/world/netanyahu-police-investigation">witch hunt</a>.” The trial triggered protests by his Likud party and an unsuccessful bid to secure immunity, among <a href="https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/politics-and-diplomacy/benjamin-netanyahus-successful-stalling-strategy-analysis-623967">other stall tactics</a>. Netanyahu was even reelected while under indictment.</p>
<p>Israel is partly a testament to the rule of law – and partly a cautionary tale about prosecuting leaders in democracies.</p>
<p><em>This story is an update <a href="https://theconversation.com/prosecuting-ex-presidents-for-corruption-is-trending-worldwide-but-its-not-always-great-for-democracy-156931">to an article</a> published on March 16, 2021.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/174648/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Criminal charges against former President Donald Trump for his role in the Jan. 6 Capitol riot could spark political consequences – not only for Trump, but for US democracy.James D. Long, Associate Professor of Political Science, Co-founder of the Political Economy Forum, Host of "Neither Free Nor Fair?" podcast, University of WashingtonMorgan Wack, Doctoral Student in Political Science, University of WashingtonVictor Menaldo, Professor of Political Science, Co-founder of the Political Economy Forum, University of WashingtonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1603132021-05-05T13:37:45Z2021-05-05T13:37:45ZNapoleon’s bicentenary: why celebrating the French emperor has become so controversial<p>Napoleon Bonaparte may have died 200 years ago, but the vast ramifications of his rule can still be felt – and not only in France. This year marks the last in a series of bicentenaries since 1969, the 200th anniversary of his birth, but the chance to give the most famous emperor in French history another send-off is proving distinctly tricky – and not only because of COVID-19 restrictions.</p>
<p>This isn’t the first time that commemorating Napoleon or the events of his reign has posed a problem. In 2005, the then president of France, Jacques Chirac, and his prime minister, Dominique de Villepin – also a Napoleonic historian – thought it wise to <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4491668.stm">sidestep the celebrations</a>for the bicentenary of the French victory against the Austrians at Austerlitz. A key part of this decision, in commentators’ eyes, was mounting controversy about Napoleon’s legacy, including accusations of genocide against people in the colonies. </p>
<p>By the bicentenary of Waterloo in 2015, the commemoration of these battles had become <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2015/06/18/415394680/200-years-after-waterloo-napoleon-still-divides-europe">distinctly less nationalistic</a> in tone across Europe. Traditionally portrayed as an Anglo-French duel, exhibitions about Waterloo emphasised the role of soldiers from Prussia and the battle’s larger social and political context.</p>
<p>The year 2021, also marketed as the “Année Napoléon” or “Napoleon Year”, has been a difficult milestone. It used to be the president who decided the who, what and when of official commemorations. But, in the wake of a series of backlashes, the French president Emmanuel Macron decided that such commemorations needed to be <a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/culture/article/2021/01/16/commemorations-une-delicate-mission-de-pacification-pour-france-memoire_6066450_3246.html">“pacified”</a>.</p>
<p>Since January 2021, the <a href="https://www.institutdefrance.fr/commemorations-nationales/">“France Mémoire”</a> section of the Institut de France has overseen the selection of official figures to commemorate. This year its list includes Napoleon. “France Mémoire” emphasises the importance of debate, of democratising memory, and of accurate historical information. </p>
<p>But others are less optimistic about how much genuine debate there will be. In a recent<a href="https://www.lexpress.fr/actualite/idees-et-debats/thierry-lentz-a-l-origine-napoleon-etait-de-gauche_2147167.html"> interview</a>, Thierry Lentz, a major Napoleonic historian and the director of the “Fondation Napoléon”, claimed there are two recurrent issues with commemorating Napoleon today: his reintroduction of slavery and his misogyny.</p>
<h2>Dictator or beloved historical figure?</h2>
<p>Napoleon’s role in the reintroduction of slavery isn’t a new point, but this media-heavy debate has gained traction, especially in the resurgence of the Black Lives Matter movement and the toppling of the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eDZ9GTkxEMA&ab_channel=RCIMartinique">statue of Napoleon’s wife in Martinique</a>, a Caribbean island and a French overseas department. </p>
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<p>France abolished slavery in 1794, but Napoleon’s role in its reintroduction is literally on view in one of the major blockbuster exhibitions to commemorate the bicentenary, <a href="https://expo-napoleon.fr/">L’Exposition: Napoléon</a>, at La Villette in Paris. Here, displayed for the first time, visitors can see <a href="https://la1ere.francetvinfo.fr/napoleon-et-l-esclavage-des-documents-rares-seront-exposes-a-la-villette-955984.html">the originals of the orders of May 20 and July 16 1802</a> that re-established slavery in various French colonial territories.</p>
<p>This year, there might be less debate about Napoleon’s misogyny, but it has been prominent in the past. The Civil Code (also referred to as the “Napoleonic Code”) of 1804 essentially made married women subservient to their husbands, and the two spouses were subjected to different standards if they wanted to divorce. </p>
<p>There is also a plethora of quotes by Napoleon about the position of women in society that in today’s context tarnish his image. Outside of academia, the topic of Napoleon and women seems to have shifted from the ramifications of the Civil Code to the relationships he cherished with the women <a href="https://www.napoleon.org/magazine/livres/les-femmes-de-napoleon/">close to him</a>. There’s also more of a focus on the fact that he gave some of these women <a href="https://www.france24.com/fr/france/20210502-napol%C3%A9on-tyran-ou-g%C3%A9nie-les-controverses-autour-de-l-empereur">important political tasks</a>. While more sympathetic readings of Napoleon’s legacy may diffuse some tension, the potential remains for charges of misogyny to erupt once more.</p>
<p>But what about the larger picture? Author and thinker Germaine de Staël, an outspoken opponent of Napoleon’s who lived in Napoleonic France, is often cited as an example of a independent woman of the time. Lower down the social ladder, there are multiple examples of women who succeeded in having a public life despite the repressive laws. Female actors and theatre directors, for example, could lead financially independent lives. Caroline Branchu, a singer of mixed French and Haitian heritage, was one of the most famous performers of the legendary Paris Opéra and was reportedly courted by Napoleon. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Black and white illustration of Germaine de Staël in a dress sitting on a large chair" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/398883/original/file-20210505-15-hrsf5p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/398883/original/file-20210505-15-hrsf5p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=810&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398883/original/file-20210505-15-hrsf5p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=810&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398883/original/file-20210505-15-hrsf5p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=810&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398883/original/file-20210505-15-hrsf5p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1018&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398883/original/file-20210505-15-hrsf5p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1018&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398883/original/file-20210505-15-hrsf5p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1018&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Illustration of Germaine de Staël, a writer and public adversary of Napoleon’s despite his tyrannical rule.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-illustration/madame-de-stael-vintage-engraved-illustration-268951745">Morphart Creation/Shutterstock</a></span>
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<p>However, at the same time, people of colour were excluded from contemporary life, as author and historian <a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/140278/the-black-count-by-tom-reiss/">Tom Reiss</a> has charted through the swashbuckling life of General Thomas Alexandre Dumas. Father of one of France’s most famous authors, Alexandre Dumas, Thomas Alexandre Dumas rose to prominence as a general during the Revolution, only to see racial inequalities introduced under Napoleon. </p>
<h2>Past, present, future</h2>
<p>These examples aren’t attempts to deny Napoleon’s legacy, far from it, but analysing cases such as these offers us examples of resistance and change. They also reintegrate other difficult aspects from Napoleon’s reign that we would do well to remember today, such as the enormous death toll of the period’s military campaigns and the way in which these conflicts stirred nationalistic sentiments across Europe.</p>
<p>Recent discussions about Napoleon show that his legacy is a far from settled. It’s interesting that many of the official channels promote the importance of debate and discussion when talking about Napoleon. The La Villette exhibition on Napoleon even has a <a href="https://expo-napoleon.fr/manifesto/">manifesto</a> to this effect. But a cursory glance at social media and newspaper columns show that the debate about Napoleon’s legacy is very much still ongoing.</p>
<p>Realistically, these contests over Napoleon’s memory are not likely to be settled any time soon, if ever. However, the commemorations and the debates that accompany them will shape Napoleon’s image for future generations. We can’t alter the facts of Napoleon’s reign, but who we give a platform to, what we choose to focus on and how we debate can lead to a more comprehensive understanding of a period’s complexity – and perhaps a little of our own complexity too.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/160313/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Clare Siviter receives funding from the Leverhulme Trust. Her work on Napoleon started with a PhD on the 'French Theatre of the Napoleonic Era' project, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council.</span></em></p>Commemorations have slowly become more muted over the years due to the racist and misogynistic aspects of his ruleClare Siviter, Lecturer in French Theatre and Performance, University of BristolLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1513982020-12-03T21:59:14Z2020-12-03T21:59:14ZValéry Giscard d'Estaing, the last great leader of France’s liberal right<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/372811/original/file-20201203-13-1sm6zrk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C10%2C1200%2C786&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, who died on Wednesday 2 December following the Covid-19.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jacques Demarthon/AFP</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, who died on December 2 at age 94 from complications relating to Covid-19, came from a family of political notables and himself held – from generation to generation – many positions in France’s senior civil service and in parliament.</p>
<p>In the summer of 1944, young Valéry, a preparatory class student at Louis-le-Grand, participated in the liberation of Paris and joined the French First Army. In the autumn of 1945, he resumed his studies, first at the Ecole Polytechnique and then at the Ecole Nationale d'Administration.</p>
<p>Upon graduating in 1951, he joined the <a href="https://www.conseil-constitutionnel.fr/membres/valery-giscard-d-estaing">Inspectorate General of Finances</a>. After a brief stint in the ministerial cabinet (as deputy director to ministerial council president Edgar Faure), he ran in the legislative elections of 1956. He was elected, at the age of 30, as deputy for the Puy-de-Dôme, a region with strong family roots for the young politician. He sat among the elected members of the Centre National des Indépendants et Paysans (CNIP), a right-wing conservative and liberal party without a particularly defined ideology.</p>
<p>He backed Charles de Gaulle’s return to power in 1958 and became secretary of state for finance in his government, working under Antoine Pinay, minister of finance and economic affairs. He himself became minister of finance and economic affairs in 1962. Giscard d'Estaing then founded the Independent Republicans, a group that grew out of the conservative group CNIP but which, unlike a large part of its elected representatives and the entire traditional political class, continued to support de Gaulle. Giscard d'Estaing was in favour of electing the president of the Republic via direct universal suffrage, which brought a new dimension to the Fifth Republic.</p>
<h2>The road to the presidential election</h2>
<p>Having pursued a policy of budgetary rigour that displeased part of the voting public, Giscard d'Estaing failed to secure reappointment in his ministerial role at the beginning of 1966. This freed him to pursue a strategy of “yes, but” in response to the Gaullist majority. He wanted institutions to become more liberal, and promoted a more modern and European-focused economic policy.</p>
<p>Through this attitude of critical support, he wanted to gradually strengthen the position of the Independent Republicans in order to shift the right-wing majority towards the centre. In 1969, when de Gaulle organised a referendum on the reform of the regions and the senate, Giscard d'Estaing advocated abstention or a no vote, which contributed to de Gaulle’s resignation. He returned to the Ministry of the Economy under the presidency of Georges Pompidou (1969-1974) but continued to push for his party to be more open to centrists.</p>
<p>By the time of the 1974 presidential election, having strengthened his influence, he felt his time had come. He campaigned on the need for change, without the risks of the left’s agenda. He overshadowed Gaullist Jacques Chaban-Delmas in the first round and went on to win <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mY8267pz_Bw">the second round</a> in a very close race against François Mitterrand, becoming president at just 48 years of age.</p>
<p>The strategy first conceived of in 1962 to eat into the Gaullist majority and present a viable Independent Republican candidacy had finally paid off. Provisional support from Jacques Chirac and some of the Gaullists, who dropped their own candidate, helped make it a reality. </p>
<h2>A seven-year term, reforms and an ‘advanced liberal society’</h2>
<p>The beginning of Giscard d'Estaing’s seven-year term would be marked by <a href="https://www.letelegramme.fr/france/les-principales-reformes-du-septennat-de-giscard-d-estaing-03-12-2020-12666472.php">numerous reforms</a>. He wanted to symbolise change with a simpler and more relaxed style, which was reflected in the media coverage of meals with middle and working-class families.</p>
<p>For the first time, a <a href="https://www.lamontagne.fr/clermont-ferrand-63000/actualites/en-1974-vge-cree-un-ministere-pour-les-femmes-la-senatrice-en-devient-titulaire-sous-mitterrand_1904857/">Ministry of Women’s Affairs</a> was established and several important societal reforms were initiated.</p>
<p>The age of majority, both electoral and civil, was lowered to 18, which is a way of recognising the importance of youth. Abortion was legalised, as was divorce by mutual consent. Contraceptives were to be reimbursed with social security. The city of Paris would have an elected mayor. The radio and television broadcasting monopoly was broken up into seven autonomous public companies. Giscard d'Estaing greatly increased – several times during his seven-year tenure – the minimum old-age pension. He stopped legal immigration but wanted to promote an integration policy led – for the first time – by a secretary of state for immigrant workers.</p>
<p>Giscard d'Estaing described <a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/disparitions/article/2020/12/03/mort-de-valery-giscard-d-estaing-le-destin-facetieux-du-president-moderne_6061999_3382.html">his</a> vision for an “advanced liberal society” in Démocratie Française (1976). He said the state must promote economic growth, serve the dynamism of economic actors and encourage major industrial investments in modernisation, such as the TGV or the nuclear industry.</p>
<p>According to him, the country was no longer divided between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat but increasingly dominated by the salaried middle classes. The government must respond to the aspirations of this large central group by developing individual liberties, promoting personal development and the quality of the living environment. It would be necessary to “govern from the centre”.</p>
<p>It was a decent enough goal, but from 1976 onwards, Giscard d'Estaing was faced with a deteriorating economic situation, high inflation and a spectacular rise in unemployment. The austerity plan put in place by Raymond Barre, prime minister and minister of economy and finance, introduced a temporary price freeze and a tax increase for the wealthiest. The president’s popularity suffered greatly from the economic turmoil.</p>
<p>At the same time, Giscard d'Estaing faced increasingly strong criticism from supporters of Chirac and from the left, whose union was faltering. However, he managed to retain a majority in the 1978 legislative elections and even strengthened the position of the centre and the liberal right, which worked together as the Union for French Democracy (UDF), a federation of parties that he launched on the eve of the elections.</p>
<h2>European politics and the end of the presidential adventure</h2>
<p>Internal debates were particularly intense when it came to Europe. Giscard d'Estaing had always been a <a href="https://www.valery-giscarddestaing.org/engagement-europeen/">strong supporter of the European project</a> and, since his election, had acted to strengthen European governance by establishing the European Council, which brought together the heads of European governments, and by working towards a European monetary system.</p>
<p>He also supported the election of the European parliament by direct universal suffrage, which the Gaullists feared would lead to a supranational drift. His efforts were vindicated in a subsequent European election that delivered heavy losses for the Gaullists and opponents of European integration. </p>
<p>In addition to the economic difficulties that worsened at the end of his seven-year term (a second oil shock, steel crisis, ever-increasing unemployment, high inflation), there were also more personal challenges, mainly relating to the donation of diamonds by the Central African Emperor Bokassa, which later turned out to be of lesser value than first thought.</p>
<p>Hoping to secure a second term, he was once again pitted against François Mitterrand in the second round of a presidential election. This time he was <a href="https://www.elysee.fr/valery-giscard-d-estaing/1981/05/05/face-a-face-televise-entre-mm-valery-giscard-destaing-et-francois-mitterrand-lors-de-la-campagne-officielle-pour-le-second-tour-de-lelection-presidentielle-paris-mardi-5-mai-1981">defeated</a>. He took losing to a hated leftist opposition badly and felt betrayed by certain Gaullist leaders who preferred to vote for the left-wing candidate. He ended up representing a brief intermission of centre-right liberalism after 23 years of the Gaullist Republic.</p>
<p>Rather than giving up politics, Giscard d'Estaing began to regain power from the local level. In 1982 he was elected general councillor of the Puy-de-Dôme in his fiefdom of Chamalières (where he had been mayor from 1967 to 1974), then in 1984 he again became deputy of this department, a mandate that he held until 2002 (interrupted by a stint as a member of the European Parliament between 1989 and 1994). He was also president of the Auvergne region from 1986 to 2004.</p>
<p>His return to politics also saw him produce a <a href="https://editions.flammarion.com/deux-francais-sur-trois/9782080646613">new essay</a>: “Deux Français sur trois” (1984), which extended his 1976 manifesto. He described its purpose as “to conceive a national design reconciling generosity and efficiency and meeting the aspirations of two French people out of three. I want to serve the cause of a liberal and reconciled France”.</p>
<p>He gave up the idea of running again in the 1988 presidential election, judging his support to be insufficient, but he led several successful legislative and European election campaigns throughout the late 1980s and early 1990s. He considered running for president again in 1995 but gave up for the same reasons as in 1988. In 2000, while Chirac was in power, he led the charge in limiting presidential terms to five years.</p>
<h2>European Referendum</h2>
<p>In 2001, Giscard d'Estaing was chosen to lead a European commission charged with preparing a constitutional treaty for the union. He was at the centre of negotiations on the European constitution and then became actively involved in supporting <a href="https://www.rtl.fr/actu/politique/mort-de-vge-disparition-d-un-europeen-convaincu-7800933493">the “yes” vote in the French referendum</a> on the project. Although he was very much in favour of deepening European integration, he was reticent about the successive enlargements of the union, which, in his view, transformed its nature.</p>
<p>Defeated in the 2004 regional elections and no longer holding elective office, he would go on to sit on the Constitutional Council, of which he had been an ex-officio member since 1981 as former president of the Republic. This role obliged him to maintain a certain duty of reserve from which he emerged to support Nicolas Sarkozy in the 2007 presidential election rather than the centrist François Bayrou. He was elected to the Académie Française in 2004 and wrote several novels, which were not particularly well received by critics.</p>
<p>Valéry Giscard D'Estaing will remain the symbol of a political heir who knew how to shake up traditional France to kick start a liberal modernisation geared towards European integration.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/151398/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Pierre Bréchon ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>The former president advocated an ‘advanced liberal society’ in which the state must promote growth and paved the way for Europe.Pierre Bréchon, Professeur émérite de science politique, Sciences Po Grenoble, Auteurs historiques The Conversation FranceLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/699382019-09-26T15:09:22Z2019-09-26T15:09:22ZJacques Chirac: what legacy for the late French president?<p>The death of Jacques Chirac leaves us with a paradox. He was the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/mar/29/iraq.france">most popular president</a> of the Fifth Republic, and yet one without any notable achievement during his tenure as leader. </p>
<p>Of course, the obituaries will judge him leniently. They will emphasise his success in resisting American pressure during the second invasion of Iraq – for which he does indeed deserve much credit. But what else is there? Chirac’s political career spanned nearly 40 years at the highest levels of government – he was president for 12 years, between 1995 and 2007, and served as prime minister for two terms (1974-76 and 1984-86). Yet a close analysis of his legacy leaves us with the impression of a lack of tangible results, if not of a large void.</p>
<h2>From bulldozer to idle king</h2>
<p>Chirac began his political career in the ministerial teams of Charles de Gaulle and <a href="http://www.biography.com/people/georges-pompidou-9444059">Georges Pompidou</a> in the late 1960s. He was thereafter forever linked with <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaullism">Gaullism</a>, even if his personality and political choices point to a much more ambiguous personal position.</p>
<p>His first major political triumph came in 1974 in the presidential election that followed the death of Georges Pompidou. Chirac outmanoeuvred his rivals to become prime minister to President <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/3312b29c-db0a-11e3-8273-00144feabdc0">Valéry Giscard d’Estaing</a>.</p>
<p>But Chirac only held the post for two years before resigning. France’s postwar boom years (the “<a href="http://www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199560981.001.0001/oxfordhb-9780199560981-e-18">trente glorieuses</a>”) were coming to an end. The country was exposed to its first oil crisis and suffered a long period of mass unemployment, alongside rampant inflation. The key changes that did take place under Chirac (lowering the voting age to 18, legalising abortion, reforming divorce laws) were largely ideas put forward by Giscard d’Estaing as a presidential candidate, rather than coming from Chirac in office. </p>
<p>This first, brief experience as head of government led Chirac to become distanced from the centre of political power for some time. He made do with the mayorship of Paris, a post he occupied until 1995 while founding a political party over which he exercised complete control – the Rassemblement pour la République (RPR). The party was Gaullist in its orientation and a forebear of the main party of today’s French right, les Républicains.</p>
<p>In 1981, Chirac failed to reach the second round of the presidential election, which was subsequently won by <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/nov/28/mitterrand-study-ambiguity-philip-short-review">François Mitterrand</a>. He became leader of the opposition and was subsequently appointed prime minister in France’s first “<a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/cohabitation">cohabitation government</a>” in 1986-88.</p>
<p>Serving under the socialist Mitterrand was the first (but not last) breach of the Gaullist legacy, and one that even today can be interpreted in different ways. Did it stem from a thirst for power, political short-sightedness, a lack of self-discipline, pragmatism or overhastiness? Or was it, perhaps, a mixture of all of those things? Either way, the experience was marked by two years of confrontations with Mitterrand, who, unsurprisingly, exploited the situation to regain the political advantage and win the presidential election convincingly in 1988.</p>
<p>Finally, in 1995, at his third attempt, Chirac finally won the presidency – despite numerous acts of treachery from within his own camp by rivals keen to stop him.</p>
<p>His time in office was far from easy. Chirac drew international criticism at the very beginning of his seven-year mandate when he resumed <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/january/29/newsid_4665000/4665676.stm">nuclear testing</a> in the Pacific. Then came <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/government-and-opposition/article/div-classtitlethe-french-strikes-of-1995-and-their-political-aftermathdiv/BDDAEA58D6C0FC2F5F5F23988BBFB688">strikes</a> in the winter of 1995 and the ill-fated dissolution of parliament in 1997. After performing badly in the subsequent parliamentary election, Chirac was forced into a cohabitation that last until 2002. This time, he played the token president next to socialist prime minister Lionel Jospin.</p>
<p>In the end, it was only a fortunate combination of circumstances – a rising far right threat and a fractured left – that enabled Chirac to win his second term in 2002. He took <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/1969649.stm">82% of the vote</a> against National Front leader Jean-Marie Le Pen in the second round of the presidential election.</p>
<p>Despite taking the highest share of the vote ever, Chirac never quite managed to shake off the idea that he hadn’t been elected for the “right” reasons. This second mandate was characterised by apparent inactivity. To borrow Nicolas Sarkozy’s phrase, Chirac was beginning to look like an “<a href="http://www.europe1.fr/politique/sarkozy-aussi-a-critique-son-predecesseur-1427547">idle king</a>”.</p>
<p>Chirac was oddly silent for a long time during the serious <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4413964.stm">urban riots of 2005</a>. He then went on to lose a referendum on the European Constitutional Treaty. His second mandate was ending on a bitter note. He even faced a number of criminal charges and was subject to a string of book-length studies that were highly critical both of him personally and of his political actions.</p>
<h2>The president of ‘French malaise’</h2>
<p>The economic backdrop was not always unfavourable, yet Chirac’s France, increasingly vulnerable, globalised, fragmented, insecure and depressed, became mired in what academic <a href="http://www.nicolasbaverez.com/2016/03/03/les-trente-piteuses/">Nicolas Baverez</a> would call “les trente piteuses” (the post-1974 gloom years).</p>
<p>All things considered, it was under Chirac’s presidency that France’s “malaise” became firmly entrenched. It was a malaise that stemmed from long-term, mass unemployment, a crisis in French society and French identity, and a growing anxiety about the increasingly globalised world beyond its borders. Indeed, it was towards the end of Chirac’s mandate that the notion of “France’s decline” returned with a vengeance.</p>
<p>Chirac was right on the subject of Iraq, but we would be hard pressed to find any other major actions under his presidency. We might cite the French state’s acknowledgement of its role in deporting French Jews during World War II or the shift towards an active pro-European policy – but are either big enough to be called a defining moment?</p>
<h2>The enigma</h2>
<p>Although Chirac’s presidential legacy is limited, many people are fascinated by him as a person. He was a political animal, capable, like his nemesis Mitterrand, of overcoming defeat and betrayal and of eliminating his rivals.</p>
<p>They are fascinated, too, by Chirac the man. Warm, hardworking, likeable, energetic, down-to-earth, charming, cultured … there is no limit to the complimentary adjectives showered on him by those who came into contact with him. He was also a man open to the world and to all cultures. <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/5097382.stm">The Paris museum of tribal art</a>, which he founded, will be an abiding testimony to that.</p>
<p>There is an almost equal amount of interest in the part of Chirac’s persona that remains hidden in shadow. Countless books have been written about “Chirac, the enigma”, and the majority of his many biographers concede that part of his personality is unquestionably shrouded in mystery.</p>
<p>The true nature of his political convictions are also a mystery. As a student, he flirted with the Communist party but then he went on to praise the economic liberalism of Reagan and Thatcher in the 1980s. In 1995, he campaigned on the subject of France’s social divide, but once elected initiated a conservative programme of deeply unpopular social reform. He also oscillated between euroscepticism and support for the EU project.</p>
<p>The same ambiguities are in evidence on the question of immigration and integration. Despite launching the controversial “regoupement familial” which authorised migrants to have their family joining them in France and steadfastly opposing the National Front, certain statements, including a comment about the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1991/06/23/world/immigrant-unrest-alarming-french.html">“noise and smell”</a> generated by African families, have left a lasting sense of unease.</p>
<p>We should also note the questions raised about the former president’s personal integrity. In 2011, he was given a suspended prison sentence of two years for abuse of trust, embezzlement of public funds and conflict of interest.</p>
<p>History may well have little to say about Chirac, associated as he is with a lacklustre period in France’s past. He was, at least a politician of his time. Certainly, comparison with his predecessors and successors will not always be to his disadvantage – but perhaps that says more about them than him.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/69938/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Laurent Binet does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The most popular president of the Fifth Republic actually achieved alarmingly little during his tenure.Laurent Binet, Lecturer, School of Modern Languages, Cardiff UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/696532019-09-26T13:27:09Z2019-09-26T13:27:09ZJacques Chirac, 1932-2019: a political bulldozer<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/148075/original/image-20161130-17069-106xev5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C1200%2C731&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Jacques Chirac (here in 2005) was a defining figure in French politics after May 1968.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/worldeconomicforum/346655272/in/photolist-wCGx3-7bn24n-8qdc9-6jMHTN-wCGwX-JZzNH-dTsfd-dSUTJ-DWPjE-dBmhDC-8u3rbV-3ft5Gq-91QsRH-2vEEkx-b9bd1-b99rs-b99rt-b99ry-b99rw-b9bcX-4NkHt-7SQEQF-rqMfA2-57FtgM-aRpMXM-PQ83A-d8cAiW-2ZKvB2-9Hu228-9TAAEK-7tD1NL-6JASZR-8NrQTg-buH5at-DdDjw-7SQELc-GikFo-hVJtr-ikVb5-52Z3K-dftq4-7vZGW6-DLtXb-34xeYu-9p3uyw-kGzEy8-6NCBr-5mHwuc-gt7HiJ-mSssZ">World Economic Forum/Flickr</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Jacques Chirac, the president of France from 1995 to 2007, has died. His family announced his passing on Thursday, September 26 via Agence France Presse. “President Jacques Chirac passed away peacefully this morning surrounded by friends and family,” said Frédéric Salat-Baroux, the husband of Chirac’s daughter Claude.</p>
<p>His health had deteriorated since his departure from the Elysée Palace in 2007, notably as a result of a <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/1497612/Minor-stroke-puts-Chirac-in-hospital-but-he-hangs-on-to-reins-of-government.html">2005 stroke</a> suffered during his second term as president. In 2016 he was hospitalised for a lung infection but recovered.</p>
<h2>A long civil-service career</h2>
<p>Chirac was born in Paris in 1932, with roots in central France. He studied at Sciences Po, the Institute of Political Studies and the National School of Administration (ENA). During his time at Sciences Po, he took a sabbatical and studied for one term at Harvard University. Then came marriage to Bernadette Chodron de Courcel, descendent of an aristocratic family, and voluntary military service in Algeria.</p>
<p>A committed civil servant, Chirac worked tirelessly and was able to climb rapidly in the world of politics. In 1962 he joined the office of the then prime minister, Georges Pompidou, who fondly referred to Chirac as “my bulldozer”. During the 1967 parliamentary elections, he stood for election in the Corrèze region. While the office was long held by the French Communist Party, Chirac campaigned actively and against all expectations, won.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/138253/original/image-20160919-11108-w8lkkb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/138253/original/image-20160919-11108-w8lkkb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=263&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138253/original/image-20160919-11108-w8lkkb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=263&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138253/original/image-20160919-11108-w8lkkb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=263&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138253/original/image-20160919-11108-w8lkkb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=330&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138253/original/image-20160919-11108-w8lkkb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=330&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138253/original/image-20160919-11108-w8lkkb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=330&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Jacques Chirac and family during the 1970s.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/retrorama/16689344213/in/photolist-rqMfA2-57FtgM-aRpMXM-PQ83A-d8cAiW-2ZKvB2-9Hu228-9TAAEK-7tD1NL-6JASZR-8NrQTg-buH5at-DdDjw-7SQELc-GikFo-hVJtr-ikVb5-52Z3K-dftq4-7vZGW6-DLtXb-34xeYu-9p3uyw-kGzEy8-6NCBr-5mHwuc-gt7HiJ-mSssZ-aU7i6-ebQHjA-33i2ka-4gV3pD-exfcJ-4Cr5iy-4Cr5kj-9rUL8c-4Vw7rV-eZhEN4-ebK7r8-nxszNC-GTHyo-bfQT2-4BKgUd-81N9Mk-3rAert-uspaG-38kmr-8JtECX-mmASup-nrULXF">Flashback/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">CC BY-NC-SA</a></span>
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<p>At the age of 35, Chirac was named secretary of state for employment by Pompidou, and in 1974 was named minister of the interior. During the election that followed the death of President Georges Pompidou, Chirac supported Valery Giscard d'Estaing and became prime minister when he won. In office, Chirac oversaw many of the great reforms in France of the early 1970s: reduction of the age of majority to 18, audio-visual reform, divorce by mutual consent and the <a href="https://eclj.org/la-dconstruction-de-la-loi-veil/french-institutions/la-dconstruction-de-la-loi-veil">legalisation of abortion</a>, a move led by the then health minister, Simone Veil.</p>
<p>Over time Chirac’s relationship with Giscard d'Estaing became difficult, however, and he resigned in 1976. The following year he was elected mayor of Paris after a fierce battle, giving him a stronghold for political action. He would hold that office until 1995.</p>
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<h2>Opponent in Chief</h2>
<p>Chirac launched his first presidential campaign in 1981, but in the first round came in behind Giscard d'Estaing, who was up for re-election. Socialist François Mitterrand <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1981/06/15/world/france-s-socialists-win-by-landslide-in-assembly-vote.html">won the second round</a>, and would serve as president until 1995. </p>
<p>After Mitterrand’s victory, Chirac became the leader of the opposition. When the conservative RPR party won the most seats in the 1986 legislative elections, Mitterrand was obliged to chose him as prime minister, launching France’s first-ever political “cohabitation”. During this time Chirac pursued a liberal economic policy, including numerous privatisations and the abolition of a wealth tax.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/138511/original/image-20160920-12481-1yzoly0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/138511/original/image-20160920-12481-1yzoly0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=448&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138511/original/image-20160920-12481-1yzoly0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=448&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138511/original/image-20160920-12481-1yzoly0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=448&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138511/original/image-20160920-12481-1yzoly0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=564&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138511/original/image-20160920-12481-1yzoly0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=564&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138511/original/image-20160920-12481-1yzoly0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=564&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Campaign poster for Jacques Chirac’s RPR party in 1986.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">DR</span></span>
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<p>Chirac’s popularity had deteriorated sharply, however. Mitterrand was easily re-elected as president in May 1988, while Chirac earned only modest scores (19.9% in the first round and 44.0% in the second). His time as prime minister was over. </p>
<h2>The third time, the charm</h2>
<p>After seven years outside of national politics, Chirac’s third chance to become president came in 1995. In the first round of that year’s presidential election, Chirac was up against conservative Édouard Balladur. Despite discouraging poll numbers, Chirac managed to come out ahead – 20.8% to 18.6% – and was easily elected in the second round against Socialist Lionel Jospin. During the campaign Chirac revealed significant strength and even obstinacy in order to reach the country’s highest office.</p>
<p>Chirac’s first term as president was anything but easy, however. His prime minister, Alain Juppé, concentrated on budget cutting, and his attempts to reform pensions and social security were met with <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/WORLD/9512/france_strike/12-16/index.html">countrywide strikes in the fall of 1995</a>.</p>
<p>With his popularity falling, Chirac made the surprise decision in April 1997 to <a href="https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1997-04-22-mn-51145-story.html">dissolve the National Assembly</a>, hoping to obtain a stronger majority. He lost his bet and was forced into a “cohabitation” with the Socialist Party. <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/special/politics97/news/06/0602/france.shtml">Lionel Jospin became prime minister</a>, exercising considerable power during the last five years of Chirac’s first term.</p>
<h2>Re-elected with 82% of the vote</h2>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/138268/original/image-20160919-11090-1kwhkip.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/138268/original/image-20160919-11090-1kwhkip.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138268/original/image-20160919-11090-1kwhkip.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138268/original/image-20160919-11090-1kwhkip.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138268/original/image-20160919-11090-1kwhkip.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138268/original/image-20160919-11090-1kwhkip.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138268/original/image-20160919-11090-1kwhkip.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Chirac addresses the nation in response to the 2005 riots in France.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/humain/83939174/in/photolist-8qdc9-6jMHTN-wCGwX-JZzNH-dTsfd-dSUTJ-DWPjE-dBmhDC-8u3rbV-3ft5Gq-91QsRH-2vEEkx-b9bd1-b99rs-b99rt-b99ry-b99rw-b9bcX-4NkHt-7SQEQF-rqMfA2-57FtgM-aRpMXM-PQ83A-d8cAiW-2ZKvB2-9Hu228-9TAAEK-7tD1NL-6JASZR-8NrQTg-buH5at-DdDjw-7SQELc-GikFo-hVJtr-ikVb5-52Z3K-dftq4-7vZGW6-DLtXb-34xeYu-9p3uyw-kGzEy8-6NCBr-5mHwuc-gt7HiJ-mSssZ-aU7i6-ebQHjA">HJalbert Gagnier/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The 2002 election was a watershed for France in a number of ways. The outgoing prime minister, Lionel Jospin, was expected to make it into the second round, but was led by Jean-Marie Le Pen of the far-right National Front party, 16.9% to 16.2%. In the second round, <a href="https://www.economist.com/europe/2002/05/09/jacques-chirac-wins-by-default">Chirac won easily against Le Pen</a>, 82.2% to 17.8%. </p>
<p>Chirac’s re-election allowed him to rebuild unity on the right side of the political spectrum, with the launch of a new political party, the Union for the Presidential Majority (UMP). As president, Chirac pushed through a range of laws, including lowering income taxes, improving road safety and measures to help the disabled. However, on the international stage his administration was most clearly distinguished by its anti-American bent. <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/france-no-troops-to-iraq/">France’s refusal to take part in the 2003 military intervention in Iraq</a> was a hugely significant moment. </p>
<p>Over the course of his time in office Chirac became increasingly pro-European, and hoped to see France ratify the draft European Constitution by referendum – one that would <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/europe/05/29/france.eu/index.html">go down to defeat in 2005</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/138255/original/image-20160919-11100-1pbmfqi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/138255/original/image-20160919-11100-1pbmfqi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138255/original/image-20160919-11100-1pbmfqi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138255/original/image-20160919-11100-1pbmfqi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138255/original/image-20160919-11100-1pbmfqi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138255/original/image-20160919-11100-1pbmfqi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138255/original/image-20160919-11100-1pbmfqi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">After retiring from politics, Jacques Chirac (here in 2011), was a popular figure.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/bryanpelz/6466361407/in/photolist-aRpMXM-PQ83A-d8cAiW-2ZKvB2-9Hu228-9TAAEK-7tD1NL-6JASZR-8NrQTg-buH5at-DdDjw-7SQELc-GikFo-hVJtr-ikVb5-52Z3K-dftq4-7vZGW6-DLtXb-34xeYu-9p3uyw-kGzEy8-6NCBr-5mHwuc-gt7HiJ-mSssZ-aU7i6-ebQHjA-33i2ka-4gV3pD-exfcJ-4Cr5iy-4Cr5kj-9rUL8c-4Vw7rV-eZhEN4-ebK7r8-nxszNC-GTHyo-bfQT2-4BKgUd-81N9Mk-3rAert-uspaG-38kmr-8JtECX-mmASup-nrULXF-nPdsWy-nJmWpq">Bryan Pelz/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Chirac left office in 2007, and in retirement devoted himself to the prevention of international conflicts, sustainable development and the <a href="http://www.quaibranly.fr/en/">Musée du quai Branly</a>, whose creation he spearheaded 10 years earlier. He was also part of France’s Constitutional Council until 2010. </p>
<p>After a life in public service, Chirac will be remembered as a man who enjoyed getting up close with the public and wasn’t shy about visiting France’s annual <a href="https://en.salon-agriculture.com/">Salon de l'Agriculture</a>, one of the world’s largest agricultural shows. He was also an ardent defender of France’s Republican values, and worked on the international scene to make the voice of France heard and to defend a multipolar world.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/69653/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Pierre Bréchon ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>A look back at the distinguished career of the former president, an ardent defender of France’s place in the world.Pierre Bréchon, Professeur émérite de science politique, Sciences Po Grenoble, Auteurs historiques The Conversation FranceLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1157342019-04-18T14:42:49Z2019-04-18T14:42:49ZNotre Dame: the public and private lives of France’s spiritual home<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/269989/original/file-20190418-28119-ue5z72.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C4%2C998%2C655&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The Seine and Notre Dame, physically and spiritually the heart of Paris.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Iakov Kalinin via Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>While flames engulfed Notre Dame on the evening of April 15 and the world watched in despair, French president Emmanuel Macron <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/bcd5aa90-5fc9-11e9-a27a-fdd51850994c">told news cameras</a> that the Paris cathedral was part of the history of all French people: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>It is our history, our literature, our imagination, the place where we have lived our great moments … it is the epicentre of our life.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Macron hit the mark in more ways than one. Certainly, since its first stone was laid in 1163, Notre Dame has witnessed a great many of France’s iconic moments. It was, after all, the church of the country’s medieval kings long before the royal court moved out to Versailles in the 17th century.</p>
<p>In 1558, it witnessed the marriage of Mary Queen of Scots to the Dauphin, soon to be King François II. In 1804, Napoleon Bonaparte crowned himself emperor there. And, on August 26 1944, the towering frame of general Charles de Gaulle strode triumphantly down the aisle for a thanksgiving service on the liberation of Paris from Nazi occupation – having braved snipers on the way.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/269996/original/file-20190418-28103-1hevo6t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/269996/original/file-20190418-28103-1hevo6t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=430&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/269996/original/file-20190418-28103-1hevo6t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=430&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/269996/original/file-20190418-28103-1hevo6t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=430&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/269996/original/file-20190418-28103-1hevo6t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=540&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/269996/original/file-20190418-28103-1hevo6t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=540&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/269996/original/file-20190418-28103-1hevo6t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=540&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Napoleon Bonaparte crowning himself emperor in Notre Dame, December 1804.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jacques-Louis David and Georges Rouget</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Notre Dame is one of the country’s “lieux de mémoire”, a “realm of memory”, to use <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/2928520">historian Pierre Nora’s term</a>; a place where historical memory is embedded and commemorated.</p>
<h2>Secret lives</h2>
<p>All buildings have their “secret lives” – a topic that Edward Hollis explores in his brilliant book with that very title. One of the cathedral’s secret lives was its part in the “culture war” that bitterly divided France after the Revolution of 1789. The Revolution was not only a frontal assault on hereditary privilege, seigneurialism and the monarchy – it also developed into an attack on the Catholic church, and Notre Dame was one of the most important sites of this conflict. </p>
<p>In the autumn of 1793, as the Terror gathered pace, the firebrands who dominated Paris’ municipal government ordered the removal of the statues that lined Notre Dame’s façade above its great doors.</p>
<p>These, it was proclaimed, were “the gothic simulacra of the Kings of France” (in fact, they represented the Kings of Judea). As the iconoclasm swept through the city, the interior of the cathedral was gutted: all religious images, statues, effigies, reliquaries and symbols were stripped out until all that remained was a bare shell of masonry and timber. The cathedral’s bells and spire were melted down for their metal.</p>
<p>This was the most serious damage sustained by the cathedral in modern times, until the recent fire, and yet (and here we might take heart) Notre Dame would be restored in the 19th century by Eugène-Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc, whose work included the replacement spire that fell so tragically in flames on April 15.</p>
<p>The crescendo of the revolutionary campaign of “dechristianisation” came on November 10, 1793 when Notre Dame – renamed the “Temple of Reason” – played host to a secular, atheist festival to the triumph of human reason over religion and superstition. The French Revolution left a legacy of cultural and political division between, on the one hand, the Republic, the secular and visions of a democratic, rights-based order, and, on the other hand, the Church, the sacred and memories of the old monarchy.</p>
<h2>Crisis of faith</h2>
<p>Napoleon Bonaparte papered over the chasm in 1801 by signing a Concordat – an agreement with the Pope, whereby he pragmatically recognised Catholicism as the religion of the “great majority of French citizens”. This was a clever formula that was both a statement of fact and left room for other faiths. In return, the Pope accepted many of the reforms of the Revolution and Notre Dame was returned to the Church in April 1802. </p>
<p>Despite this compromise, friction continued between the church and the state as the political pendulum swung back and forth over the course of the 19th century. Education was a particularly contentious battleground, as both sides fought to win the hearts and minds of the younger generations.</p>
<p>From this conflict sprang the republican principle of “laïcité”. While French people of all races and creeds were free to practice their beliefs as private individuals, in their contacts with the state, particularly in schools, they were meant to be equal citizens abiding by the same laws and adhering to the same, universal, republican values.</p>
<p>Notre-Dame was given a role in this – if only in opposition to laïcité. When the Eiffel Tower was opened in 1889 for the Universal Exposition, itself commemorating the centenary of the French Revolution, it was heralded by republicans as a triumph of human reason, science and progress over faith and superstition. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/269988/original/file-20190418-28087-pyt7es.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/269988/original/file-20190418-28087-pyt7es.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/269988/original/file-20190418-28087-pyt7es.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/269988/original/file-20190418-28087-pyt7es.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/269988/original/file-20190418-28087-pyt7es.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/269988/original/file-20190418-28087-pyt7es.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/269988/original/file-20190418-28087-pyt7es.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Two of Notre Dame’s oldest inhabitants enjoying the view of the Eiffel Tower.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Neirfy via Shutterstock</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The French diplomat and travel-writer <a href="https://www.revolvy.com/page/Eug%C3%A8ne%252DMelchior-de-Vog%C3%BC%C3%A9">Eugène Melchior de Vogüé</a> imagined an argument between Notre Dame and the Eiffel Tower, between the old and the new, between faith and science. The cathedral’s two towers mock Eiffel’s creation:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>You are ugly and empty; we are beautiful and replete with God … Fantasy for a day, you will not last, because you have no soul.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The iron structure retorts: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Old abandoned towers, no one listens to you anymore … You were ignorance; I am knowledge. You keep man enslaved; I free him … I have no more need of your God, invented to explain a creation whose laws I know. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>In 1905, the republicans finally triumphed, formally separating church and state, thereby tearing up Napoleon’s Concordat. Notre Dame itself, along with other ecclesiastical property, was taken over by the government.</p>
<h2>Sacred union</h2>
<p>So Notre Dame is certainly a symbol of France’s past, but not only because of its longevity, its royal associations, its undeniably stunning architecture and its location on the Île de la Cité – the ancient legal, political and ecclesiastical heart of the former kingdom. It also stood as a site – and a symbol – of the culture war: the “Franco-French” conflict between, on the one hand, the country’s monarchist and Catholic traditions and, on the other hand, its revolutionary and republican heritage. These frictions have periodically torn the country apart since 1789. This is its hidden history.</p>
<p>This alone is reason to mourn the damage, because its “secret life” carries lessons for all of us – about the relationship between church and state, faith and reason, the secular and the sacred, about tolerance and intolerance, about the use and abuse of religion and culture.</p>
<p>But happily this is not the full story. In times of national crisis, the French have shown an inspiring capacity to rally together, evoking the “union sacrée”, the unity of wartime in 1914, just as they mobilised around the democratic, republican values in response to the terrorist attacks in 2015. </p>
<p>And Notre Dame has historically played a part in these moments of reconciliation and union. When France emerged from the brutal, sectarian 16th-century strife between Catholics and the Protestant Huguenots – remembered as the Wars of Religion – the Protestant Henri de Navarre, who took the crown as Henri IV, pragmatically decided that: “Paris is well worth a Mass” and converted to Catholicism.</p>
<p>When he rode into the capital in 1594, he immediately took communion in Notre Dame: it was a moment that promised peace between Catholics and Protestants (and four years later, the new king issued the Edict of Nantes, which declared toleration for both faiths). </p>
<p>It was in Notre Dame, too, that the official celebrations of Napoleon’s compromise with the Church, the Concordat, came to a climax on Easter Sunday 1802, with a Mass attended by the entire government of a republic once deemed “Godless”.</p>
<p>In 1944, de Gaulle’s triumphant march to Notre Dame through liberated Paris was a moment of catharsis for French people humiliated by four years of Nazi occupation. And in 1996, the then president Jacques Chirac (also the first French president to make a state visit to the Vatican) helped to arrange a Requiem Mass for his agnostic predecessor, François Mitterand.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/269991/original/file-20190418-28103-4s10ix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/269991/original/file-20190418-28103-4s10ix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=440&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/269991/original/file-20190418-28103-4s10ix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=440&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/269991/original/file-20190418-28103-4s10ix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=440&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/269991/original/file-20190418-28103-4s10ix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=553&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/269991/original/file-20190418-28103-4s10ix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=553&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/269991/original/file-20190418-28103-4s10ix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=553&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">General Charles de Gaulle marches down the Champs Elysees to Notre Dame for a service of thanksgiving following the city’s liberation in August 1944.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Imperial War Museum</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The gesture – and the subsequent papal visit that same year – certainly <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/historians-battle-over-clovis-first-french-king-1306501.html">elicited protests from people</a>, particularly on the left, who defended a pure form of laïcité. Yet that Chirac, who in other contexts steadfastly defended the Republic’s secularism, could as president do these things suggests how far the boundaries between republicanism and Catholicism have softened. Notre Dame is certainly an appropriate site to reflect on this because it is both state property – and officially designated a “monument historique” as long ago as 1862 – and a fully-functioning church.</p>
<h2>Bridges to build</h2>
<p>This is not to say that there are no bridges still to build, or frictions to resolve – far from it. Recently, controversies over laïcité have revolved around attempts to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/mar/14/headscarves-and-muslim-veil-ban-debate-timeline">ban the hijab, the burka and the burkini</a>, which have stoked fears of racism and of the exclusion of France’s substantial Muslim population. And while there is certainly a dark side to les gilet jaunes, they are no less a symptom of deep economic distress and social malaise.</p>
<p>So when Macron, on first learning of the terrible fire consuming Notre Dame, could tweet that his thoughts were with “all Catholics and for all French people” and that “tonight I am sad to see this part of us burn”, he was – perhaps intentionally – almost using the Napoleonic language of the Concordat. His tweet recognised that not all French people are Catholic, while at the same time stating that the iconic cathedral is the heritage of all citizens regardless of belief. </p>
<p>And indeed the rector of the Paris Grand Mosque, <a href="https://churchpop.com/2019/04/16/french-islamic-leader-calls-for-muslims-to-aid-notre-dame-rebuilding-citing-their-veneration-of-mary/">Dalil Boubakeur</a>, issued a press release as the fire still blazed, saying: “We pray that God might safeguard this monument so precious to our hearts.” </p>
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<p>When the reconstruction of Notre Dame begins, the country will be restoring not only a site of its history, but also a symbol of the complexities of that history, complexities that, hopefully, remind us of a capacity for healing, inclusion and unity.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/115734/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michael Rapport receives funding from the British Academy and the Leverhulme Trust for his work on Revolutionary Paris. He is a member of Stirling4Europe.</span></em></p>From coronations to Revolution to reconciliation, Notre Dame has witnessed nearly 900 years of French history.Michael Rapport, Reader in Modern European History, University of GlasgowLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/812152017-07-19T06:11:16Z2017-07-19T06:11:16ZThe ups and downs of Franco-American relations<p>The Franco-American alliance needs no introduction, but oblige me for a moment because French President Emmanuel Macron’s invitation to Donald Trump to attend the Bastille Day celebrations was too perfect a metaphor for the relationship between France and the United States not to unpack. </p>
<p>Despite (frequent) feuds, relations between the two countries are anchored by the weight of history. They are also subject to complicated trends – not all of them positive – and often undermined by trivial disputes. </p>
<p>Still, as both current presidents seem to realise, these destructive tendencies must be contained.</p>
<h2>The cornerstones of the relationship</h2>
<p>Paris and Washington are traditional allies whose political and military cooperation is essential. Despite some important differences, their political philosophies are similar. </p>
<p>Though the countries sometimes compete in cut-throat economic and trade relations, France and the US have never been at war with each other (which cannot be said for such French allies as England, Spain, Italy and, of course, Germany). </p>
<p>France even played a major role in America’s Revolutionary War against England, in the 18th century, and the US played a role in ensuring France’s survival against German expansionism some 140 years later.</p>
<p>This is what both countries celebrated together this Bastille Day, which coincided with the 100th anniversary of the first US troops on French soil in 1917, the first world war analogue to the history-changing invasion of <a href="http://www.ina.fr/video/RCC09004856">Normandy on June 6 1944</a>.</p>
<p>Franco-American military, political and intelligence cooperation remains crucial from the African Sahel to the Middle East. In Washington, France’s on-the-ground knowledge of Africa is held in high regard, as shown in US-supported <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-20991719">interventions in Mali</a> and <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-25183377">Central African Republic</a> in 2013.</p>
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<p>Further, both countries are liberal and democratic. Their differences were thoroughly recorded by Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859) <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/05/17/tocqueville-in-america">in his time</a>, but when push comes to shove, France and the US have always stood together against authoritarian regimes, even when their leaders were not necessarily close. </p>
<p>To quote former French president general Charles de Gaulle from <a href="http://fresques.ina.fr/de-gaulle/fiche-media/Gaulle00111/entretien-avec-michel-droit-deuxieme-partie.html">a 1965 interview</a>, “In truth, who has been America’s staunchest ally, if not France…? Should the worst happen, should the freedom of the world come under threat, who would be the most obvious allies, if not France and the United States?”</p>
<p>Each country’s particularities, though, can irk the other. The French attachment to Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s <a href="https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/rousseau/#IdeaGeneWill">notion of the common good</a> does not always go down well in the US, where it can be seen as an unbearable constraint on individual freedom. And the American <a href="https://jhupbooks.press.jhu.edu/content/political-philosophy-james-madison">Madisonian</a> idea that special interests can coexist within a democratic system is often seen in France as an intolerable obstacle to equality.</p>
<p>These special interests, both industrial and otherwise, make France and the US competitors, <a href="https://www.lesechos.fr/29/06/2014/lesechos.fr/0203604047291_les-juges-americains-infligent-une-sanction-historique-a-bnp-paribas.htm">fierce rivals in trade and finance</a>. Allies or not, many powerful Americans would be happy to see strategic European sectors, such as aeronautics and defence, disappear altogether. </p>
<h2>Dangerous liaisons</h2>
<p>Modern history abounds with squabbles between the two nations. Their presidential regimes are indubitably conducive to ego clashes: at major summits, both France and the US are represented by their heads of state, while most other allies are represented by “only” the executive-branch leader (prime minister or chancellor). </p>
<p>The underlying tensions around the official etiquette of this situation may be accentuated when contemporaneous presidents have different political sensibilities, as they so often seem to: think Jacques Chirac and George W. Bush or Nicolas Sarkozy and Barack Obama.</p>
<p>These discrepancies are manifest in the French obsession with showing its powerful partner that France is a “friend and ally, but not aligned”, <a href="http://www.hubertvedrine.net/article-190.html">in the words</a> of former minister of foreign affairs Hubert Védrine. And they’re implicit in American irritation with its small, economically limited ally claiming sovereign equality.</p>
<p>But periods of genuine tensions originate mostly from profound differences over major international affairs. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.lefigaro.fr/histoire/archives/2015/04/29/26010-20150429ARTFIG00315-le-30-avril-1975-la-chute-de-saigon-met-fin-a-la-guerre-du-vietnam.php">In Phnom Penh in 1966</a>, at the height of the Vietnam War, General de Gaulle warned the US that Asia would not submit to its will.</p>
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<p>Decades after the quagmire that came of not heeding that advice, in 2003, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/jan/22/germany.france">Jacques Chirac opposed the Iraq War</a>, warning of major destabilisation in the Middle East, condemning America’s ultimatum against Saddam Hussein as a dangerous precedent in international relations and threatening a UN veto. </p>
<p>Within NATO, <a href="https://books.google.fr/books?id=-IGzjxaoBpgC&pg=PA40&lpg=PA40&dq=Chirac+against+bombing+belgrade&source=bl&ots=IrsgVQuKpm&sig=YeVS181TXjeQgmbsDhjA3d32V8w&hl=en&sa=X&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=Chirac%20against%20bombing%20belgrade&f=false">Chirac also opposed</a> American plans to bomb Belgrade during the 1999 war in Kosovo . </p>
<p>Today, Emmanuel Macron and Donald Trump are at odds – and, again, quite publicly so – <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/emmanuel-macron-donald-trump-paris-agreement-climate-change-us-rejoin-france-paris-bastille-day-a7844646.html">on the issue of climate change</a>. These differences, which cannot be reduced to symbolic clashes between political personalities (unlike the much-covered <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/07/trump-macron-handshake/533688/">Trump-Macron handshake</a>), can lead to a feeling of deep incompatibility between these two nations. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/can-europe-make-it/v-nick-pay/politics-of-french-bashing">French-bashing is a common practice in the US</a>, and, in France, some cannot resist the pull of resurgent revolutionary third-worldism (see Jean Luc Mélenchon’s interest in South America’s leftist <a href="http://www.liberation.fr/politiques/2017/04/14/jean-luc-melenchon-s-explique-sur-l-alliance-bolivarienne_1562985">Bolivarian alliance</a>, for instance).</p>
<p>More significantly, various candidates in the run-up to the 2017 French presidential election, including three of the four leading contenders (the far-right Marine Le Pen, the conservative Francois Fillon and the far-left candidate Mélenchon), promoted closer ties with Moscow in a direct affront to US sensibilities (at least, it was <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/democracy-post/wp/2017/07/05/with-friends-like-putin-who-needs-enemies/?utm_term=.95b6f51c3e33">in the pre-Trump era</a>).</p>
<p>Macron was <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/06/what-to-make-of-trump-and-macrons-upcoming-rendez-vous-in-paris/532059/">criticised</a> for inviting Donald Trump to join a day of great national importance to France. But, mindful of the past, he surely knows that in many ways, neither country has a better spare ally, and, much beyond the Trump factor, this fact still outweighs individual tensions and all-too-real divides. </p>
<p><em>Translated from the <a href="https://theconversation.com/la-relation-franco-americaine-constantes-et-anicroches-81050%5D(https://theconversation.com/la-relation-franco-americaine-constantes-et-anicroches-81050">The Conversation France</a> by Alice Heathwood for <a href="http://www.fastforword.fr/en/">Fast for Word</a>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/81215/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Frédéric Charillon does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>France and the US have always had their differences, but they’ve also proved strong and steady allies.Frédéric Charillon, professeur de science politique, Université Clermont Auvergne (UCA)Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/802982017-07-05T13:05:57Z2017-07-05T13:05:57ZBrexit and the long history of English property owners in France: will the passion endure?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/176247/original/file-20170629-16047-1orq31b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Eymet, a small village in the Perigord, is home to hundreds of British people. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/westher/20211700841/in/photolist-p3snc-p3sW9-p3tMz-p3t6n-p3que-p3qiK-p3q9D-p3sUT-p3tEV-p3sJR-p3q3q-p3spz-p3tAq-p3ssa-p3swN-p3qgG-p3tym-wN3fuH-p3tMZ-p3t4v-p3tc4-p3sG5-p3qg7-p3q1s-p3sRn-p3snZ-p3q1a-p3ttx-p3qkb-p3tu2-p3q1N-p3sTM-p3tPj-p3suN-p3sgf-p3sMN-p3s6m-p3tnS-p3tBJ-p3svc-p3tHd-p3sRK-p3skY-p3sNv-p3qjB-p3sZ3-p3sMe-p3tFm-p3qnm-p3sPH">Esther Westerveld / Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Since the first decades of the 19th century, many British citizens have bought properties or built houses in France. Approximately <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/jan/27/fewer-britons-in-rest-of-europe-than-previously-thought-ons-research">150,000 UK citizens currently live in France</a>, second only to Spain. With Brexit on the horizon, many are uneasy, for the draw of life in France remains strong, and its roots are deep. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/175875/original/file-20170627-24776-19dozrr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/175875/original/file-20170627-24776-19dozrr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/175875/original/file-20170627-24776-19dozrr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=384&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/175875/original/file-20170627-24776-19dozrr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=384&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/175875/original/file-20170627-24776-19dozrr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=384&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/175875/original/file-20170627-24776-19dozrr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=483&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/175875/original/file-20170627-24776-19dozrr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=483&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/175875/original/file-20170627-24776-19dozrr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=483&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">The villa Bric-à-Brac of the English family Faber, in Dinard, now aquarium, then today luxury hotel.</span>
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<p>Initially, those who acquired estates in France belonged to the privileged classes. They were seeking a milder climate as well as a lower cost of living. Starting in the 1800s, prominent British citizens began buying or building luxurious residences in the Channel ports of Boulogne and Calais. In Dieppe, on the Emerald Coast, the Villa <em>Bric à Brac</em>, was built in 1856 by the members of the Faber family. (It has recently been transformed into a <a href="http://www.lepoint.fr/art-de-vivre/a-dinard-l-ultime-meltamorphose-de-la-villa-bric-a-brac-17-10-2016-2076646_4.php">luxurious hotel</a>). Close by, another superb English villa is <em>Solidor</em>, owned by Williers Forbes, who in 1879 launched the <a href="http://www.club.fft.fr/tennisclub.dinard/05350064_a/cms/index_public.php">first tennis club in France</a>. In 2005 it was purchased by French billionaire <a href="http://www.ouest-france.fr/le-milliardaire-breton-reste-fidele-dinard-110821">François Pinault</a> and renovated. Many distinguished guests, including French president Jacques Chirac, have been hosted there.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/175873/original/file-20170627-24749-2sykwx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/175873/original/file-20170627-24749-2sykwx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/175873/original/file-20170627-24749-2sykwx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/175873/original/file-20170627-24749-2sykwx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/175873/original/file-20170627-24749-2sykwx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/175873/original/file-20170627-24749-2sykwx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=534&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/175873/original/file-20170627-24749-2sykwx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=534&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/175873/original/file-20170627-24749-2sykwx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=534&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Lord Brougham and his Family at the Villa Eleanore-Louise Cannes.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.clarkart.edu/Collection/9278">The Clark Art</a></span>
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<p>In the south of France, other British visitors started exploring what was to become the Côte d'Azur. In 1834, <a href="http://allthingsbrougham.co.uk/lord-brougham.php">Lord Brougham</a> discovered a small village named Cannes. </p>
<p>Enchanted by the place, the politician and staunch abolitionist built a beautiful villa, which he named <em>Eleonore-Louise</em>, <a href="http://fragments-cannes.com/villa_eleonoreang.html">after his daughter</a>. He stayed there every winter until his death in 1868, and his statue stands in the nearby <a href="http://www.cannes-destination.fr/Cannes/PCUPACA06V000148/Statue-de-Lord-Brougham-au-centre-des-all%C3%A9es">Allées de la Liberté</a>. </p>
<h2>Artists’ time</h2>
<p>During the inter-war period, British and Irish artists and intellectuals were attracted to France. Playwright George Bernard Shaw came every year to stay in the mythical Eden Roc Hotel in Cap d'Antibes; H.G. Wells, the father of modern science fiction, preferred the town of Grasse. In 1927, Wells had the <a href="http://bit.ly/2sN6zeX"><em>Lou Pidou</em> built</a>, a house in which he lived with his companion Odette Keun, a Dutch journalist.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/175892/original/file-20170627-24749-1f1202i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/175892/original/file-20170627-24749-1f1202i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/175892/original/file-20170627-24749-1f1202i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/175892/original/file-20170627-24749-1f1202i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/175892/original/file-20170627-24749-1f1202i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/175892/original/file-20170627-24749-1f1202i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/175892/original/file-20170627-24749-1f1202i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/175892/original/file-20170627-24749-1f1202i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Nancy Cunard.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/johannab/16790876815/in/photolist-4Tqgcs-5cu3Sd-dD7u5D-7bGjC7-rzKCG8">Johanna/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
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<p>Nancy Cunard, the “scandalous” writer and rich heiress of the eponymous transatlantic shipping company, bought a farm house in Normandy, at the La Chapelle Réanville. She restored the house, known as <em>Le Puits carré</em> (“the square well”), with writer and poet <a href="http://www.artscouncilcollection.org.uk/artwork/nancy-cunard-and-louis-aragon-paris">Louis Aragon</a>. There she launched the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/fashion/2011/nov/16/nancy-cunard-gucci">Hours Press</a>, her publishing house, and there produced twenty or so books, including texts by Samuel Beckett. Badly damaged during World War II, the house is now <a href="http://abar.net/crowderpuits.htm">completely abandoned</a>. But the memory of the couple remains; Aragon’s name was given to a nearby secondary school.</p>
<p>With the war’s end, former residents such as Graham Green (Travels with my Aunt, 1969) and Somerset Maugham (The Razor’s Edge, 1944) began to return. They and other “old timers” were soon outnumbered by new arrivals. In the mid-1980s, the writer William Boyd (A Good man in Africa, 1981) bought an estate in Sadillac, near Bergerac in the Dordogne, where he produces his own wine. During the same time, in Provence, Peter Mayle lived and wrote his ode to the French lifestyle, <a href="http://bit.ly/2udYmy6">A Year in Provence</a> (1989). By the end of the 1990s, more and more Britons were crossing the Channel with the intention of settling somewhere deep in the French countryside, be it in Normandy, the interior of Brittany, or in <a href="https://www.cairn.info/revue-population-et-avenir-2008-5-page-15.htm">Limousin</a>, where rural houses are inexpensive by UK standards.</p>
<h2>The romance endures</h2>
<p>Unable to buy the cottage of their dreams in the UK, retirees and others from the less monied classes are now contributing to the revitalisation of rural France. Whether they are optimistic or pessimistic, whether or not their pensions are paid in sterling, most of those who live in France or who wish to do so have been considering Brexit with some apprehension. Has this prospect discouraged those who planned to purchase a property in France?</p>
<p>The majority of British (65%) who were intending to buy a house in France prior to Brexit do not seem to have changed their minds. According to the 9th edition of the <a href="http://www.bnpparibas-pf.com/fr/presse-et-actualites/9eme-observatoire-bnp-paribas-international-buyers-investing-living-abroad-2017/">Investing & Living Abroad</a> report from BNP Paribas, 23% of the potential buyers are considering accelerating their efforts – the fear is that their plans could be hindered when the divorce between the UK and the EU is formalised. </p>
<p>UK citizens remain the first buyers of real estate in France, while in Paris itself, Americans and Italians come first. Indeed, there the resources needed by would-be property owners are necessarily greater than those available to the average Briton who hopes to settle in some remote farmhouse.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/175878/original/file-20170627-24749-1saf5ic.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/175878/original/file-20170627-24749-1saf5ic.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/175878/original/file-20170627-24749-1saf5ic.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/175878/original/file-20170627-24749-1saf5ic.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/175878/original/file-20170627-24749-1saf5ic.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/175878/original/file-20170627-24749-1saf5ic.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/175878/original/file-20170627-24749-1saf5ic.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/175878/original/file-20170627-24749-1saf5ic.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Peter Mayle, author of <em>A Year in Provence</em>.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/voyages-provence/15239517475/in/album-72157647590007511/">Patrick Gaudin/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Thus in two centuries, the profile of the British in France has completely changed. In the beginning of the 19th century it was the lovers of French culture and the admirers of the Revolution of 1789, enlightened amateurs, hedonists, and cosmopolitans. They were gradually joined and progressively replaced by the first “tourists” travelling in groups, chaperoned by Thomas Cook and Co, and later by writers and artists who came to seek inspiration in the Latin Quarter or around Montparnasse. </p>
<p>While these earlier residents would sometimes buy an apartment, their enthusiasm for owning property in France was nothing compared to that of the British citizens, who at the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st are now helping revitalise rural France. And so even as it changes form, the longstanding passion of the British for real estate in France endures.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/80298/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Diana Cooper-Richet ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>While people from many nations have chosen to make their home in France, the British were among the first and remain the most numerous.Diana Cooper-Richet, Chercheur au Centre d’histoire culturelle des sociétés contemporaines, Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (UVSQ) – Université Paris-Saclay Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/796832017-06-19T13:11:13Z2017-06-19T13:11:13ZHow President Macron’s parliament shapes up<p>After the first round of the French general election, on June 11, the order went out from the Elysée Palace to members of President Emmanuel Macron’s La République en Marche (LRM): “Pas de triomphalisme” – no complacency nor gloating. Which is just as well, because while the party has secured a comfortable majority, it wasn’t quite the cake walk some <a href="https://www.fifthandahalfrepublic.com/words/lrmpremierpartidefrance">were expecting</a>. And a good thing too. The last thing French democracy needs right now is a single-party state.</p>
<p>After that first round, even the most conservative forecasters were predicting that LRM would reach 400 seats in the new National Assembly. Some even thought 450 might be on the cards. But, by a strange paradox, an even higher abstention rate in the second round (a 43% turnout, compared to 48% the week before) saw the final number drop back to what we thought before the first round. In the end, the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/feb/22/french-elections-centrist-bayrou-offers-alliance-with-macron">alliance</a> of LRM and François Bayrou’s Modem secured about 359 of the Assembly’s 577 seats – comparable to the majority elected after Jacques Chirac’s victory in 2002.</p>
<h2>Who won what?</h2>
<p>The opposition is now made up of the right-wing party Les Républicains and its allies in the Union of Democrats and Independents. They secured 130 seats between them, and there are half-a-dozen non-aligned right-wing deputies who might well sign up to their group.</p>
<p>The Parti Socialiste (PS) and its allies have around 46 seats, while Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s La France Insoumise (LFI) took about 17. The Communists, who will probably join LFI in a parliamentary group, have another ten. </p>
<p>After predictions of as few as two seats, the Front National has eight, including one for Marine Le Pen and for her partner Louis Aliot, both making their parliamentary débuts. Le Pen’s political right-hand man, Florian Philippot, however, will not be joining her, after failing to win a seat. Within the party, the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jun/16/marie-sara-the-french-bullfighter-locking-horns-with-the-front-national">witch hunt</a> against him and his gang will now begin in earnest.</p>
<p>Right across the board, the opposition performed to the best of their ability and as the results came in on Sunday night, Mélenchon, Le Pen and LR leader François Baroin all looked remarkably relaxed and relieved. </p>
<p>But Baroin now faces a difficult choice. The lines are being drawn for the contest over the party leadership that will follow in the autumn. Already we know that Xavier Bertrand, a more moderate figure within the party, and Laurent Wauquiez, who pushes a much tougher, hard-right line, plan to stand. Baroin may opt out of that confrontation. </p>
<p>Le Pen will look back on the wreckage of her presidential campaign, take stock and prepare for the the FN’s “refounding” congress, slated for early next year.</p>
<p>Mélenchon is perhaps the best placed. He secured himself a platform in the new Assembly, where he will probably chair his parliamentary group, a role that will allow him a say in the organisation of the chamber’s timetable. Le Pen will not enjoy that privilege because she fell short of the 15-seat threshold for group status (that won’t stop her complaining about being a victim of the system, of course).</p>
<h2>The class of 2017</h2>
<p>This is a new National Assembly in so many ways. A great deal has been made of the fact that half LRM’s candidates are “civilians”. In fact, Le Monde reckons that only 145 outgoing deputies of more than 300 seeking re-election have been returned and that 75% of the class of 2017 are new to the job. That carries with it all sorts of <a href="http://www.lemonde.fr/les-decodeurs/article/2017/06/19/apres-les-legislatives-2017-75-de-l-assemblee-nationale-est-renouvelee-un-record_5147128_4355770.html">attendant issues</a>. </p>
<p>It has long been apparent that the 2017 election would bring a large intake of inexperienced deputies. Some 216 outgoing members announced that they would not be standing again. In part this was down to the passing of a political generation, first elected in 1986 and 1988, but in other cases it is the consequence of the new law on the <em>cumul des mandats</em>, that rather quaint French practice whereby a deputy (or senator) often also holds local office.</p>
<p>A new law on the accumulation of elected offices recently came into effect, which prohibits members of parliament holding an executive position at local level at the same time (such as working as mayor, president of a departmental or regional assembly.) It is noticeable that several leading politicians, especially on the right, have opted to keep their local positions rather than to stay in parliament. For example, Bertrand and Wauquiez are both presidents of regional assemblies, while Baroin announced that he is standing down as a senator to remain mayor of the city of Troyes. The bases of political power are shifting as well as the party political landscape.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, LRM’s leaders in government and in parliament, face that enviable difficulty of managing a clear majority, but one with very little experience, while the new deputies will have to get up to speed with how the National Assembly works in double-quick time. And large majorities do have a tendency to become overconfident and even truculent – characteristics that Macron is not the sort of man to tolerate.</p>
<p>French politics remains in a fluid state for the time being. But at last Macron has his majority. Now the work begins.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/79683/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Paul Smith does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A huge number of new politicians have joined the National Assembly after the 2017 election.Paul Smith, Associate Professor in French and Francophone Studies, University of NottinghamLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/765662017-04-24T00:15:20Z2017-04-24T00:15:20ZThe fate of Europe will depend on the winner of the French presidential election<p>The results of one of the most divisive and unpredictable presidential contests in recent French history, which saw early frontrunner, the conservative François Fillon, laid low <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/14/world/europe/france-francois-fillon-charged.html">by a corruption scandal</a> and judicial investigation; a late surge by Jean-Luc Mélenchon <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/16/world/europe/jean-luc-melenchon-france-presidential-election.html">the far-left firebrand</a> who wants to take France out of the European Union and NATO; and the Socialist Party candidate Benoît Hamon come in a distant fifth place, are now in. </p>
<p>Centrist Emmanuel Macron and far-right Marine Le Pen will face off on May 7 in the second round of voting to determine who will be the next French president.</p>
<p>This is the first time since the Fifth Republic was established in 1958 that the top two from the first voting round do not belong to one of France’s two mainstream parties. Le Pen leads <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/as-frances-far-right-national-front-rises-memory-of-its-past-fades/2017/01/26/dfeb0d42-e1ac-11e6-a419-eefe8eff0835_story.html?utm_term=.90513066c94d">the far-right National Front</a>, which has historically been on the fringe of French electoral politics, while Macron is running as an independent.</p>
<h2>Two different visions for Europe</h2>
<p>The outcome of the run-off could have historic and far-reaching implications for France, Europe, and the EU. </p>
<p>A Le Pen victory would mark the first time <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/14/opinion/sunday/france-in-the-end-of-days.html">the extreme right</a> has held power in France since the 1940s. </p>
<p>Macron, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/feb/17/emmanuel-macron-the-french-outsider-president">who quickly advanced through</a> the Socialist Party hierarchy before leaving it to start his own political movement last year, has never held elective office.</p>
<p>The candidates offer two totally different visions for France’s future and its relationship to Europe. <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2017/01/21/politics/europe-far-right-conference/">Le Pen has called the EU</a> a “chimera” and a “anti-democratic oligarchy” and <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-france-lepen-referendum-idUSKCN1190HW">has promised</a> a referendum on France’s EU membership within six months of taking office. </p>
<p>After last year’s Brexit vote, a Le Pen victory would signal that European voters are rebelling against the EU in a historic way.</p>
<p>Macron, on the other hand, embraces European integration and wants to deepen France’s partnership <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-germany-france-macron-analysis-idUSKBN16M2LQ">with Germany</a> to lead Europe. His victory could lead to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/feb/09/emmanuel-macron-france-reform-eu-britain">a rejuvenation of the EU</a> at a time when the bloc faces a period of unprecedented and historic crises.</p>
<p>Beyond Europe, a Le Pen victory could threaten the post-second world war transatlantic alliance. Le Pen is a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/05/world/europe/marine-le-pen-trump-populism-france-election.html">fierce critic of NATO and the US role in Europe</a>. She would likely seek to align France more closely with Russia, precisely at a time <a href="https://theconversation.com/twin-crises-in-syria-and-ukraine-prove-the-west-cannot-restrain-russia-65811">when relations between Moscow and the West</a> have deteriorated to their lowest point since the end of the Cold War. </p>
<p>She has called the sanctions imposed on Russia after its invasion and annexation of Crimea in 2014 “<a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/marine-le-pen-front-national-russian-kremlin-putin-invasion-annexation-crimea-ukraine-2014-a7566196.html">completely stupid</a>,” and has suggested that she might recognise Russia’s seizure of the peninsula.</p>
<p>The most immediate impact of a Le Pen victory would likely be felt in the <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/what-would-a-le-pen-victory-in-france-mean-for-markets-1492858801">financial markets</a>. Stock markets around the world would react strongly. </p>
<p>Anticipating a possible French exit from the Eurozone, investors would sell off the country’s debt. Fears of capital controls and devaluation could lead to bank runs in France. </p>
<p>Markets could even start to anticipate the collapse of the entire Eurozone, leading to serious economic, social, and even political disruption and destabilisation.</p>
<h2>A Le Pen victory is still possible</h2>
<p>Current polls show Macron easily beating Le Pen in the second round of voting.</p>
<p>While <a href="http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2017/04/france-s-presidential-election">many experts</a> continue to dismiss the possibility of a Le Pen victory in next month’s runoff, few would go so far as to say that it is completely unimaginable.</p>
<p>The central question is whether a “<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2002/04/23/world/the-french-surprise-the-shock-french-political-leaders-rally-around-chirac.html">Republican front</a>” will emerge to block Le Pen, as happened in 2002 when her father, Jean-Marie Le Pen, faced Jacques Chirac in the second round of presidential voting. </p>
<p>Left-leaning voters helped deliver a decisive victory for Chirac.</p>
<p>But if first-round supporters of François Fillon, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, socialist Benoît Hamon, or the lesser candidates do not come out for Macron – many of them see him as just a continuation of the dreadful Hollande government – Le Pen could have a chance. Her supporters tend to be <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/22/world/europe/france-election-voters.html">more motivated and more likely to come out in strong numbers to vote</a>.</p>
<p>A Le Pen victory would thus be a tragedy for those who believe in the idea and reality of a united Europe. Its economic and political integration was a French initiative, spearheaded after the second world war by <a href="http://csweb.brookings.edu/content/research/essays/2014/monnets-brandy-and-europes-fate.html">visionary French statesmen</a>, such as Robert Schuman and Jean Monnet.</p>
<p>Three generations of French and other European leaders devoted their careers to building a united and peaceful Europe. And until recently, most French leaders saw their country’s future as inextricably tied to the EU.</p>
<h2>Ambivalence toward European integration</h2>
<p>But when given an opportunity to express their voice, French voters have been ambivalent towards greater European integration. In a 2005 referendum, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/30/world/europe/french-voters-soundly-reject-european-union-constitution.html">55%</a> of them said no to the adoption of a so-called EU constitution. </p>
<p>In 1992, French voters approved the Maastricht Treaty, which transferred more powers to EU institutions in Brussels, by the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1992/09/21/world/turmoil-in-europe-french-approve-unity-treaty-but-slim-margin-leaves-doubts.html?pagewanted=all">narrowest of margins</a>, 51% for and 49% against.</p>
<p>And today, after some 20 years of economic stagnation, France has <a href="http://www.economist.com/news/europe/21677987-france-has-less-and-less-influence-eu-and-fears-use-what-it-still-has-dispensable">less influence</a> in the EU than it has had in decades. </p>
<p>The EU has always been led by <a href="http://www.economist.com/news/europe/21577100-european-union-fretting-over-widening-gulf-between-two-partners-have-always">a Franco-German tandem</a>, but the power balance today has shifted decisively toward Berlin. On issues ranging from Greek bailouts, the refugee crisis, or containing Russian aggression, Germany increasingly calls the shots. </p>
<p>Still, the majority of French voters want to remain in the Eurozone and the EU. According to a recent <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/03/10/three-quarters-french-against-return-franc-blow-marine-le-pen/">poll</a>, 72% want to keep the euro. </p>
<p>And while a Pew Research Center <a href="http://www.pewglobal.org/2016/06/07/euroskepticism-beyond-brexit/pm_2016-06-07_brexit-01/">poll</a> last year found that 60% of French respondents hold an unfavourable view of the EU, more French citizens want <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jun/27/frexit-nexit-or-oexit-who-will-be-next-to-leave-the-eu">to stay in the EU</a> than to leave it.</p>
<p>Next month’s run-off then is a critical juncture for the future of France and the EU. Facing the effects of an unprecedented migration crisis, the rise of right-wing populism, Brexit negotiations, and nearly a decade of economic austerity, the EU is already embattled. </p>
<p>A Le Pen victory could signal the end of the project. The stakes could scarcely be higher.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/76566/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Richard Maher does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Le Pen and Macron offer two totally different visions for France’s future and its relationship to Europe.Richard Maher, Research Fellow, Global Governance Programme, Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies, European University InstituteLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/753722017-04-19T01:11:10Z2017-04-19T01:11:10ZWhy the French presidential candidates are arguing about their colonial history<p>When the French presidential elections begin on April 23, the world will be watching closely. </p>
<p>Polls are tightening up, but Marine Le Pen, of the far-right National Front (FN) Party, seems likely to get through to the second, runoff ballot on May 10. Will the xenophobic populism that brought Brexit to the U.K. and Donald Trump to the White House claim the Elysée Palace, too?</p>
<p>Le Pen’s expected advance has been one of the few constants in a campaign marked by surprising, dispiriting twists. To a historian of French colonialism like me, one of the most revealing is the renewed debate over the memory and teaching of the colonial past. The candidates’ positions on this issue can be seen as a revealing barometer of French attitudes toward immigration, race and multiculturalism today. </p>
<h2>Sixty million subjects</h2>
<p>At its height in the 1930s, the French empire encompassed some 60 million colonial subjects, from <a href="https://books.google.com/books/about/Greater_France.html?id=UFD_d-d7FhgC">the Caribbean to Southeast Asia</a>. But after decolonization in the 1950s and 1960s, the French relegated imperial racism, slavery and colonialism to the “<a href="http://www.beacon.org/Silencing-the-Past-P329.aspx">historical back burner</a>.” The eruption of the <a href="https://www.cairn.info/les-guerres-de-memoires--9782707154637.htm">history wars</a> finally broke this public silence in the mid-1990s. </p>
<p>There were two main triggers for the decade-long fight about how to remember France’s colonial history. </p>
<p>The first was the 150th anniversary of the French abolition of colonial slavery in 1998. Angered by the self-congratulatory celebration of French abolitionists, black and Afro-Caribbean activists demanded greater attention to <a href="http://www.temple.edu/tempress/titles/2424_reg.html">enslaved Africans’ suffering</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/165662/original/image-20170418-32723-dyb9k5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/165662/original/image-20170418-32723-dyb9k5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/165662/original/image-20170418-32723-dyb9k5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165662/original/image-20170418-32723-dyb9k5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165662/original/image-20170418-32723-dyb9k5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165662/original/image-20170418-32723-dyb9k5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165662/original/image-20170418-32723-dyb9k5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165662/original/image-20170418-32723-dyb9k5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Christiane Taubira.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christiane_Taubira#/media/File:Christiane_Taubira_par_Claude_Truong-Ngoc_juin_2013.jpg">Wikicommons/Claude Truong Ngoc</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Their efforts culminated in a 2001 law sponsored by Guyanese deputy Christiane Taubira. The “<a href="https://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/affichTexte.do?cidTexte=LEGITEXT000005630984&dateTexte=vig">Taubira Law</a>” “recognizes the slave trade and slavery as crimes against humanity.” </p>
<p>The second came in 2000, with revelations about the French army’s systematic use of torture during the Algerian War of Independence (1954-1962). Memoirs published by an Algerian nationalist and a French military officer and studies by <a href="http://www.editionsladecouverte.fr/catalogue/index-Une__dr__le_de_justice-9782707142580.html">two young French historians</a> <a href="http://www.gallimard.fr/Catalogue/GALLIMARD/Folio/Folio-histoire/La-torture-et-l-armee-pendant-la-guerre-d-Algerie">unleashed harsh condemnation</a> of abuses committed in Algeria, <a href="http://www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/?GCOI=80140100455090">the jewel of the French empire</a>.</p>
<h2>A notorious law</h2>
<p>The supposed injustice of such criticisms of French empire is <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/004724419802810906?journalCode=jesa">a favored theme</a> of the National Front and its founder, Jean-Marie Le Pen, Marine Le Pen’s father and a veteran of the Algerian War. Nostalgia for the colonies jibes neatly with the FN’s nationalistic, anti-immigrant, Islamophobic ideology. Strategically, “positive” accounts of the colonial past appeal to former settlers from French North Africa, known as <a href="http://www.cairn.info/revue-pole-sud-2006-1-page-75.html">pieds-noirs</a>, and to nationalist defenders of the French military. </p>
<p>This made colonial revisionism tempting to mainstream conservatives, too, as FN began to gain electoral ground beginning in the mid-1980s. Jean-Marie Le Pen’s shocking advance to the second round of the 2002 presidential elections spurred new conservative efforts to win back FN voters, especially <a href="http:/www.manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk/9780719087233/">the pieds-noirs</a>. </p>
<p>Prime among them was the infamous <a href="https://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/affichTexte.do?cidTexte=JORFTEXT000000444898&dateTexte=&categorieLien=id">law of Feb. 23, 2005</a>, whose Article 4 specified that French school programs should “recognize the positive role of the French presence overseas, especially in North Africa.”</p>
<p>Historians responded with loud, public <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2005/apr/15/highereducation.artsandhumanities">outrage</a>. They objected to the imposition of an “official history,” the sidelining of slavery, racism and colonial violence, and the apparent endorsement of <a href="http://www.lemonde.fr/societe/article/2005/03/24/colonisation-non-a-l-enseignement-d-une-histoire-officielle_630960_3224.html">nationalist ethnocentrism</a>. The ensuing outcry convinced President Jacques Chirac to <a href="http://www.iupress.indiana.edu/product_info.php?products_id=137787">repeal the offending Article 4</a> a year later.</p>
<p>But since then, rising protests against inequality from immigrant and minority groups and growing fears of Islamist terrorism have fueled the revival of colonial revisionism on the French Right. </p>
<h2>History and political positioning</h2>
<p>Among the current presidential candidates, not only the current FN leader, Jean-Marie Le Pen’s daughter Marine, but also the (now scandal-ridden) conservative candidate François Fillon have publicly endorsed revisionist colonial histories. </p>
<p>Marine Le Pen has long favored <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.fr/2013/02/26/marine-le-pen-contre-enseignement-seconde-guerre-mondiale-colonisation_n_2766337.html">“rebalancing”</a> secondary school curricula. She objects to what she calls the “masochism” of critical histories and calls for counting empire as one of the “glorious elements” of the French past. Students should be taught colonization’s “positive aspects” alongside its negatives.</p>
<p>Fillon, for his part, carries on the conservative attempt to peel off FN support by co-opting its rosy view of colonialism. In <a href="http://www.lexpress.fr/actualite/politique/pour-francois-fillon-la-colonisation-visait-a-partager-sa-culture_1825773.html">a speech</a> last August, he denounced school programs that teach students “to be ashamed” of their country’s treatment of colonized peoples. Instead, textbooks and lesson plans should be revised to give a more favorable image of colonization as a “sharing of culture.”</p>
<p>“France is not blameworthy for wanting to share its culture with the peoples of Africa, Asia and North America,” Fillon <a href="http://www.lexpress.fr/actualite/politique/pour-francois-fillon-la-colonisation-visait-a-partager-sa-culture_1825773.html">declared</a>, nor should it be held particularly responsible for the evils of slavery. </p>
<p>Also excised from Marine Le Pen’s “most positive, most flattering” version of national history is French collaboration with the Nazis during World War II. Too painful and “complex” for children, such events should be revisited only in high school, “<a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.fr/2013/02/26/marine-le-pen-contre-enseignement-seconde-guerre-mondiale-colonisation_n_2766337.html">if it’s necessary</a>.”</p>
<p>Fillon agrees that primary school is no place for difficult, uncomplimentary historical topics. “Calling our history into question: this is a shameful teaching!” he protested in <a href="http://www.lexpress.fr/actualite/politique/pour-francois-fillon-la-colonisation-visait-a-partager-sa-culture_1825773.html">his August 2016 speech</a>. Like Le Pen, Fillon sees a glorious national “narrative” (récit) as essential to national unity. Teachers should focus on figures, sites and events whose meaning lies “in the progressive construction of France’s singular civilization.”</p>
<p>This view of history education has been a staple of French nationalism since the Third Republic made primary public schooling <a href="http://www.sup.org/books/title/?id=3200">free and compulsory in the 1880s</a>. In the 19th century, lessons about the development of French civilization aimed to cultivate patriotism and civic virtue among future (male) voters and soldiers. Today, Le Pen and Fillon both seek to revive this colonial-era tradition and, by extension, the hierarchies of race and civilization that defined it.</p>
<p>Only one candidate has openly challenged this new revisionism: the current favorite to face Le Pen in the second round, centrist former Economy Minister Emmanuel Macron. Macron made waves in February by telling an Algerian television station that French colonization in North Africa was a <a href="http://www.liberation.fr/elections-presidentielle-legislatives-2017/2017/02/15/en-algerie-emmanuel-macron-qualifie-la-colonisation-francaise-de-crime-contre-l-humanite_1548723">“crime against humanity.”</a> </p>
<p>“Colonization is part of French history,” he said. “It is a true barbarity and a part of that past we must confront head-on, while also apologizing to the women and men against whom we committed these acts.” He went on to specifically denounce any effort to glorify colonization, as Article 4 had tried to do in 2005.</p>
<p>These are forceful words that might have signaled a shift in official discourse on colonial history, had the speaker been willing to stand by them. </p>
<p>He wasn’t. </p>
<p>When the Right and pied-noir groups accused him of indulging in unpatriotic, leftist “repentance,” Macron folded. Only four days later, he apologized not to the victims of colonization but to <a href="http://www.lemonde.fr/election-presidentielle-2017/article/2017/02/18/nouvelle-manifestation-de-pieds-noirs-devant-le-meeting-de-macron-a-toulon_5081891_4854003.html">the pieds-noirs</a>. </p>
<p>Equally damning, Macron’s Algiers statement was a flagrant about-face from an interview he did last November with the French magazine <a href="http://www.jeuneafrique.com/376888/societe/france-emmanuel-macron/">Le Point</a>. Then, he had earned condemnations from the left for <a href="https://twitter.com/LarrereMathilde/status/801425252173672449">saying</a> that “the reality of colonization” included “elements of civilization and elements of barbarity.”</p>
<p>Macron’s shifting position on French colonization is clearly opportunistic, making it hard to tell what he really thinks about it. But perhaps what matters most is that he saw taking a position on the colonial past as a political opportunity in the first place. In the current election, as in the history wars of 20 years ago, colonial history has once again become political.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/75372/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nothing to disclose.
</span></em></p>Should French children be taught about the ‘positive aspects’ of colonialism? What the presidential candidates say.Jennifer Sessions, Associate Professor of History, University of IowaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/733012017-02-20T14:49:02Z2017-02-20T14:49:02ZWhy winning the French presidential election could be a poisoned chalice<p>The 2017 presidential election won’t be the first time the French have looked out across the political landscape and seen a fractured field. In 2002, there were no fewer than 16 candidates standing in the first round of the presidential election. Back then, the field was so fractured that the Socialist prime minister <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/1970421.stm">Lionel Jospin</a> was eliminated from the contest. Voters were then left with a choice between the sitting, right-wing president, Jacques Chirac, and Jean-Marie Le Pen of the far right Front National (FN).</p>
<p>Of course, Chirac proceeded to <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/1969902.stm">crush Le Pen</a>, 82% to 18%, in the run-off. In the process, he forced the three competing parties of the right and centre right into an electoral alliance, then a single party, the UMP, which later became the Republicans.</p>
<p>The 2002 election is regarded as a turning point in the political history of the <a href="http://www.popularsocialscience.com/2013/10/08/the-french-fifth-republic-against-all-odds/">Fifth Republic</a> (the regime created by Charles de Gaulle in 1958). Not only was the outcome unexpected, but it was the first in which the president was elected for a new five-year term (reduced from seven) shortly before elections to the lower house, the National Assembly.</p>
<p>Initially, this was a simple coincidence of the electoral calendar but it now means the French are summoned, barely a month after electing a new president, to provide him or her with a majority in the assembly. One entirely predictable consequence of this has been the relegation of national assembly elections to almost secondary status and high rates of abstention among those who didn’t vote for the new head of state.</p>
<p>It’s worth knowing this detail, because while the main focus currently is on the 2017 presidential candidates and their programmes, rallies and public utterances, and the who was paying whom and for what, behind the scenes there are also feverish negotiations going on over who will stand in the 577 constituencies in June’s assembly election. In a system where political parties are weak and prone to fragmentation, the value of the support of a potentially victorious presidential candidate is a powerful lever.</p>
<p>By the same token, experience suggests that defeated presidential candidates do not make good rallying points for their parties when the parliamentary vote rolls around. Even <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/marine-le-pen-2938">Marine Le Pen</a> could only turn her 17% of the vote in the 2012 presidential election into two seats in the assembly – neither of them for her. Le Pen’s success between then and now has come through the intervening local and European elections – and these have been as much about rejecting Hollandisme as they are an endorsement of her.</p>
<p>So far, there are five main presidential candidates in the 2017 race. They are, from left to right, <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-hologram-a-family-scandal-and-a-man-on-the-march-the-french-election-just-got-really-exciting-72605">Jean-Luc Mélenchon</a> (heading a movement called La France insoumise), Benoît Hamon (for the Socialists), <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/emmanuel-macron-33770">Emmanuel Macron</a> (who has established his own movement called En Marche!), François Fillon (for the Republicans), and Le Pen (for the Front National/Rassemblement Bleu Marine).</p>
<h2>The left</h2>
<p>The ecologist Yannick Jadot may or may not run. Last week, his electors authorised him to negotiate a joint platform with Hamon and Mélenchon, which would, in due course, also cover the matter of an alliance for the general election. Hamon is receptive, but Mélenchon is not and, to be honest, never has been. Mélenchon left the Socialists in 2008, objecting to its drift towards social democracy. His singular goal, ever since, has been to destroy the party and recreate a new left under his leadership.</p>
<p>The Socialist party is straining to hold itself together. Party secretary Jean-Christophe Cambadélis has warned that anyone defecting to support Macron in the election will be expelled, and thus forfeit support if they plan to stand in the general election. Those with a strong local power base will see that as a risk they can take in the interests of backing a candidate more likely to win – but not all will.</p>
<p>The Socialist position might change, of course, if Macron is elected to the Elysée and Hamon does not get a creditable score (at least 16%) in the first round. Even though he is the party candidate, he is not its leader and if Macron made the right noises, a broad centre and left electoral alliance is not out of the question.</p>
<p>Another possibility would be a simple form of what is known as “désistement républicain”, whereby the parties of the left (though not Mélenchon) and Macronistes agree to stand down for whichever of them is better placed in a particular constituency. The circle that Macron has to square is that while he might get elected by himself, he cannot govern alone and no-one can predict how his pop-up party will fare amid the rough and tumble of a general election campaign.</p>
<h2>The right</h2>
<p>To Macron’s right, the Republican party has flipped around completely. One of the explanations for Fillon’s unexpected victory in the primary was that he paid attention to the party’s grassroots. While Nicolas Sarkozy controlled the hierarchy, his former PM focused on getting out into the provinces and holding small-scale meetings with the the rank and file. But it is precisely here that unease is strongest now.</p>
<p>While Fillon has announced his determination to fight on, even if the <a href="https://theconversation.com/francois-fillon-scandal-is-the-once-favourite-presidential-candidate-toast-72430">formal investigation into his financial conduct</a> continues, and the party’s heavyweights have voiced solidarity, there is real concern in the constituencies that Fillon will not deliver the “alternance” (a change of majority) they expect and demand. For the Gaullist core of a movement that sees itself as the natural party of government, the prospect of five more years out of power is almost unbearable. If Fillon is eliminated, who will pick up the pieces? The failure to answer that question adequately after Sarkozy’s defeat in 2012 is just one of the reasons for Le Pen’s rise and rise.</p>
<p>And yet, while the Front National can make a pretty strong claim to be “le premier parti de France”, its position is not as strong as it might be. Despite winning 25% of the national vote in the European elections of 2014, the same in departmental elections, and 28% in the regionals in late 2015, the FN remains a leadership without much structure, few candidates and desperately short of funds. The party has more local councillors than ever before, but membership remains low. The FN is being very coy about just how many candidates it thinks it can field.</p>
<p>It is almost impossible to imagine a president elected without a majority in the assembly. It’s just as hard to imagine any other party being willing to join the FN in a coalition.</p>
<p>While a Le Pen victory in May might fit the Brexit/Trump zeitgeist, Le Pen might actually be better off losing the 2017 election. She could spend five years building a parliamentary base, which also comes with state funding on a per seat basis, and mount a challenge in 2022. If she makes the run-off and then fails to take 40% of the votes, on the other hand, it’s perfectly possible that she’ll be booted out as leader of her party.</p>
<p>However it turns out, the election to the fourth five-year presidential term risks pushing France ever deeper into an institutional turmoil than its instigators could never have imagined when they stood on the cusp of the Fifth-and-a-half Republic back in 2002. It was all supposed to be so simple.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/73301/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Paul Smith does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Just a month after moving into the Élysée Palace, the new president will face the country’s parliamentary elections.Paul Smith, Associate Professor in French and Francophone Studies, University of NottinghamLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/504992016-01-25T10:56:57Z2016-01-25T10:56:57ZA decade after the riots, France has rewritten its colonial history<p>Ten years after the riots that hit France in 2005, there has been much debate about how far France <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/oct/22/nothings-changed-10-years-after-french-riots-banlieues-remain-in-crisis">has moved on</a> from the images of burning cars, disaffected youth and urban apocalypse. </p>
<p>At the time, the riots were presented as a sign of France’s malaise, illustrating the plight of marginalised communities in the country’s neglected suburbs. Much of the recent assessment has concluded that not a lot has changed, with such marginalisation now linked to some cases of <a href="https://theconversation.com/paris-attacks-there-is-no-simple-explanation-for-acts-of-terror-50704">radicalisation</a> in the aftermath of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/paris-attacks-2015">Paris Attacks</a> on November 13. </p>
<p>What is easily forgotten is that the 2005 riots were part of a broader debate about how France remembers and teaches children about its colonial legacy that has since sparked a re-writing of French history textbooks. </p>
<p>The culmination of this debate on “colonial memory” was a <a href="http://legifrance.gouv.fr/affichTexte.do?cidTexte=JORFTEXT000000444898">fierce backlash</a> in 2005 against a new law to “show the nation’s recognition to the national contribution of France’s repatriate population”, more commonly known as the law on the memory of colonialism. </p>
<p>The law represented France’s convoluted relationship with its colonial past. It was the result of forceful lobbying by groups of <em>pieds-noirs</em>, around a million former settlers from North Africa who had left Algeria – often unwillingly – after the country gained independence in 1962. </p>
<p>Since the 1970s, political <em>pied-noir</em> organisations have <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/05/world/europe/05iht-kimmel.4.20622745.html?_r=0">constantly led</a> a “memorial struggle” in order to gain official recognition for their loss, together with a rehabilitation of the memory of the French empire. </p>
<p>The law was the fruition of this. It showed France’s recognition of the <em>pied-noir</em> constituency through financial benefits (which the community had been receiving since the 1960s), but also through the erection of monuments and compensation for former <em>Organisation de l'armée secrète</em>, the anti-decolonisation terrorists who had “suffered” the effects of political exile in the 1960s. The law went entirely unnoticed at first, but criticism mounted due to its <a href="http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/affichTexte.do?cidTexte=JORFTEXT000000444898&dateTexte=&categorieLien=id">fourth article</a>, which called for school curricula to stress “the positive role of the French presence overseas” – or of French colonialism.</p>
<h2>Chirac backed down</h2>
<p>Pressure against the fourth article mounted over the course of a few months with historians and teachers’ unions protesting, but the backlash only gained real momentum after the riots in November. At the end of that month, the <a href="http://www.assemblee-nationale.fr/12/cra/2005-2006/081.asp#P37_399">National Assembly held a session</a> that was widely covered in the media, where centre-left deputies tried in vain to rescind the fourth article.</p>
<p>Politicians suddenly discussed colonial history with a sense of acrimony usually reserved for the hottest of contemporary issues. The press <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2005/apr/15/highereducation.artsandhumanities">fawned</a> over a “balance sheet” of France’s colonial empire and its legacies of contemporary racism and discrimination. The biggest change this implied was the understanding that the memory of colonialism had political relevance in today’s society. </p>
<p>Ultimately, then-president, Jacques Chirac, chose to silence the debate and the embarrassment it was causing the conservative government. In a highly controversial move, at the end of January 2006, he <a href="http://www.lemonde.fr/societe/article/2006/01/25/l-elysee-souhaite-la-suppression-de-l-article-sur-le-role-positif-de-la-colonisation_734564_3224.html">ordered</a> the Constitutional Council to bypass parliament and rescind the law’s fourth article.</p>
<p>More than anything before, this debate illuminated the status of colonial history in French schools. In the 1960s, France’s colonial history <a href="http://revistas.udesc.br/index.php/tempo/article/view/2175180306112014193/3064">was presented</a> in sepia-tinted colours. France’s colonial past had been present in school curricula since the 1980s, but heavily marginalised. </p>
<p>In the early 2000s, a team of researchers from Versailles conducted an extensive survey about how “sensitive subjects” <a href="http://ecehg.ens-lyon.fr/ECEHG/enjeux-de-memoire/histoire-et-memoire/reflexion-generale/entre-memoire-et-savoirs/memoire_savoir.pdf">were taught in schools</a>. They came to the conclusion that teachers were not equipped with the knowledge needed to teach subjects such as the Algerian War and therefore preferred to avoid them.</p>
<h2>Textbooks updated</h2>
<p>Soon after the 2005 controversies, the French government <a href="http://media.eduscol.education.fr/file/Formation_continue_enseignants/23/7/questions_sensibles_actes_110237.pdf">began looking</a> into updating school curricula to include a larger emphasis on colonial history. Since then, historians, teachers and political associations have made headway towards improving the way schools approached colonial history. </p>
<p>The big change occurred in 2011 with the publication of a new batch of schoolbooks focused on the Algerian War and the slave trade. Today, the programme of the final year of the lycée – French secondary school – even contains an obligatory <a href="http://cache.media.eduscol.education.fr/file/lycee/12/3/01_RESS_LYC_HIST_TermS_th1_309123.pdf">module</a> on the “Memory of the Algerian War”. </p>
<p>The issue of schoolbooks – and of history programmes – has been so charged because of the school’s traditional role as the place where French Republican identities are formed. But the inclusion of France’s colonial past into history curricula has not resulted in a new and inclusive national story that has resolved the underlying issues of discrimination and racism that have <a href="http://teo.site.ined.fr/fr/">only increased</a> since the riots. </p>
<p>To some extent, this owes much to problems of implementation. <a href="http://ecehg.ens-lyon.fr/ECEHG/enjeux-de-memoire/histoire-de-l-immigration/reflexions-generales/enseigner-l-histoire-de-l-immigration/enseigner_histoire_immigration.pdf/view">Recent surveys</a> conducted for the newly established Museum of Immigration show that teachers still struggle with the new history programmes. Particularly in racially diverse classes of the banlieues, or French suburbs, even the most well-meaning teachers often feel they lack the tools to convey France’s history of colonial violence to the descendants of its victims. </p>
<p>Ultimately, curricula that take a critical view of history are just a first step in the creation of a truly inclusive society in France. After all, these same schoolchildren will eventually graduate into a society where an acrimonious debate on the memory of colonialism <a href="http://ecehg.ens-lyon.fr/ECEHG/enjeux-de-memoire/histoire-de-l-immigration/reflexions-generales/enseigner-l-histoire-de-l-immigration/enseigner_histoire_immigration.pdf/view">has not changed</a> racial prejudice and discrimination.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/50499/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Itay Lotem receives funding from Queen Mary University of London for a PhD. He is a member of the Labour Party. </span></em></p>France’s colonial legacy remains an uncomfortable subject.Itay Lotem, PhD Candidate, Schhol of History, Memory of colonialism in Britain and France, Queen Mary University of LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/345612014-12-02T15:53:07Z2014-12-02T15:53:07ZSarkozy sets his sights on 2017 election as rivals flounder<p>Former French president Nicolas Sarkozy has been <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/nov/30/sarkozy-narrow-victory-ump-leadership">re-elected</a> as leader of the opposition party the UMP. His candidacy for the 2017 presidential election is still not certain but his rivals are in a state of disarray and may not be able to stop him standing in 2017.</p>
<p>On the eve of the presidential election in 2012, Sarkozy pronounced that if he lost, he would quit politics for good. At the time, it sounded almost like the sort of “après moi le déluge” threats that Charles de Gaulle used to make until, in April 1969, no one cared any more and the general lost his “moment of truth” referendum.</p>
<p>In Sarkozy’s case, France voted instead for his Socialist Party rival François Hollande – the average Joe candidate who promised to be a <a href="https://theconversation.com/no-more-mr-normal-francois-hollande-must-change-his-style-6940">président normal</a> and turned out to be just plain mediocre.</p>
<p>After his defeat, Sarkozy insisted he would focus on his private life with wife Carla Bruni-Sarkozy and their daughter Juliet – and pursue other career options. The vertiginous collapse in his popularity between 2007 and 2012 suggested that his political career was indeed finished. The other sharks in the water began to circle at the prospect of taking control of the UMP.</p>
<h2>Shambles on the right</h2>
<p>In Sarkozy’s wake, two men emerged as the front-runners for the UMP leadership and, it was assumed, as the top candidates for the 2017 presidential election. They were Jean-François Copé, a former budget minister and leader of the UMP parliamentary party, and former prime minister François Fillon.</p>
<p>The race was too close to call though and accusations flew back and forth about vote-rigging. Copé eventually emerged victorious but soon ran into <a href="https://theconversation.com/ump-funding-scandal-could-derail-a-new-sarkozy-bid-for-french-presidency-27362">accusations of corruption</a>. He was forced to resign in mid-2014, leaving the UMP without a credible figurehead.</p>
<p>A year previously, academic and journalist Thomas Guénolé published a book entitled <em>Nicolas Sarkozy, chronique d'un retour impossible?</em> No-one thought it was beyond the realms of possibility, though. By then, Sarkozy loyalists such as Christian Estrosi, the mayor of Nice, were begging the former president to return, for the sake of the party and the Republic and France. He didn’t really need too much convincing.</p>
<h2>Prodigal son</h2>
<p>This popularity can’t mask the fact that Sarkozy hardly smells of roses. France’s <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/nicolas-sarkozy/10160909/Nicolas-Sarkozy-exceeded-spending-limits-in-2012-French-presidential-campaign.html">Constitutional Council</a> refused to reimburse €11m in expenses from Sarkozy’s 2012 election campaign, having concluded that he overspent, and there are other politico-financial affairs that remain unresolved to which Sarkozy’s name has been linked.</p>
<p>Back in 2004, Sarkozy defied Jacques Chirac’s disapproval to win a massive endorsement from 85% of the party membership. His vote in 2014 vote was less emphatic – he polled 65% of the votes, while his main rival Bruno Le Maire secured just short of 30%. Le Maire is not well-known outside France but he is a well-liked politician with hopes for 2022 if not 2017.</p>
<p>The size of Le Maire’s share of the vote is a warning to Sarkozy that the path to candidacy for 2017 is not entirely without obstacle. A significant bloc within the party is less than keen for him to be their man in a stand-off with the <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/front-national">Front National’s</a> Marine Le Pen (the Socialists are dead in the water at this point).</p>
<p>He faces a particular challenge from Fillon, who perhaps perversely decided after his run-in with Copé not to seek the party leadership again – and who certainly did not want an early show down with Sarkozy, where a defeat would mean the end of his career. Instead, he sent in Le Maire.</p>
<p>The other potential rival is Alain Juppé, who was prime minister under Jacques Chirac from 1995 to 1997, and holder of the title of least-popular prime minister in the history of the Fifth Republic … until the next one came along.</p>
<p>This was a man stripped of his right to stand for election for two years in 2004, and even of his right to vote in one. Juppé had taken the fall for Chirac after an investigation into vote rigging in Paris. But he began his comeback when he was re-elected mayor of Bordeaux in 2006.</p>
<p>Nowadays, Juppé plays the role of the elder statesman – or as Sarkozy himself put it, someone who makes even him look young. Fillon, on the other hand, seems intent on throwing away a lot of the goodwill he has built up within the party and the electorate with ill-judged outbursts against Sarkozy. He is also wasting a lot of energy at the moment <a href="http://www.france24.com/en/20141109-fillon-sue-monde-defamation-sarkozy-legal-action-presidency/">suing two Le Monde journalists</a> for libel after they claimed he had sought to get involved in investigations into Sarkozy’s dealings.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, in the background, a host of younger UMP wannabes, including François Baroin, Nathalie Kosciusko-Morizet and of course Le Maire, are watching the dinosaurs devour each other and keeping their powder dry for 2022.</p>
<p>In 2004, the only vague impediment to Sarkozy’s run to the presidential election of 2007 was Dominique de Villepin. Then, once he had been selected, he capitalised while the Socialist Party’s candidate Ségolène Royal blew an election many thought was unlosable. If he can make it past his old rivals, Sarkozy could once again win the unwinnable.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/34561/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Paul Smith does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Former French president Nicolas Sarkozy has been re-elected as leader of the opposition party the UMP. His candidacy for the 2017 presidential election is still not certain but his rivals are in a state…Paul Smith, Associate Professor in French and Francophone Studies, University of NottinghamLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.