the times | Saturday April 9 2022 35
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come together, it can often end in violence.”
How did France come to this? In 2016 Macron
appeared from almost nowhere. He quit his post as
economy minister in the Socialist government of the
day to launch his own centrist party and run for the
presidency. His chances appeared slim. He had only
joined the cabinet two years earlier as a political novice.
A merchant banker, then a backroom adviser in the
Élysée Palace, he had never stood in an election. The
only thing most voters knew about him was that
Brigitte Macron, his wife, was 24 years his senior — and
they only knew that because Paris Match had run a
front-page photograph of the couple at the seaside.
Luck was on his side, though, as his main rivals fell by
the wayside. Hollande, the Socialist president, was so
unpopular he did not even bother seeking re-election,
and François Fillon, the Republicans challenger who
looked like the overwhelming favourite, ended up being
floored by corruption claims.
Macron was also perceptive. Noting the disaffection
with politics, he proclaimed the traditional parties to be
moribund and cast himself as an outsider who would
govern as no one had before, drawing ministers and
policies from left and right. He offered a “new world”,
which was pretty much what voters wanted to hear. Yet
once in power, he soon came to embody the old world,
at least in the eyes of many provincials who viewed him
as the ultimate establishment figure, a combination of
centre-left and centre-right, a French version of David
Cameron and Gordon Brown rolled into one. It made
him just about the sole target for anyone with a grudge,
and there are plenty of those in France. On a trip to the
west of the country a couple of years ago, for instance,
he found himself under fire over pigeon droppings in a
village square, a lack of GPs and a refusal to give
planning permission for a casino.
The French love to cut off their rulers’ head, at least
metaphorically. They began electing presidents in 1965
and since then only two have won re-election:
Mitterrand and Chirac. Both had lost mid-term
parliamentary elections, depriving them of power and
enabling them to convince voters that if France had
problems, it wasn’t their fault. But rarely in recent times
has a president faced such vitriol as Macron. “He has
been the focus of hatred since the start of his term of
office, even more than presidents usually face,” said
Jean-Yves Camus, director of the Observatory of
Political Radicalism. “I think it’s because he is seen as
a young banker, a technocrat and because he forms
an atypical couple with his wife. He is out of the
ordinary and he has never really found out how to
address the French people, notably the most modest.”
Campaigning in Dijon, Burgundy, last week, he
came face to face with a group of teenage dropouts.At the same age, Macron
was competing in a
national essay-writing
competition once won by
Victor Hugo, playing the
piano with such assiduity
he could have become a
concert performer and
rehearsing for school plays
with Brigitte, then a teacher
at his lycée in Amiens,
northeast France. He was
mystified at the group’s
penchant for loafing around.
“What’s all this about?” he
said. “What do your parents
have to say?” When
Clément, 17, said he was
doing nothing, having failed
to get onto a vocational
course to become a baker,
Macron took his phone
number and promised to help
to find him an apprenticeship.
“I hope you’re willing to get up early,” he said. Clément
said that he was but looked distinctly unsure.
Macron’s re-election campaign has been far from
inspiring. He stayed out of the race until early March in
the belief that he would gain plaudits for devoting his
time and energy to Ukraine. Many voters simply
assumed he was taking victory for granted. He already
had a reputation for “arrogance, highhandedness,
disdain for the [lower] classes”, said Paul Bacot, emeritus
professor of political science at Sciences Po, the
prestigious higher education institute in Lyons. His
initial refusal to campaign made it worse.
When he entered the fray it was with a pledge to
push back the retirement age from 62 to 65. Germany is
moving to 67 and the UK is planning on 68; Macron’s
reform scarcely seems radical. Yet among shoppers in
Dreux this week, it was deeply unpopular and the only
one of Macron’s manifesto commitments that any could
cite. “It’s absurd to think that people can go on working
until 65,” said Muriel Dufour, a prison service employee
who is 58. “As soon as I heard that, I thought there’s no
way I’m voting for Macron. People should retire at 60
to make room for the young, who need to find work.”
Le Pen, who is standing for the third time, appears to
have caught the national mood. Having ditched the
toxic language that earned her 93-year-old father Jean-
Marie more than 25 convictions, she has moved further
away from his extremism in recent weeks. In Hénin-
Beaumont, she was a model of empathy with market
stallholders, shaking hands, posing for selfies,
sympathising over the cost of petrol, talking at length
with a farmer. Black and Muslim stallholders got the
same treatment. “I don’t think she’s got a clue on the
economy,” said Rafik, 34, who sells old magazines. “But
she’s not racist.”
Throughout the campaign, Le Pen has focused more
on the cost of living and less on immigration, assuming,
correctly, that voters knew her position on the latter.
Her attempt to appear respectable has been helped by
Zemmour’s emergence as a political force. He initially
looked as if he would divide the populist vote and
damage Le Pen’s chances. In the end, his claims that
Muslim immigration could spell the end of French
culture and trigger civil war seem to have frightened
voters and made Le Pen seem moderate.
Michel Lieti, 77, a pensioner shopping in Dreux,
began the campaign thinking he would vote for Valérie
Pécresse, the Republicans candidate. With her ratings
having slumped, he will vote for Le Pen instead. “She’s
the only one who can stop Macron now,” he said. “And
someone needs to stop him. He’s a banker and he’s run
the country like a banker.”
Not everyone has such a dim view of Macron’s
presidency and he is credited with a competent
handling of Covid-19 and the economy. More broadly,
and perhaps importantly, he has looked the part as
head of state, at least as far as many are concerned.
“He’s not God and hasn’t done everything right but he
does have a presidential stature,” said Loic Dochy, 42, a
cereal farmer from Burgundy. “It would be very bad for
the image of France if anyone else got into the Élysée.”
If the polls are right, there are probably just enough
voters who agree with Dochy to ensure Macron’s re-
election. The question is what will happen afterwards.
Camus is not optimistic. With France restless and
swathes of the country questioning the legitimacy of
representative democracy, he can foresee trouble.
“There is lots of frustration bubbling away in French
society. The war in Ukraine and the health crisis has
wiped everything else out. But there will come a
moment when the pressure cooker will explode.”President Macron and,
inset, Marine Le Pen on a
campaign visit to a
market, and one of the
yellow-vest protesters in- Below, President
Mitterrand represented
the old-style French left
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