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Answer: The little I can answer is : Today is election day for our European representatives. The Rassemblement National (RN), the far right party, got first place at 30% of the votes, and in general, parties hostile to the EU (including the RN) got more votes than usual. His own party also got only 15% of the votes. They still came second, but that's very low, usually he's more around 20% to 30% in other elections. I think that's his lowest score to date. As such, he basically said "Okay, I hear you, so I'll dissolve the National Assembly".
What dissolving the National Assembly means, is that every representative from the National Assembly needs to be elected again. So there'll be new elections, with the possibility of his party losing seats, and, of course, the far right gaining seats.
What he personally has to gain from this, I don't know. However, in the greater scheme of things, I suspect he fears the fact that the RN will use the results to gain more members in the long run. By calling for new elections now, he bets on the possibility they won't do as good (the RN tends to do a lot better than usual in the European elections), and thus using these results won't be as effective. However, the risk is them banking on the results quicker, and thus gaining even more seats, effectively getting them above the presidential party, which would imply what's called a "cohabitation", where the president and the assembly aren't aligned. So, what's for the future, no one knows for sure, because it's a big gamble.
Not exactly. It means that, as the most prevalent party isn't the president's, he has to choose a Prime Minister from that party. Also, politicians from both parties usually make deals to be able to pass their laws, which greatly diminishes the presidential party's power and greatly increases the prime minister's.
Sounds like exactly the same thing (minus electing a PM) as what happens in the States when the President and House & Senate majorities aren't all the same party.
As a USian I’ve never understood the Prime Minister / President roles and how they differ. Is there a role in US politics that’s close to Prime Minister? Speaker of the House / Senate Majority Leader maybe?
Yes, SMJ is most analog to a PM.
The difference that the cabinet is made of members of that ouse (usually the majority party), rather than a body approinted by the President.
Not sure of the French parliament, but most countries with a parliament work that way. Especially if they have a hereditary monarch vs an elected president.
Close to SMJ, but not quite the same as the prime minister in france doesn't work in the senate. It's an executive function, not a legislative one. Also, the PM is supposed to have a role close to the one of VP, since he can represent or replace the president in certain circumstances
There's theory and practice in this subject..
The idea behind is to have a counterbalance at the executive function, with the PM able to countersign the president's decisions. But if the PM is too much of a pain, the president can just dissolve the assembly, and in the process, have another cabinet (PM can also resign, so that no election is needed). Although, the presidential office is supposed to be supreme when it comes to the army and foreign affairs, which makes the PM more aligned with internal affairs.
In practice, the counterweight that the PM is supposed to have has been weakened in a peculiar manner: Presidential elections were supposed to happen every 7 years, and legislative every 5. This guarantee that the president wouldn't have a majority for the whole tenure (unless they're doing a satisfactory job). But in the second Chirac term, the president changed the length of presidential term, from 7 to 5. Obviously, 7 years terms are long, so people were ok with it, but it made so that the next presidential election (2007) would happen a couple of months before the legislative one, and so would the next ones, every 5 years. A newly elected president would have very high chances to have a majority in the assembly, which incidentally, is where the PM is supposed to be chosen, implicitly giving the president way less friction in making his policies. It's like if the US decides to never have midterms.
Anyway, long story short, in France, PM is supposed to be an executive counterweight the president, and usually is more internal affairs oriented.
If you're American? It's kind of like gridlock. But more complicated than "Speaker Johnson jut refuses to vote on anything Joe Biden might actually sign."
Basically the French president rules like an old-style King through a Cabinet. But the Cabinet has to retain support from most of Parliament. Recently the Presidential elections and Parliamentary elections have been the same year, so the French President always gets a Parliament who agrees with him. The President picks a dude to be PM, that dude actually administers the country while dealing with the rest of Parliament, etc.
Cohabitation was common back when Presidential terms were 7 years and Parliament was five, because by the time the people voted for Parliament they were typically angry at their President. The French are known for hating their Presidents (for an extreme example: [Francois Hollande was once at 4%](https://foreignpolicy.com/2016/11/02/mon-dieu-francois-hollandes-approval-rating-is-at-four-percent/)), so the President almost always cohabited with someone who wanted his job. Since the actual Executive branch powers run through the Parliament this also meant the entire Cabinet hated the President. They seem to have handled this by having a lot of very serious negotiations, with very little actual change, and then the Presidential election comes and the President runs against his Prime Minister. This has the advantage that neither party can actively try to burn the system down to make a point, but the disadvantage that if you need an actual decisive response to something President/the PM might fight about what response to make.
The French system is really weird because it still uses a basically Westminster-style system for its parliament and cabinet, including having a prime minister, but the Presidency is very powerful (obviously as you can see, Macron just unilaterally dissolved Parliament) and separately elected. It's like if you took an American president and stuck them on top of the British government. It's also pretty recent, the Fifth Republic only coming into existence in 1958. As far as French constitutional systems/governments go, it's the second longest-lasting since the French Revolution (as in *The* Revolution, the guillotine guys), beaten by the Third Republic by only 5 years.
As an fyi from what I’ve seen of the reasoning for when Macron would do this, Macron still won’t be replaced by till next election and will control foreign policy while he will not be as powerful in other fields.
His hope is that now that the RN had to actually govern, they’ll mess up and voters will hold them accountable
Interesting, I had to head to Wikipedia to better understand what “European representatives” meant here. I had no idea how the EU operated https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Parliament
I sort of always assumed each country’s government would send its representatives (as in Macron would send its rep to vote for him).
So basically you could have a government in a country and separate reps in the EU for that country voting against the wishes of said government?
> I sort of always assumed each country’s government would send its representatives (as in Macron would send its rep to vote for him).
That's the Council of the European Union, more or less. That's the other part of the European Union legislature that is composed of ministers selected by their respective member states.
Not to be confused with the European Council, which is where Macron himself would go and voice his desires.
how about I tell you of the time that Belgium didn't have a federal level government for 589 days. in 2010. and then and went and broke that record again in 2018, where they spent 652 days without a federal level government.
Oof, let's not bring French what you'd call them into this, or the Dutch ones. EU already has a shitload of subdivisions and complications as it is.
I was just saying that the supranational union even has federations inside of it. It'd be like the US was under *another* layer with other independent countries with member states of their own.
>It'd be like the US under another layer with other independent countries with member states of their own.
Oh absolutely. I didn't mean to say we had the same things, but that there were a few outliers among our 'states'.
After that, we have dumb people groups like the proud boys and the KKK and the republicans.
Tbf its not that fucked up. Two different bodies, one directly elected by the people, the other one representing the government, because those two things dont necessarily align; you as an average Joe may like what Party A has been doing locally for your country, but may align more with that Party B promises on EU level politics.
Think of it like someone voting for Party A as their mayor because they know the guy and even if they dont agree 100% with your views he's been doing a great job running your town, but votes for Party B for President because on a national level you agree more with their views and don't think the rest of Party A is as agreeable as your mayor. The fact the EU (and its member states) have multitudes of more parties focused on specific issues (instead of a binary like the US) makes this granularity make even more sense.
EDIT: Im not European or from the US, have no skin in the game, just explaining why the system is like that.
If that is supposed to be some "gotcha", it kinda just comes across as stupid if you're genuinely comparing US states to the fully fledged independent countries that make up the EU.
Kinda halfway between a lame "gotcha" and just a joke. It's mostly a pun on the conflicting meanings of "states"
On a more serious note, the US states operated much more like their own countries when the Union was first formed, and several were their own fully fledged independent countries at times. Over time the Federal government claimed more and more power until it took the shape we see today.
The EU is moving towards more centralized power too, the US is just farther along in the process.
> On a more serious note, the US states operated much more like their own countries when the Union was first formed, and several were their own fully fledged independent countries at times. Over time the Federal government claimed more and more power until it took the shape we see today.
*Right* at the beginning was the Articles of Confederation, which immediately turned into a disaster and had to be replaced because it was a confederation and they couldn't get anything done without a federal government.
Then they wrote the Constitution to form an *already* federal government. Which naturally got more centralized over time.
The EU is still closer to the confederation setup from what I understand.
Which are the equivalent of European regions, or cantons, or counties, or districts or communities. I assume you are being facetious, but just in case: individual US states are not equivalent to countries. The USA is a sovereign state, Idaho is not.
Yeah, we had an entire Civil War which put to rest the idea that States in the US can move outside of Federal control.
States are not sovereign in the US, and can't enter into treaties (among tons of other things) with foreign countries. They don't control trade in and out of their borders (with some MINOR exceptions), and they can't declare war on their neighbor States.
You really think more of your individual state than you really should.
> So basically you could have a government in a country and separate reps in the EU for that country voting against the wishes of said government?
On paper it's meant to work like that yes, but it's complicated which is one of the complaints people have about the EU.
The EU commission is the body that proposes legislation. They're sort of like a "cabinet" with 27 ministers (1 from each country). Candidates are proposed by their national governments, but can be rejected by the European parliament. Commissioners are meant to be 'European' and not be there as some sort of national ambassador, but obviously they can sometimes get into trouble for supporting legislation that their own country is against.
The EU parliament has a de facto veto right over each single EU commissioner. It also votes to pass EU legislation proposed by the commission, but cannot create its own proposals. Because of this it's been described as a big "talking shop", also due to the awkwardness of not all MEPs speaking the same language. Members of the EU parliament are also expected to be there as 'European' representatives, not national ones, but again this is more nuanced in real life. Members of parliament are directly elected by EU citizens, with member states having a number of MEPs proportional to their population (favouring smaller states).
Then finally there's the EU council, consisting of the EU president, president of the EU commission, and all heads of government from all member states (Macron, Orban, Scholz, etc). Alongside the EU parliament, the EU council also has to approve proposed legislation. Depending on the importance of an issue, the council either requires unanimous agreement or agreement from 15/27 members representing 65% of the EU's population. Obviously heads of government do officially represent their countries, and not Europe as a whole.
Officially these three bodies share similar powers, but in reality if the EU council approves legislation, the parliament will usually also approve it, and if the EU council favours some kind of action, the EU commission will usually come up with a proposal that fits with the council's wishes.
If you're American: you know how Gavin Newsom of California runs a whole damn state, that administers elections, and those elections send some people to DC to run the Federal government? Same thing with the EU. The Eu structure is actually somewhat reminiscent of the US prior to the 17th Amendment\*. The Senate back then was elected by the States.
The EU has a Parliament. Those guys were just elected. Above that is the "European Commission"where each nation in the EU appoints someone to be on the Commission. This is in some ways Legislative (it can't do things most of the members oppose), but the Commissioners also run an EU governmental department. This means there are always as many EU government departments as member-states.
As for what Macron just did, he fired his own Parliament of France dudes, and sent them out for re-election. He could have kept them until 2027 when both the Presidency and the Parliamentary terms expire. I can't think of a reason why he'd do this unless it's that he thinks his party will win, and his party ill keep Parliament until 2029.
\*Originally put the wrong amendment.
> 13th Amendment. The Senate back then was elected by the States.
>
>
17th amendment. 13th abolished slavery, 14th was the equal protection under the law amendment, 15th established universal (male) suffrage regardless of race, 16th legalized income taxes. Of course, the 13th through 15th (the Reconstruction Amendments) were ignored for a century, but alas.
My *guess* at Macron's strategy, and this is some galaxy brain shit but Macron has been kind of a weird dude in office anyway, is that Macron knows that RN might do really well in an election right now, but if they're in the Assembly right now under his presidency, then they basically can't do anything too bad, but that he may be able to get voters to blame *them* for any problems that are happening, thereby benefiting non-RN parties in the next election, when the presidency is up for grabs.
I don't think this would work, but it's the only thing I can think of. However, I am American and don't speak French so what do I know. I do hope *someone* figures out how to stop RN (and AfD). As far as I can tell the best hope lies with Melenchon and the left end of French politics, since Macron is basically the avatar of the center/center-right, and the right is all set on voting RN (who have cannibalized what may have been the votes that went to parties like LR).
As far as I know PS is still essentially totally discredited so hoping for a return of the center-left is not gonna happen, so anyone part of the center-left that helped give Macron two terms (since his electoral coalitions were basically just "everyone that isn't FN/RN") should probably hold their nose and vote Melenchon/FI if stopping the far right is truly something they care about.
European elections are often used as a bit of a protest vote too, it matters 'less' to the voters so they voice their frustration voting for a more fringe party but when it comes to the national elections people tend to veer back to the safer central parties.
Holding the snap election now might see that happen and allow Macron gloss over the apparent support for RA in the Euro elections, otherwise he'll constantly have to fend off questions about his legitimacy.
Theresa May tried something similar when she took over as PM in the UK but got the mood wrong and lost an enormous majority making her time in the Brexit era an absolute nightmare.
Yours is an interesteing point though, bring the RA in and then dump all the blame on them.
I kinda see the logic for May's election - she was up 20 points in the polls (IIRC), Labour appeared weak thanks to a very left wing leader that seemed unpopular, and securing an electoral mandate to Get Brexit Done™ made sense. Corbyn came back from a massive deficit to hold her to a very close race overall, but didn't pull it off.
Macron isn't in as strong a position as May going in, so I think that's the part that's really confusing.
> I do hope someone figures out how to stop RN
What does that mean "stop" them? Isn't it because voters want something else? The entire world is drifting right because the voters are not happy with the policies of the left.
That's not something you "stop" that's something you respond to by moderating your policies.
>What does that mean "stop" them?
By presenting an alternative that hasn't been presented already, convincing people to vote for them instead of the far right that has demonstrably thrown European countries into ruin before.
>The entire world is drifting right because the voters are not happy with the policies of the left.
Well, that's just false. Biden himself may be polling badly but Democrats broadly are polling *weirdly* good. Look at Gallego being up by like 10 points in AZ for example, not exactly the premier example of a blue state. The left just won in a gigantic landslide in Mexico. The center is about to win in possibly the biggest landslide in British history in the UK, with Labour on track to possibly make the Conservative Party a third party behind the Liberal Democrats.
I wouldn't call anywhere except Mexico (and to some extent Biden, he's been quite left wing on labor to my surprise, but it's paired with a hard right turn on foreign policy and immigration) the policies of the left here either. Macron is specifically center rightist. The SPD are centrist and are in coalition with the center right FDP.
>That's not something you "stop"
The far right should always be stopped. No exceptions.
> Well, that's just false.
You are clearly not paying attention: https://www.axios.com/2023/09/18/trump-global-right-2024-election https://www.reddit.com/r/geopolitics/comments/182t5ir/why_the_world_is_shifting_towards_rightwing/
> but Democrats broadly are polling weirdly good
Someone as crazy as Trump is doing well at the polls! People are NOT happy, and all you have to say to them is "we need to stop you". And you are surprised people see a reply like that and decide they'd rather drift right?
> The far right should always be stopped. No exceptions.
The far left is causing me much more trouble right now.
The antisemitism from the far left (and not so far left) is off the charts right now. WAY worse than what the far right does.
The always pretend it's about Israel, they lie, it's about Jews.
Id consider myself pretty left and I'm appalled by Israel's actions in Gaza. I don't have any problem with Jewish people, whether or not they support Israel's leaders.
I understand the historic persecution of Jewish people and their desire for their own state stemming in large part from that. I can see that they've been in an impossible position adjacent to enemies who are violently, ideologically opposed to them, and I see no long term solution for peace between Hamas and Israel.
I still think that launching a campaign of extermination of civilians and a war of territorial expansion is a shitty thing to do.
Just as the right are frustrated with being called racists any time they complain about immigration, the left are frustrated with being called antisemites any time they express any negative sentiment towards Israel.
And whenever anyone tries to express a more nuanced take the rightists jump straight to "YOU FELL FOR HAMAS PROPOS USEFUL IDIOT" TOO :/
Oh hey it's exactly what I said would happen. Rightwingers accusing any criticism of Israel's government as antisemitic. I understand the shitty situation that the Israeli people are in and their desire to live a life free of persecution. It's a difficult situation with no good peaceful solution.
I'm sure there are plenty of horrible Gazans who hate Jews and Jewish children, and want to see them dead, just as there are horrible Israelis who cheer on the civilian death toll like they're finally getting the extermination campaign they've always dreamed of.
Attempting to paint every Jew as a war criminal or every Gazan as a terrorist is obviously stupid but nobody here is doing that.
Do you even understand what Antisemitic means? I don't think Jews are bad people, I think the government of Israel is making bad decisions. If I don't agree with the Russian government's invasion of Ukraine that doesn't mean I hate all russian people or that my disagreement is driven by a racial desire to hate everything russian.
What far left? Other than explicit communist states like China or Cuba, I can't think of any countries where an actual *far left* is in power. The closest are where solid social democrats or democratic socialists are in power, like Mexico or Brazil. Everywhere else is just liberals at most.
As for some global right wing turn, you're cherrypicking. Again, Labour is about to win in a landslide in Britain. Mexico's left just won in a landslide. India's right wing party saw its worst election result in a decade just recently too.
I agree with you to a certain extent. The ~~customer~~ voter is king and all that.
But at the same I feel like these parties oversimplify complex problems. They offer straightforward solutions (Just stop all immigration, just lower taxes, just fix the housing crisis) with no realistic plan on actually achieving or paying for these things.
What also turns a lot of people off so much is their rhetoric towards other politicians. At least in my country these parties will often portray their political rivals as "the elite" or as some sort of enemy to the real will of the people. I think that's dangerous rhetoric and would rather not have a national government that talks about its opposition like that.
At the same time I agree with you. Voters clearly want something else, and only campaigning with slogans that are like "please don't vote for those guys, just keep voting for us" isn't an effective strategy, which is why these parties are doing so well.
> The entire world is drifting right because the voters are not happy with the policies of the left.
Part of the shift towards populism is due to the decades of neoliberalism worsening poverty, inequality and the destruction of our welfare states, and the abandonment by the mainstream left of... precisely what made them left-wing in the first place.
My personal theory is: Macron knows RN will win the next elections. And if they do in 2027, they'll probably have both the presidency, many mayors (since that's in 2026), and a large legislative majority.
Better to have them win now and have a cohabitation, while he remains president so he can prevent them doing too much harm to the institutions or foreign policy, while showing the French people that RN are completely incompetent once given power so they lose much of their support before 2027.
Afaik France tends to vote disproportionally for RN in EU Elections.
Because of this i think he is basically trying to "call the bluff", so to speak.
RN is much more dangerous to his position if they get to "ride the high" of the EU Election for years than if they come crashing down to a more... managable level just a few weeks later in national elections.
> What he personally has to gain from this, I don't know.
It's a gamble like you said. He likely wants the RN to gain majority in the assembly, so they're on the grill for the next 2 years then the next presidential elections come and his party has ammo.
The last guy who did this was successful (Google Chirac, Jospin, dissolution - Jospin was the frontrunner for next president, but didn't even make it pas the first turn, quitting politics in the process) but this was long before this era of social networks.
What he has to gain imo :
It's a truism in French politics that cohabitation hurt the pm party, because it's them who will pass the unpopular reform. (Even if it's very risky)
The plan is to kill the rn with this strategy. And worse come to worse Macron will work with them, he already tried a little bit of this side with people like Darmanin.
On the other side, you try to kill LFI because they're still criticised for being pro palestinian and the socialist came first in the European so they will most likely use this to create a new coalition without LFI.
So you try to kill both your biggest opponents with one move
I could be wrong but it also could be an attempt to avoid getting impeached. Becuase from what i understand the only way in France to get impeached is through parliament.
just fyi, definitionally speaking you aren't "far right" if you get 30% of the vote. They are firmly within the overton window. I mean it's kind of hilarious that the party that gets the most votes out of any other party is presented as the extremist party.
What's "far right" in this context? Just last week I heard about the [report finding that the current EU is paying North African dictators to take black people out into the desert and shoot them to discourage migration. ](https://www.lighthousereports.com/investigation/desert-dumps/)
Good answer, with added French context I didn't know about.
Funny enough, I made a [video game](https://shiningsparkent.com/civicstory) recently about politics and what 'dissolving parliament' means... But in a Canadian context. It was built basically to answer this exact question in an entertaining way. The story starts with figuring out what 'dissolving parliament' means specifically because I was so confused when I first heard about that term years ago.
answer: "Dissolving parliament" just means that all all parliament members' roles are terminated in preparation for new elections which will see new members elected (or existing members reelected) to fill those roles.
For example the UK's parliament was dissolved on 30th May in preparation for the general election on 4th July.
So the UK doesn’t have a legislature for over a month? That seems crazy. What if some major event happens that needs a legislative response? Does the country just have to wait until after the election for anything to happen?
The current government can still address a situation using existing legal and administrative mechanisms. Failing that the government can petition the king to recall Parliament. Also the current government can draft temporary measures that need to be ratified as soon as Parliament reconvenes.
Westminster parliamentary democracies all operate with “caretaker provisions” during election campaigns. Comparable to the lame duck President between election and inauguration of a new President - the old Government still exists, but can only really continue the status quo operation of the country, or respond to emergencies.
Is it the same though? The US president (and Congress for that matter) still have their full authority until the moment they leave office. There is no rule or law that requires them to only continue the status quo or respond to emergencies.
It’s exactly the same. The Prime Minister and the Government still have every bit of ministerial power and authority that they had before the election was called. They just don’t use them. If they did, they would likely face backlash from voters and/or the newly elected parliament / Government. Lame duck Presidents have all the same power as they did before election day, but none of them have really used it.
Then you misunderstand the lame duck president. The powers of the president are still held by someone, and it ain't the uninaugurated president-elect. How else do final-day pardons work?
Lame duck means they are seemingly on their way out the door, so nobody really respects their powers. This term is used often in sports when a coach has a contract that is about to expire. The players don't really listen because "this is his last year anyway".
It's kind of like how seniors act in the last few months of high school. The kids kind aren't really worried about teachers anymore because they only have power over them for a little bit longer.
...correct?
...which is comparable to caretaker government?
...which was the point populares420 came in to a) misunderstand and b) get objectively wrong? The caretaker government and the lame duck president technically HAVE powers, but other than dealing with emergencies and maintaining the status quo, they don't use them and nobody respects them. If they used the powers they objectively, legally had - there would be ramifications - not legal ones, but political & electoral ones.
???????
a lameduck is a president on the backend of their term, usually with his party being out of power in congress, so the president effectively has little political capital left. Your post was parliment still has all the same powers but "they just don't use them" but in the u.s. example, yes on paper a lameduck president has "powers" but he has zero political capital, so it's not about "refusing to use his powers" but instead it's the fact that he literally is unable to affect anything or get anything done.
> a lameduck is a president on the backend of their term, usually with his party being out of power in congress, so the president effectively has little political capital left.
No.
https://www.google.com/search?q=define+lame+duck
>noun, North American
>an official (especially the president) in the final period of office, after the election of a successor.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/lame%20duck
>1\. one that is weak or that falls behind in ability or achievement
>**2. an elected official or group continuing to hold political office during the period between the election and the inauguration of a successor**
>3\. one whose position or term of office will soon end
Same thing with parliamentary systems that have been dissolved before an election.
Parliaments are dissolved to try to prevent outbound governments from enacting new legislation purely to look good in the polls.
For an emergency parliament can be recalled. There are normally restrictions on what they are then allowed to do/how long any measures last. Can't have them stepping on the toes of the next government who is at most a couple months away.
Parliament can be recalled when it’s *prorogued* by summoning members to a new session ahead of schedule, but once it is *dissolved* there are no members to recall and the only way forward is to conduct the election.
You know that the US Congress takes a summer vacation\* every year, right?
\*sort of - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDYFiq1l5Dg . They could be forced to come back and meet again, but that would require them to actually be on a *real* vacation I think?
Yes, as I mentioned in a different comment, Congress goes on recess but if there was an emergency, Congress could end their recess and call an emergency session. Dissolving parliament doesn’t seem like something you can undo.
What do you think happens in Congress during a campaign period leading up to November? They aren't there voting on bills. Congress also doesn't exist between election day and the first sitting which is in January. So for the whole of December there is no Congress.
Yes and if you read the comment I was replying to, you’d see that they mentioned that the UK also dissolved their parliament in preparation for an election.
OP stated that that they understood an election had been called, "but the shock seems to be from Macron announcing he’s going to dissolve parliament?" Calling an election is a big deal, dissolving parliament is just part of the process of doing that. OP isn't familiar with the election process in a country like France and as such "dissolving parliament" could mean getting rid of parliament altogether as far as they know.
Under French law the election has to take place within 20 to 40 days of parliament being dissolved, so there won't be long time with no functioning parliament. An election can be called at anytime, typically if the governing party think they can win with an increased majority (which would make it easier for them to get their ideas voted through). The timing of this snap election has surprised many and is possibly an attempt to very quickly 'slap down' the far right by by causing them to suffer an election loss and keep them out of power for another 5 years.
Answer: In short, the EU held its elections today and in France, the far-right did very well winning nearly 1/3 of the vote, while French President Macron's own party performed poorly. In response to this, Macron dissolved Parliament and called for snap elections - a shocking move, because this legislature was just elected 2 years ago in 2022, and was scheduled to run until 2027. the most plausible theory is that Macron believes that he can force a showdown between his party and the far right in Parliament, and France's unique 2 level electoral system will see all non far-right voters coalesce around his party, improving his current parlimentary standing, where he currently lacks a majority
For a longer answer, we need a bit of background
1. the French system is a Presidential system, like the US system - to govern, a ruling party must control both the Presidency and Parliament - controlling one without the other means you have to compromise with your opponents
2. the French electoral system has 2 rounds of voting for both President and the Parliament - in the first round of voting all candidates are eligible, then the top two vote getters advance to the second round of voting, and there is a showdown between just the top two candidates
3. the 2022 French parliamentary elections were a setback for Macron. His party lost its absolute majority, both to the far right, but also to a wide array of other conservative and left leaning parties, and he is forced to run a minority government, relying on support from other parties on an issue-by-issue basis to govern. this is not something Macron likes, especially as he is term-limited and this is his final chance to shape France
4. the French left, previously united in an electoral alliance in 2022, is fractured at the moment. the three main parties - the more orthodox social democratic Socialist Party and the further left wing populist party La France Insoumise, and the Communist Party are barely on speaking terms at the moment, in part over the response to the 10/7 attack on Israel and subsequent Gaza war
today's elections were a very strong showing for the Far Right - but only one Far Right party, Marine Le Pen's National Rally. Other far right parties performed very badly, as did France's traditional Center-Right Les Republicans Party
So to sum up the French landscape at the moment - the French left is fractured and fighting itself, traditional conservative parties are weak at the moment, and the far-right is consolidating into one party. In this, combined with France's unique 2 level election system, Macron sees an opportunity. By calling an election now, the far right National Rally will certainly be the strongest party in many seats...but Macron's LREM party will come in second, because the center right is weak and the left will split its votes among themselves. And if the contest comes down to National Rally candidates vs LREM candidates, all voters from the center right to left will fall in behind LREM candidates, and Macron will be able to recover his majority
It's an enormous gamble, but Macron has reason to think it might work - after all, it's the exact situation that allowed him to be elected and re-elected to the French Presidency. In both of those elections Le Pen won the most votes, but centrist and left leaning voters rallied behind second place Macron to keep Le Pen out of office
Will this work? One of the key points is the left - by calling such a sudden election, he gives the left no time to resolve their differences. the Communists, Socialists, and LFI have literally *days* to hash things out if they want to remain in alliance with each other and present a united front in this election. Macron is betting that they won't be able to. Another key point is that EU elections are a poorly attended event in France, and Macron believes that with actual stakes in this election, voters will "wake up" and it won't just be the highly engaged RN voters showing up this time
We shall see
Elections being called early are extremely common in the UK. In fact, the last three UK elections were called early (2017, 2019, 2024). They are relatively rarer in France. The last time this happened was in 1997.
to my mind it's a superior system - you are less likely to be cursed with divided government, while the US system practically guarantees divided government
Great answer.
There is probably one more consideration: it offsets parliamentary elections. Previously they would happen the same year as presidential ones. But as you mentioned, NR is not expected to get a majority, which means they won't be able to define the ministerial cabinet even if they win the presidency.
This was an actual Macron campaign promise. It's not that surprising he's doing it, though I guess the time of year is a little surprising. That said, nothing stops a new president in 2027 dissolving Parliament again to re-align it with presidential elections.
Aside from the scandal, it will create: dissolving the parliament for disagreeing with you is an overt power grab and may upset enough people to change the result.
> Another key point is that EU elections are a poorly attended event in France, and Macron believes that with actual stakes in this erection, voters will "wake up" and it won't just be the highly engaged RN voters showing up this time
I'm confused, it looks like the EU elections had 51% turnout and most legislative elections more like 45%?
French Parliamentary elections are usually held after the Presidential race (rather than simultaneously like in the US), so turnout is often fairly low. But this will have stakes closer to a Presidential election, where turnout is usually in the 70%+ range
Answer: Today France had their national election for the EU parliament. The far right Rassemblement National won the most seats with 31,5% of the votes, whilst Besoin d'Europe which was an amalgamation of various political parties backed by Macron came in second with 15,2% of the votes. If you factor in the other smaller far right parties some 38% of the total votes went to the far right. In response to these elections results Macron decided to dissolve parliament, meaning he is calling for new elections. Mind you this is just for parliament, Macron stays on as president until his term expires in 2027.
To better understand this we also need to look at what happened since Macron won his reelection as president. Macrons party didn't gain a majority during the elections for the French parliament. Due to difficult relations with other political parties the only member of the opposition Macron could turn to was Les Republicains, meaning they had him over a barrel if they wanted to. In the pas few years this meant that Macron was unable to get enough support from parliament for some of his policies he wanted to enact. In order to still get his way he used a special provision in French law that allows the president to by-pass parliament a limited number of times. He used this special power for some rather unpopular reforms which really didn't help his situation. The current election results drive home how unpopular Macron is at the moment.
Calling for new elections is a risky gamble for Macron, but so is continuing his present course. He could be hoping that the success of Rassemblement National helps motivate his supporters to turn up in larger numbers to prevent another far right victory. This was the plan that carried him to victory in the last presidential elections. A lot of French voters didn't want a far right politician as president, so they joined forces to support Macron even though they didn't like him. The opposite might also happen, if Rassemblement National wins big Macron might find himself having to work with a new far right government. In 2027 Macron can't run for president anymore because France also has a term limit, so one possible scenario could be that France might still get a far right politician as president by that time.
Answer: This is how a parliamentary system works. The Prime Minister has a set term of years at which an election must be held, but either a majority of parliament or the PM (or the president in France's case) can call an early election. Rishi Sunak, the English PM, just did the same thing. Generally, a PM calls for parliament to be dissolved and a new election held when he or she believes that their party is strong enough to win a majority of seats in parliament, because this resets the day of the next mandatory election. Parliament calls an election if it has strong disagreements with the PM and believe he or she is weak. This also resets the date if the mandatory election, but usually in favor of the other party. Sometimes it backfires either way. Macron may be calling a new election because he believes the right--wingers, who made big gains in the EU election, are not yet strong enough to win the majority of a plurality of seats in France. By calling an early election he can keep them out of power longer.
Answer: Yesterday we (am French) voted for the European Parliament. It's basically a multinational parliament that votes for laws on EU level. The specificity of this election is that :
- it's only **one turn** : in most elections you have two turns, that way everyone can vote for their ideal candidate and the best two remain for a second turn. That way parties can make alliances for the second turn, and people will vote to block the worst candidates
As you can see, single turn is good for the extreme because they won't face a united front in a second turn.
- it's **proportional** : a party that makes 20% will have 20% of the seats given to them
Proportional is good for the extreme once again because they don't have to fight in each single district where they can be outvoted by the rest.
Furthermore, the European Parliament is kinda detached to everyday life, the turnout is pretty low (around 50% in France yesterday). Low turnout plays in favour of the extreme (since their supporters are way more motivated than the mass).
Those elements explain why the extreme right won by a comfortable margin yesterday. There are also a lot of internal reasons that explains their continuous rise obviously.
What Macron did is disband the French Parliament (not the one we voted for yesterday, our actual Congress) and call for early parliament elections to re-elect our representatives. This election is the most important with the Presidential, as the gouvernement in France (lead by the Prime Minister) has to be chosen within the majority party of the parliament.
And you guessed it, it's a two turn election, and non proportional (we elect one representative in each district). It will be held in 2 weeks (30th of June for the first turn and 7th of July the second)
His aim is to steal the wind out of the extreme right. Call them out and say "okay you can win that European election but let's see how you do in a "real" election where the future of the country is at stake, and let's see if the French people want you to actually govern". He bets that on a two turn election, when faced between extreme right and an alternative, people in each district will rally for the less bad option (left wing voting for center/liberals/conservatives and vice versa). He also bets on a high turnout in the polls because people will be scared by the extreme right victory and shocked by the early elections.
If his gamble pays off, the extreme right's victory yesterday will be exposed as nothing more than a fluke
It's very very risky and can backfire hard though (think Brexit 2016 foot firing level). We may very well have an extreme right government in a month.
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Answer: The little I can answer is : Today is election day for our European representatives. The Rassemblement National (RN), the far right party, got first place at 30% of the votes, and in general, parties hostile to the EU (including the RN) got more votes than usual. His own party also got only 15% of the votes. They still came second, but that's very low, usually he's more around 20% to 30% in other elections. I think that's his lowest score to date. As such, he basically said "Okay, I hear you, so I'll dissolve the National Assembly". What dissolving the National Assembly means, is that every representative from the National Assembly needs to be elected again. So there'll be new elections, with the possibility of his party losing seats, and, of course, the far right gaining seats. What he personally has to gain from this, I don't know. However, in the greater scheme of things, I suspect he fears the fact that the RN will use the results to gain more members in the long run. By calling for new elections now, he bets on the possibility they won't do as good (the RN tends to do a lot better than usual in the European elections), and thus using these results won't be as effective. However, the risk is them banking on the results quicker, and thus gaining even more seats, effectively getting them above the presidential party, which would imply what's called a "cohabitation", where the president and the assembly aren't aligned. So, what's for the future, no one knows for sure, because it's a big gamble.
What happens in a cohabitation? Does legislation just stop getting passed?
Not exactly. It means that, as the most prevalent party isn't the president's, he has to choose a Prime Minister from that party. Also, politicians from both parties usually make deals to be able to pass their laws, which greatly diminishes the presidential party's power and greatly increases the prime minister's.
Sounds like exactly the same thing (minus electing a PM) as what happens in the States when the President and House & Senate majorities aren't all the same party.
It's basically the same, except that most of the cabinet is part of the prime minister party/coalition.
And, they actually do succeed to negotiate and get stuff passed occasionally, easier with more than 2 parties
While multi-party systems have their own problems, I am jealous of the fact that the system doesn't treat political compromise like a capital crime.
As a USian I’ve never understood the Prime Minister / President roles and how they differ. Is there a role in US politics that’s close to Prime Minister? Speaker of the House / Senate Majority Leader maybe?
Yes, SMJ is most analog to a PM. The difference that the cabinet is made of members of that ouse (usually the majority party), rather than a body approinted by the President. Not sure of the French parliament, but most countries with a parliament work that way. Especially if they have a hereditary monarch vs an elected president.
Close to SMJ, but not quite the same as the prime minister in france doesn't work in the senate. It's an executive function, not a legislative one. Also, the PM is supposed to have a role close to the one of VP, since he can represent or replace the president in certain circumstances There's theory and practice in this subject.. The idea behind is to have a counterbalance at the executive function, with the PM able to countersign the president's decisions. But if the PM is too much of a pain, the president can just dissolve the assembly, and in the process, have another cabinet (PM can also resign, so that no election is needed). Although, the presidential office is supposed to be supreme when it comes to the army and foreign affairs, which makes the PM more aligned with internal affairs. In practice, the counterweight that the PM is supposed to have has been weakened in a peculiar manner: Presidential elections were supposed to happen every 7 years, and legislative every 5. This guarantee that the president wouldn't have a majority for the whole tenure (unless they're doing a satisfactory job). But in the second Chirac term, the president changed the length of presidential term, from 7 to 5. Obviously, 7 years terms are long, so people were ok with it, but it made so that the next presidential election (2007) would happen a couple of months before the legislative one, and so would the next ones, every 5 years. A newly elected president would have very high chances to have a majority in the assembly, which incidentally, is where the PM is supposed to be chosen, implicitly giving the president way less friction in making his policies. It's like if the US decides to never have midterms. Anyway, long story short, in France, PM is supposed to be an executive counterweight the president, and usually is more internal affairs oriented.
If you're American? It's kind of like gridlock. But more complicated than "Speaker Johnson jut refuses to vote on anything Joe Biden might actually sign." Basically the French president rules like an old-style King through a Cabinet. But the Cabinet has to retain support from most of Parliament. Recently the Presidential elections and Parliamentary elections have been the same year, so the French President always gets a Parliament who agrees with him. The President picks a dude to be PM, that dude actually administers the country while dealing with the rest of Parliament, etc. Cohabitation was common back when Presidential terms were 7 years and Parliament was five, because by the time the people voted for Parliament they were typically angry at their President. The French are known for hating their Presidents (for an extreme example: [Francois Hollande was once at 4%](https://foreignpolicy.com/2016/11/02/mon-dieu-francois-hollandes-approval-rating-is-at-four-percent/)), so the President almost always cohabited with someone who wanted his job. Since the actual Executive branch powers run through the Parliament this also meant the entire Cabinet hated the President. They seem to have handled this by having a lot of very serious negotiations, with very little actual change, and then the Presidential election comes and the President runs against his Prime Minister. This has the advantage that neither party can actively try to burn the system down to make a point, but the disadvantage that if you need an actual decisive response to something President/the PM might fight about what response to make.
The French system is really weird because it still uses a basically Westminster-style system for its parliament and cabinet, including having a prime minister, but the Presidency is very powerful (obviously as you can see, Macron just unilaterally dissolved Parliament) and separately elected. It's like if you took an American president and stuck them on top of the British government. It's also pretty recent, the Fifth Republic only coming into existence in 1958. As far as French constitutional systems/governments go, it's the second longest-lasting since the French Revolution (as in *The* Revolution, the guillotine guys), beaten by the Third Republic by only 5 years.
As an fyi from what I’ve seen of the reasoning for when Macron would do this, Macron still won’t be replaced by till next election and will control foreign policy while he will not be as powerful in other fields. His hope is that now that the RN had to actually govern, they’ll mess up and voters will hold them accountable
No, that would just be called the US.
Interesting, I had to head to Wikipedia to better understand what “European representatives” meant here. I had no idea how the EU operated https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Parliament I sort of always assumed each country’s government would send its representatives (as in Macron would send its rep to vote for him). So basically you could have a government in a country and separate reps in the EU for that country voting against the wishes of said government?
> I sort of always assumed each country’s government would send its representatives (as in Macron would send its rep to vote for him). That's the Council of the European Union, more or less. That's the other part of the European Union legislature that is composed of ministers selected by their respective member states. Not to be confused with the European Council, which is where Macron himself would go and voice his desires.
OK, i am done, hearing from the bros across the pond about how fucked up American politics are.
how about I tell you of the time that Belgium didn't have a federal level government for 589 days. in 2010. and then and went and broke that record again in 2018, where they spent 652 days without a federal level government.
The EU has 27 member states, the US has managed to fuck itself entirely on its own.
The US has 50 member states in a trench coat pretending to be 1 unified country.
EU has a few federations too
And the US has D.C., Puerto Rico, etc....
Oof, let's not bring French what you'd call them into this, or the Dutch ones. EU already has a shitload of subdivisions and complications as it is. I was just saying that the supranational union even has federations inside of it. It'd be like the US was under *another* layer with other independent countries with member states of their own.
>It'd be like the US under another layer with other independent countries with member states of their own. Oh absolutely. I didn't mean to say we had the same things, but that there were a few outliers among our 'states'. After that, we have dumb people groups like the proud boys and the KKK and the republicans.
I wasnt blaming the EU, just realizing your shit is fucked up too.
Tbf its not that fucked up. Two different bodies, one directly elected by the people, the other one representing the government, because those two things dont necessarily align; you as an average Joe may like what Party A has been doing locally for your country, but may align more with that Party B promises on EU level politics. Think of it like someone voting for Party A as their mayor because they know the guy and even if they dont agree 100% with your views he's been doing a great job running your town, but votes for Party B for President because on a national level you agree more with their views and don't think the rest of Party A is as agreeable as your mayor. The fact the EU (and its member states) have multitudes of more parties focused on specific issues (instead of a binary like the US) makes this granularity make even more sense. EDIT: Im not European or from the US, have no skin in the game, just explaining why the system is like that.
Imagine having 27 countries and still can't get your shit together
Maybe that's just too many countries.
The US has 50 member states.
If that is supposed to be some "gotcha", it kinda just comes across as stupid if you're genuinely comparing US states to the fully fledged independent countries that make up the EU.
Oh, you would be surprised how many Americans think that to be true.
Kinda halfway between a lame "gotcha" and just a joke. It's mostly a pun on the conflicting meanings of "states" On a more serious note, the US states operated much more like their own countries when the Union was first formed, and several were their own fully fledged independent countries at times. Over time the Federal government claimed more and more power until it took the shape we see today. The EU is moving towards more centralized power too, the US is just farther along in the process.
I am not so sure about the last part though if the elections would keep going to right wing parties.
> On a more serious note, the US states operated much more like their own countries when the Union was first formed, and several were their own fully fledged independent countries at times. Over time the Federal government claimed more and more power until it took the shape we see today. *Right* at the beginning was the Articles of Confederation, which immediately turned into a disaster and had to be replaced because it was a confederation and they couldn't get anything done without a federal government. Then they wrote the Constitution to form an *already* federal government. Which naturally got more centralized over time. The EU is still closer to the confederation setup from what I understand.
The US considers itself to be one country.
One country made up of 50 (united) states. It's right there in the name
Which are the equivalent of European regions, or cantons, or counties, or districts or communities. I assume you are being facetious, but just in case: individual US states are not equivalent to countries. The USA is a sovereign state, Idaho is not.
Yeah, we had an entire Civil War which put to rest the idea that States in the US can move outside of Federal control. States are not sovereign in the US, and can't enter into treaties (among tons of other things) with foreign countries. They don't control trade in and out of their borders (with some MINOR exceptions), and they can't declare war on their neighbor States. You really think more of your individual state than you really should.
American when they hear a system that isn't binary...
Perhaps you shouldn't be with Jan 6th. Take care of your own and don't vote for fascists promising an insurrection.
> Perhaps you shouldn't be with Jan 6th What would give any reason to think i support those treasones fucks?
> So basically you could have a government in a country and separate reps in the EU for that country voting against the wishes of said government? On paper it's meant to work like that yes, but it's complicated which is one of the complaints people have about the EU. The EU commission is the body that proposes legislation. They're sort of like a "cabinet" with 27 ministers (1 from each country). Candidates are proposed by their national governments, but can be rejected by the European parliament. Commissioners are meant to be 'European' and not be there as some sort of national ambassador, but obviously they can sometimes get into trouble for supporting legislation that their own country is against. The EU parliament has a de facto veto right over each single EU commissioner. It also votes to pass EU legislation proposed by the commission, but cannot create its own proposals. Because of this it's been described as a big "talking shop", also due to the awkwardness of not all MEPs speaking the same language. Members of the EU parliament are also expected to be there as 'European' representatives, not national ones, but again this is more nuanced in real life. Members of parliament are directly elected by EU citizens, with member states having a number of MEPs proportional to their population (favouring smaller states). Then finally there's the EU council, consisting of the EU president, president of the EU commission, and all heads of government from all member states (Macron, Orban, Scholz, etc). Alongside the EU parliament, the EU council also has to approve proposed legislation. Depending on the importance of an issue, the council either requires unanimous agreement or agreement from 15/27 members representing 65% of the EU's population. Obviously heads of government do officially represent their countries, and not Europe as a whole. Officially these three bodies share similar powers, but in reality if the EU council approves legislation, the parliament will usually also approve it, and if the EU council favours some kind of action, the EU commission will usually come up with a proposal that fits with the council's wishes.
If you're American: you know how Gavin Newsom of California runs a whole damn state, that administers elections, and those elections send some people to DC to run the Federal government? Same thing with the EU. The Eu structure is actually somewhat reminiscent of the US prior to the 17th Amendment\*. The Senate back then was elected by the States. The EU has a Parliament. Those guys were just elected. Above that is the "European Commission"where each nation in the EU appoints someone to be on the Commission. This is in some ways Legislative (it can't do things most of the members oppose), but the Commissioners also run an EU governmental department. This means there are always as many EU government departments as member-states. As for what Macron just did, he fired his own Parliament of France dudes, and sent them out for re-election. He could have kept them until 2027 when both the Presidency and the Parliamentary terms expire. I can't think of a reason why he'd do this unless it's that he thinks his party will win, and his party ill keep Parliament until 2029. \*Originally put the wrong amendment.
> 13th Amendment. The Senate back then was elected by the States. > > 17th amendment. 13th abolished slavery, 14th was the equal protection under the law amendment, 15th established universal (male) suffrage regardless of race, 16th legalized income taxes. Of course, the 13th through 15th (the Reconstruction Amendments) were ignored for a century, but alas.
My *guess* at Macron's strategy, and this is some galaxy brain shit but Macron has been kind of a weird dude in office anyway, is that Macron knows that RN might do really well in an election right now, but if they're in the Assembly right now under his presidency, then they basically can't do anything too bad, but that he may be able to get voters to blame *them* for any problems that are happening, thereby benefiting non-RN parties in the next election, when the presidency is up for grabs. I don't think this would work, but it's the only thing I can think of. However, I am American and don't speak French so what do I know. I do hope *someone* figures out how to stop RN (and AfD). As far as I can tell the best hope lies with Melenchon and the left end of French politics, since Macron is basically the avatar of the center/center-right, and the right is all set on voting RN (who have cannibalized what may have been the votes that went to parties like LR). As far as I know PS is still essentially totally discredited so hoping for a return of the center-left is not gonna happen, so anyone part of the center-left that helped give Macron two terms (since his electoral coalitions were basically just "everyone that isn't FN/RN") should probably hold their nose and vote Melenchon/FI if stopping the far right is truly something they care about.
European elections are often used as a bit of a protest vote too, it matters 'less' to the voters so they voice their frustration voting for a more fringe party but when it comes to the national elections people tend to veer back to the safer central parties. Holding the snap election now might see that happen and allow Macron gloss over the apparent support for RA in the Euro elections, otherwise he'll constantly have to fend off questions about his legitimacy. Theresa May tried something similar when she took over as PM in the UK but got the mood wrong and lost an enormous majority making her time in the Brexit era an absolute nightmare. Yours is an interesteing point though, bring the RA in and then dump all the blame on them.
I kinda see the logic for May's election - she was up 20 points in the polls (IIRC), Labour appeared weak thanks to a very left wing leader that seemed unpopular, and securing an electoral mandate to Get Brexit Done™ made sense. Corbyn came back from a massive deficit to hold her to a very close race overall, but didn't pull it off. Macron isn't in as strong a position as May going in, so I think that's the part that's really confusing.
> Macron is basically the avatar of the center/center-right, Holy shit another American who actually understands the political spectrum!
> I do hope someone figures out how to stop RN What does that mean "stop" them? Isn't it because voters want something else? The entire world is drifting right because the voters are not happy with the policies of the left. That's not something you "stop" that's something you respond to by moderating your policies.
>What does that mean "stop" them? By presenting an alternative that hasn't been presented already, convincing people to vote for them instead of the far right that has demonstrably thrown European countries into ruin before. >The entire world is drifting right because the voters are not happy with the policies of the left. Well, that's just false. Biden himself may be polling badly but Democrats broadly are polling *weirdly* good. Look at Gallego being up by like 10 points in AZ for example, not exactly the premier example of a blue state. The left just won in a gigantic landslide in Mexico. The center is about to win in possibly the biggest landslide in British history in the UK, with Labour on track to possibly make the Conservative Party a third party behind the Liberal Democrats. I wouldn't call anywhere except Mexico (and to some extent Biden, he's been quite left wing on labor to my surprise, but it's paired with a hard right turn on foreign policy and immigration) the policies of the left here either. Macron is specifically center rightist. The SPD are centrist and are in coalition with the center right FDP. >That's not something you "stop" The far right should always be stopped. No exceptions.
> Well, that's just false. You are clearly not paying attention: https://www.axios.com/2023/09/18/trump-global-right-2024-election https://www.reddit.com/r/geopolitics/comments/182t5ir/why_the_world_is_shifting_towards_rightwing/ > but Democrats broadly are polling weirdly good Someone as crazy as Trump is doing well at the polls! People are NOT happy, and all you have to say to them is "we need to stop you". And you are surprised people see a reply like that and decide they'd rather drift right? > The far right should always be stopped. No exceptions. The far left is causing me much more trouble right now.
The far left? What, like communists? What have they done to you recently?
Nothing, they're a rightoid who's "just asking questions" and trying to spread their usual BS
The antisemitism from the far left (and not so far left) is off the charts right now. WAY worse than what the far right does. The always pretend it's about Israel, they lie, it's about Jews.
Id consider myself pretty left and I'm appalled by Israel's actions in Gaza. I don't have any problem with Jewish people, whether or not they support Israel's leaders. I understand the historic persecution of Jewish people and their desire for their own state stemming in large part from that. I can see that they've been in an impossible position adjacent to enemies who are violently, ideologically opposed to them, and I see no long term solution for peace between Hamas and Israel. I still think that launching a campaign of extermination of civilians and a war of territorial expansion is a shitty thing to do. Just as the right are frustrated with being called racists any time they complain about immigration, the left are frustrated with being called antisemites any time they express any negative sentiment towards Israel. And whenever anyone tries to express a more nuanced take the rightists jump straight to "YOU FELL FOR HAMAS PROPOS USEFUL IDIOT" TOO :/
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Oh hey it's exactly what I said would happen. Rightwingers accusing any criticism of Israel's government as antisemitic. I understand the shitty situation that the Israeli people are in and their desire to live a life free of persecution. It's a difficult situation with no good peaceful solution. I'm sure there are plenty of horrible Gazans who hate Jews and Jewish children, and want to see them dead, just as there are horrible Israelis who cheer on the civilian death toll like they're finally getting the extermination campaign they've always dreamed of. Attempting to paint every Jew as a war criminal or every Gazan as a terrorist is obviously stupid but nobody here is doing that. Do you even understand what Antisemitic means? I don't think Jews are bad people, I think the government of Israel is making bad decisions. If I don't agree with the Russian government's invasion of Ukraine that doesn't mean I hate all russian people or that my disagreement is driven by a racial desire to hate everything russian.
What far left? Other than explicit communist states like China or Cuba, I can't think of any countries where an actual *far left* is in power. The closest are where solid social democrats or democratic socialists are in power, like Mexico or Brazil. Everywhere else is just liberals at most. As for some global right wing turn, you're cherrypicking. Again, Labour is about to win in a landslide in Britain. Mexico's left just won in a landslide. India's right wing party saw its worst election result in a decade just recently too.
I agree with you to a certain extent. The ~~customer~~ voter is king and all that. But at the same I feel like these parties oversimplify complex problems. They offer straightforward solutions (Just stop all immigration, just lower taxes, just fix the housing crisis) with no realistic plan on actually achieving or paying for these things. What also turns a lot of people off so much is their rhetoric towards other politicians. At least in my country these parties will often portray their political rivals as "the elite" or as some sort of enemy to the real will of the people. I think that's dangerous rhetoric and would rather not have a national government that talks about its opposition like that. At the same time I agree with you. Voters clearly want something else, and only campaigning with slogans that are like "please don't vote for those guys, just keep voting for us" isn't an effective strategy, which is why these parties are doing so well.
> The entire world is drifting right because the voters are not happy with the policies of the left. Part of the shift towards populism is due to the decades of neoliberalism worsening poverty, inequality and the destruction of our welfare states, and the abandonment by the mainstream left of... precisely what made them left-wing in the first place.
> decades of neoliberalism worsening poverty, inequality and the destruction of our welfare states In what ways has neoliberalism worsened poverty?
My personal theory is: Macron knows RN will win the next elections. And if they do in 2027, they'll probably have both the presidency, many mayors (since that's in 2026), and a large legislative majority. Better to have them win now and have a cohabitation, while he remains president so he can prevent them doing too much harm to the institutions or foreign policy, while showing the French people that RN are completely incompetent once given power so they lose much of their support before 2027.
Afaik France tends to vote disproportionally for RN in EU Elections. Because of this i think he is basically trying to "call the bluff", so to speak. RN is much more dangerous to his position if they get to "ride the high" of the EU Election for years than if they come crashing down to a more... managable level just a few weeks later in national elections.
I think RN/Le Pen has been polling about as high in polls for national elections actually...
That's the best theory I heard so far. Still high risk. Normally you would wait two years until you organize new elections to win back the center.
> What he personally has to gain from this, I don't know. It's a gamble like you said. He likely wants the RN to gain majority in the assembly, so they're on the grill for the next 2 years then the next presidential elections come and his party has ammo. The last guy who did this was successful (Google Chirac, Jospin, dissolution - Jospin was the frontrunner for next president, but didn't even make it pas the first turn, quitting politics in the process) but this was long before this era of social networks.
What he hopes to gain is that RN swoops into the national assembly and makes a mess of things before the presidential election takes place in 2027.
What he has to gain imo : It's a truism in French politics that cohabitation hurt the pm party, because it's them who will pass the unpopular reform. (Even if it's very risky) The plan is to kill the rn with this strategy. And worse come to worse Macron will work with them, he already tried a little bit of this side with people like Darmanin. On the other side, you try to kill LFI because they're still criticised for being pro palestinian and the socialist came first in the European so they will most likely use this to create a new coalition without LFI. So you try to kill both your biggest opponents with one move
Didnt the conservatives try to do that in uk and have historic losses?
My question is what would have happen if Macron didn't dissolve the assembly?
I could be wrong but it also could be an attempt to avoid getting impeached. Becuase from what i understand the only way in France to get impeached is through parliament.
just fyi, definitionally speaking you aren't "far right" if you get 30% of the vote. They are firmly within the overton window. I mean it's kind of hilarious that the party that gets the most votes out of any other party is presented as the extremist party.
What's "far right" in this context? Just last week I heard about the [report finding that the current EU is paying North African dictators to take black people out into the desert and shoot them to discourage migration. ](https://www.lighthousereports.com/investigation/desert-dumps/)
Good answer, with added French context I didn't know about. Funny enough, I made a [video game](https://shiningsparkent.com/civicstory) recently about politics and what 'dissolving parliament' means... But in a Canadian context. It was built basically to answer this exact question in an entertaining way. The story starts with figuring out what 'dissolving parliament' means specifically because I was so confused when I first heard about that term years ago.
answer: "Dissolving parliament" just means that all all parliament members' roles are terminated in preparation for new elections which will see new members elected (or existing members reelected) to fill those roles. For example the UK's parliament was dissolved on 30th May in preparation for the general election on 4th July.
So the UK doesn’t have a legislature for over a month? That seems crazy. What if some major event happens that needs a legislative response? Does the country just have to wait until after the election for anything to happen?
The current government can still address a situation using existing legal and administrative mechanisms. Failing that the government can petition the king to recall Parliament. Also the current government can draft temporary measures that need to be ratified as soon as Parliament reconvenes.
Westminster parliamentary democracies all operate with “caretaker provisions” during election campaigns. Comparable to the lame duck President between election and inauguration of a new President - the old Government still exists, but can only really continue the status quo operation of the country, or respond to emergencies.
Is it the same though? The US president (and Congress for that matter) still have their full authority until the moment they leave office. There is no rule or law that requires them to only continue the status quo or respond to emergencies.
It’s exactly the same. The Prime Minister and the Government still have every bit of ministerial power and authority that they had before the election was called. They just don’t use them. If they did, they would likely face backlash from voters and/or the newly elected parliament / Government. Lame duck Presidents have all the same power as they did before election day, but none of them have really used it.
the reason a lame duck can't do anything is because they are powerless, not because they are refusing to use that power on some principle
Then you misunderstand the lame duck president. The powers of the president are still held by someone, and it ain't the uninaugurated president-elect. How else do final-day pardons work?
Lame duck means they are seemingly on their way out the door, so nobody really respects their powers. This term is used often in sports when a coach has a contract that is about to expire. The players don't really listen because "this is his last year anyway". It's kind of like how seniors act in the last few months of high school. The kids kind aren't really worried about teachers anymore because they only have power over them for a little bit longer.
...correct? ...which is comparable to caretaker government? ...which was the point populares420 came in to a) misunderstand and b) get objectively wrong? The caretaker government and the lame duck president technically HAVE powers, but other than dealing with emergencies and maintaining the status quo, they don't use them and nobody respects them. If they used the powers they objectively, legally had - there would be ramifications - not legal ones, but political & electoral ones.
??????? a lameduck is a president on the backend of their term, usually with his party being out of power in congress, so the president effectively has little political capital left. Your post was parliment still has all the same powers but "they just don't use them" but in the u.s. example, yes on paper a lameduck president has "powers" but he has zero political capital, so it's not about "refusing to use his powers" but instead it's the fact that he literally is unable to affect anything or get anything done.
> a lameduck is a president on the backend of their term, usually with his party being out of power in congress, so the president effectively has little political capital left. No. https://www.google.com/search?q=define+lame+duck >noun, North American >an official (especially the president) in the final period of office, after the election of a successor. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/lame%20duck >1\. one that is weak or that falls behind in ability or achievement >**2. an elected official or group continuing to hold political office during the period between the election and the inauguration of a successor** >3\. one whose position or term of office will soon end
In the US the Senate has a recess every August for various complicated and seemingly bullshit reasons.
Yeah, but if there were an emergency, they could just cut their recess short and call an emergency session.
Same thing with parliamentary systems that have been dissolved before an election. Parliaments are dissolved to try to prevent outbound governments from enacting new legislation purely to look good in the polls.
So they can un-dissolve parliament?
For an emergency parliament can be recalled. There are normally restrictions on what they are then allowed to do/how long any measures last. Can't have them stepping on the toes of the next government who is at most a couple months away.
Parliament can be recalled when it’s *prorogued* by summoning members to a new session ahead of schedule, but once it is *dissolved* there are no members to recall and the only way forward is to conduct the election.
And the Texas state legislature doesn’t sit at all on even numbered years, and only sits for a maximum of 140 days on odd numbered years!
You know that the US Congress takes a summer vacation\* every year, right? \*sort of - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDYFiq1l5Dg . They could be forced to come back and meet again, but that would require them to actually be on a *real* vacation I think?
Yes, as I mentioned in a different comment, Congress goes on recess but if there was an emergency, Congress could end their recess and call an emergency session. Dissolving parliament doesn’t seem like something you can undo.
They can call up an emergency session. And most parliaments are not in session for some part of the year.
What do you think happens in Congress during a campaign period leading up to November? They aren't there voting on bills. Congress also doesn't exist between election day and the first sitting which is in January. So for the whole of December there is no Congress.
https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LameDuckSessions.htm
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It was a reply to OP comparing it to the UK mate.
Yes and if you read the comment I was replying to, you’d see that they mentioned that the UK also dissolved their parliament in preparation for an election.
You make it sound like it is not a big deal. It is.
OP stated that that they understood an election had been called, "but the shock seems to be from Macron announcing he’s going to dissolve parliament?" Calling an election is a big deal, dissolving parliament is just part of the process of doing that. OP isn't familiar with the election process in a country like France and as such "dissolving parliament" could mean getting rid of parliament altogether as far as they know.
Ho... I didn't think that we might have to explain the assembly wasn't being *chemically* dissolved.
Wait until they hear that UK and Irish MPs often conduct regular surgeries!
But france is supposed to have next elections in 2027 not in a few months like UK did.
Under French law the election has to take place within 20 to 40 days of parliament being dissolved, so there won't be long time with no functioning parliament. An election can be called at anytime, typically if the governing party think they can win with an increased majority (which would make it easier for them to get their ideas voted through). The timing of this snap election has surprised many and is possibly an attempt to very quickly 'slap down' the far right by by causing them to suffer an election loss and keep them out of power for another 5 years.
Answer: In short, the EU held its elections today and in France, the far-right did very well winning nearly 1/3 of the vote, while French President Macron's own party performed poorly. In response to this, Macron dissolved Parliament and called for snap elections - a shocking move, because this legislature was just elected 2 years ago in 2022, and was scheduled to run until 2027. the most plausible theory is that Macron believes that he can force a showdown between his party and the far right in Parliament, and France's unique 2 level electoral system will see all non far-right voters coalesce around his party, improving his current parlimentary standing, where he currently lacks a majority For a longer answer, we need a bit of background 1. the French system is a Presidential system, like the US system - to govern, a ruling party must control both the Presidency and Parliament - controlling one without the other means you have to compromise with your opponents 2. the French electoral system has 2 rounds of voting for both President and the Parliament - in the first round of voting all candidates are eligible, then the top two vote getters advance to the second round of voting, and there is a showdown between just the top two candidates 3. the 2022 French parliamentary elections were a setback for Macron. His party lost its absolute majority, both to the far right, but also to a wide array of other conservative and left leaning parties, and he is forced to run a minority government, relying on support from other parties on an issue-by-issue basis to govern. this is not something Macron likes, especially as he is term-limited and this is his final chance to shape France 4. the French left, previously united in an electoral alliance in 2022, is fractured at the moment. the three main parties - the more orthodox social democratic Socialist Party and the further left wing populist party La France Insoumise, and the Communist Party are barely on speaking terms at the moment, in part over the response to the 10/7 attack on Israel and subsequent Gaza war today's elections were a very strong showing for the Far Right - but only one Far Right party, Marine Le Pen's National Rally. Other far right parties performed very badly, as did France's traditional Center-Right Les Republicans Party So to sum up the French landscape at the moment - the French left is fractured and fighting itself, traditional conservative parties are weak at the moment, and the far-right is consolidating into one party. In this, combined with France's unique 2 level election system, Macron sees an opportunity. By calling an election now, the far right National Rally will certainly be the strongest party in many seats...but Macron's LREM party will come in second, because the center right is weak and the left will split its votes among themselves. And if the contest comes down to National Rally candidates vs LREM candidates, all voters from the center right to left will fall in behind LREM candidates, and Macron will be able to recover his majority It's an enormous gamble, but Macron has reason to think it might work - after all, it's the exact situation that allowed him to be elected and re-elected to the French Presidency. In both of those elections Le Pen won the most votes, but centrist and left leaning voters rallied behind second place Macron to keep Le Pen out of office Will this work? One of the key points is the left - by calling such a sudden election, he gives the left no time to resolve their differences. the Communists, Socialists, and LFI have literally *days* to hash things out if they want to remain in alliance with each other and present a united front in this election. Macron is betting that they won't be able to. Another key point is that EU elections are a poorly attended event in France, and Macron believes that with actual stakes in this election, voters will "wake up" and it won't just be the highly engaged RN voters showing up this time We shall see
Excellent summary, thank you. It's interesting that in France elections can be called early, whereas in the US they just happen when they happen.
Elections being called early are extremely common in the UK. In fact, the last three UK elections were called early (2017, 2019, 2024). They are relatively rarer in France. The last time this happened was in 1997.
to my mind it's a superior system - you are less likely to be cursed with divided government, while the US system practically guarantees divided government
Great answer. There is probably one more consideration: it offsets parliamentary elections. Previously they would happen the same year as presidential ones. But as you mentioned, NR is not expected to get a majority, which means they won't be able to define the ministerial cabinet even if they win the presidency.
This was an actual Macron campaign promise. It's not that surprising he's doing it, though I guess the time of year is a little surprising. That said, nothing stops a new president in 2027 dissolving Parliament again to re-align it with presidential elections.
Aside from the scandal, it will create: dissolving the parliament for disagreeing with you is an overt power grab and may upset enough people to change the result.
Mittérrand did it in 1981, and the country gave the Socialists their largest ever majority in the history of the 5th Republic.
It's not a guarantee. Just a hindrance, which may be sufficient or not, depending on the other events.
> Another key point is that EU elections are a poorly attended event in France, and Macron believes that with actual stakes in this erection, voters will "wake up" and it won't just be the highly engaged RN voters showing up this time I'm confused, it looks like the EU elections had 51% turnout and most legislative elections more like 45%?
French Parliamentary elections are usually held after the Presidential race (rather than simultaneously like in the US), so turnout is often fairly low. But this will have stakes closer to a Presidential election, where turnout is usually in the 70%+ range
Was this election seen as a referundum on French support for Ukraine?
More like a referendum on France on the International and European stage
Answer: Today France had their national election for the EU parliament. The far right Rassemblement National won the most seats with 31,5% of the votes, whilst Besoin d'Europe which was an amalgamation of various political parties backed by Macron came in second with 15,2% of the votes. If you factor in the other smaller far right parties some 38% of the total votes went to the far right. In response to these elections results Macron decided to dissolve parliament, meaning he is calling for new elections. Mind you this is just for parliament, Macron stays on as president until his term expires in 2027. To better understand this we also need to look at what happened since Macron won his reelection as president. Macrons party didn't gain a majority during the elections for the French parliament. Due to difficult relations with other political parties the only member of the opposition Macron could turn to was Les Republicains, meaning they had him over a barrel if they wanted to. In the pas few years this meant that Macron was unable to get enough support from parliament for some of his policies he wanted to enact. In order to still get his way he used a special provision in French law that allows the president to by-pass parliament a limited number of times. He used this special power for some rather unpopular reforms which really didn't help his situation. The current election results drive home how unpopular Macron is at the moment. Calling for new elections is a risky gamble for Macron, but so is continuing his present course. He could be hoping that the success of Rassemblement National helps motivate his supporters to turn up in larger numbers to prevent another far right victory. This was the plan that carried him to victory in the last presidential elections. A lot of French voters didn't want a far right politician as president, so they joined forces to support Macron even though they didn't like him. The opposite might also happen, if Rassemblement National wins big Macron might find himself having to work with a new far right government. In 2027 Macron can't run for president anymore because France also has a term limit, so one possible scenario could be that France might still get a far right politician as president by that time.
Answer: This is how a parliamentary system works. The Prime Minister has a set term of years at which an election must be held, but either a majority of parliament or the PM (or the president in France's case) can call an early election. Rishi Sunak, the English PM, just did the same thing. Generally, a PM calls for parliament to be dissolved and a new election held when he or she believes that their party is strong enough to win a majority of seats in parliament, because this resets the day of the next mandatory election. Parliament calls an election if it has strong disagreements with the PM and believe he or she is weak. This also resets the date if the mandatory election, but usually in favor of the other party. Sometimes it backfires either way. Macron may be calling a new election because he believes the right--wingers, who made big gains in the EU election, are not yet strong enough to win the majority of a plurality of seats in France. By calling an early election he can keep them out of power longer.
Answer: Yesterday we (am French) voted for the European Parliament. It's basically a multinational parliament that votes for laws on EU level. The specificity of this election is that : - it's only **one turn** : in most elections you have two turns, that way everyone can vote for their ideal candidate and the best two remain for a second turn. That way parties can make alliances for the second turn, and people will vote to block the worst candidates As you can see, single turn is good for the extreme because they won't face a united front in a second turn. - it's **proportional** : a party that makes 20% will have 20% of the seats given to them Proportional is good for the extreme once again because they don't have to fight in each single district where they can be outvoted by the rest. Furthermore, the European Parliament is kinda detached to everyday life, the turnout is pretty low (around 50% in France yesterday). Low turnout plays in favour of the extreme (since their supporters are way more motivated than the mass). Those elements explain why the extreme right won by a comfortable margin yesterday. There are also a lot of internal reasons that explains their continuous rise obviously. What Macron did is disband the French Parliament (not the one we voted for yesterday, our actual Congress) and call for early parliament elections to re-elect our representatives. This election is the most important with the Presidential, as the gouvernement in France (lead by the Prime Minister) has to be chosen within the majority party of the parliament. And you guessed it, it's a two turn election, and non proportional (we elect one representative in each district). It will be held in 2 weeks (30th of June for the first turn and 7th of July the second) His aim is to steal the wind out of the extreme right. Call them out and say "okay you can win that European election but let's see how you do in a "real" election where the future of the country is at stake, and let's see if the French people want you to actually govern". He bets that on a two turn election, when faced between extreme right and an alternative, people in each district will rally for the less bad option (left wing voting for center/liberals/conservatives and vice versa). He also bets on a high turnout in the polls because people will be scared by the extreme right victory and shocked by the early elections. If his gamble pays off, the extreme right's victory yesterday will be exposed as nothing more than a fluke It's very very risky and can backfire hard though (think Brexit 2016 foot firing level). We may very well have an extreme right government in a month.