French Politics: Revenge of the Sith
MASTERPOST
Previously...
(click the link to see the animation; the text is otherwise available just below)
During Emmanuel Macron's first mandate, the government had it easy. The main challenge was to try and convince everybody in the country that ~le wokisme~ would lead to the end of civilization. It was also seen that having a presidential candidate financially supported by a certain Russian dictator was somehow acceptable. Adding to that, speaking out against the president became essentially banned on television. The 2022 presidential election was characterized by the left acting stupid, the right acting stupid, and the French middle-class being absolutely clueless. However, the left prepared for the legislative elections by uniting under the NUPES name...
So what can you expect to read about in this post?
In no particular order: bad nicknames, a prolonged game of musical chairs, the end of democracy, and Elon Musk. Yes, Elon Musk is involved.
Terribly, thank you.
With Macron re-elected at the end of April 2022, he had to elect a Prime Minister. As is tradition, his previous Prime Minister, Jean Castex, resigned at the end of Macron's first term, after already having replaced Edouard Philippe in the middle of the mandate.
ENTER: ELISABETH BORNE
1) BORNE-OUT
Borne had previously been minister of transport, minister of ecology and minister of labour, employment and integration. She had quite a reputation, as her previous coworkers had nicknamed her "Madame Borne-out" - an obvious play on her name and "burn-out". She was also nicknamed "Madame Bornée" (Madam Stubborn) and, as recently re-discovered, "Méchanta" (a feminized version of the word "Mean").
Obvious Prime Minister material, right?
So an incompetent wimp was followed by sadistic lady with no empathy. Surely things would go perfectly well.
2) LEGISLATIVES
Next came the time to elect representatives at the National Assembly. Wikipedia describes it as the lower house of the French Parliament, the other, higher house being the Senate. We don't care about the Senate (for now), because the National Assembly is what votes on laws, while the Senate theoretically moderates the NA. The NA is more proeminent and its members are elected by the people.
Basically, the National Assembly is the core battlefield of this game of musical chairs.
I know it may be a bit boring, but you need to understand the basics to understand the drama. Think of it as the opening episodes of a Game of Thrones season, before shit hits the fan.
The National Assembly is constituted by 577 members, which means the majority sits at 289 seats. Usually, the president's party has most seats and thus, can basically do what they want.
"Usually."
As stated in the opening crawl, the French Left united until a single name (while still retaining their individual parties): NUPES. Basically, they would support each other and try to put a single candidate in each territory, instead of fighting against each other. Two communist parties opted out, as they didn't appreciate the main (but weakened) left party taking so much space in the coalition.
So here are the key parliamentary groups: NUPES (the left union), LIOT (utilitarian center union; they don't necessarily share views), Ensemble (Together, Macron's union), UDC (the right) and RN (far-right).
"Nobody won," said Gabriel Attal, the government's spokesperson at the time.
Macron's Ensemble party got 245 seats, so they didn't get a majority. For a while, it was thought the NUPES (the left union) might get the majority, but nope, they "only" got 131 seats - still consequent. A very bad surprise, however, came in the form of the far-right getting 89 seats, a historical score and more than the right union (64). However, Nazi newcomer Eric Zemmour didn't secure any seat for his far-right party so hey, we'll take the small victories.
So let's talk alliances: the Left union had 131 seats (32%). The Right (Macron + UDC) had 245 + 64 (38% + 7%). LIOT was a wild card (or rather, comprised of wild cards). You might assume that Macron's party, definitely right-wing, would get on just fine with the other right union, and strategically-speaking, they have 309 seats, that is, the majority.
However... Les Républicains, UDC's main party on the right, is presided by Eric Ciotti.
Let's play a game.
Here are two Nazis. One pretends to follow the same ideas as the government, and one pretends to follow the same ideas as the government. Who's who? You've got two hours.
So the two Right coalitions don't see eye to eye, but don't worry! Gérald Darmanin, Minister of the Interior, said that Marine Le Pen (far-right) was "too soft". He also continually supports cops. So what I'm saying is that the two Right coalitions are enemies but also very similar. Still, a lot of pride and resentment.
This also means the government is majorly fascist. Surely nothing might go wrong.
3) ENTER: 49.3
What is 49.3?
Pronounced /ka.ʁɑ̃tnœftʁwɑ/, 49.3 is an infamous part of the French Constitution. Americans have the Second Amendment, well we have 49.3.
49.3 exists exactly to face the kind of situation that the National Assembly is in: with no guarantee that a law will be approved by the NA, the Prime Minister might be tempted to bypass it completely. In doing so, the Prime Minister opens the possibility for the opposition to submit a vote of no confidence. If the National Assembly approves the vote of no confidence, the law is rejected and the Government is disassembled - only the President stays. That means organizing new Legislative Elections. If the vote of no confidence is rejected, the law is approved, goes to the Senate, then goes back to the National Assembly for a second read.
There's a big limitation to 49.3: you can't use it at will. That would be preposterous. Imagine a Prime Minister using 49:3 eleven times in six months. Couldn't happen, right?
Elisabeth Borne, by whom I really mean Emmanuel Macron, decided to do exactly that.
Ordinarily, the Prime Minister (so Borne) is only able to use 49:3 once per year... except for laws related to finances. And oh, would you look at that, Macron had a big project planned for a long time:
la réforme des retraites
The idea is to basically extended how long we need to the national pool for retirement, before we can retire ourselves and benefit from pension. There's been a fair bit of manipulation here: the government announced they would prolong the length by two years, then less than that, then more.. But it doesn't account for people who do hard work like construction workers and the likes. People die before reaching that age. Among other young people, we often joke that we won't get any pension, but it's out of apathy, really. It's a horrible reform, it creates more gender inequality and most of all, it's unneeded. The government's justification is that it's necessary, otherwise the country will be heavily indebted by 2050, but it's obviously a pretext. Dozens of experts have said he's wrong - but Macron loves to listen to people who agree with him. Know what we could do instead?
Currently, there's a guy who's richer than goddamn Elon Musk. His name is Bernard Arnault. He's the richest (officially) guy in the world. He's also French. He could fund everybody's pension for decades.
So. Anyway.
People were opposed to that reform from the very start, even in 2019-2020. Our deputies at the National Assembly filibustered for a while (basically sending thousands of amendments to be studied, most notably the Left union NUPES, while the Far-Right party RN's attempt at filibuster were lukewarm at best). Macron (through his Prime Minister, Edouard Philippe) used 49.3 to bypass the amendments... but then there were a lot of protests, and do you know what else happened at that time?
COVID-19, our beloved!
One positive consequence of the pandemic was that the government was so busy facing it (with no competence whatsoever, aside from lying a lot to the population) that they just gave up on any bill they were trying to pass.
The pandemic didn't stop, but everyone pretended it did, so here we were in 2022, and Macron was once again trying to make everybody accept his goddamn reform. Once again, filibuster happened and then Macron (through his Prime Minister, Borne) started using 49.3 like there's no tomorrow.
From October to December 2022, Borne used 49:3 ten times. Then on January 23th, 2023...
"Look out! New rule!"
The government taught us there were more than 3 numbers...
Bitches, bros and nonbinary hoes: please welcome 47.1!
Pronounced ka.ʁɑ̃t.sɛtœ̃, 47.1 is the bad guy reappearing after you thought he'd been blown up already, but with broken teeth. It basically says to the deputies:
"Hey, if you don't vote for me quickly, I'll be automatically approved :-) Oh, and you can't filibuster your way through this either <3"
The bill would then go to the Senate (with a shortened debate time too), then again at the National Assembly.
"People know 49.3, it's very unpopular because it's brutal. But nobody knows about 47.1, it makes things easier for us," said a clueless Macron deputy.
People complained, because while they were confused at what exactly 47.1 entailed, they knew it was basically 49.3 with makeup.
Which it was.
4) NO CONFIDENCE
So the pension bill was voted at the Senate on March 11th, 2023. On March 15th, a Joint Committee approved it and added some stuff. On March 16th, the Senate approved the changes.
THEN IT WAS TIME... FOR THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY... TO VOTE FOR THE BILL AGAIN.
At this point, the bill was more than unpopular. Polls estimated than more than 70% of the French population was against the pension reform. The left-wing NUPES comprising 32% of the seats was very much against the bill. The far-right RN had also made it clear that they were against it (17%), as they'll do anything to be contrarian to the government - they're populists, after all. Even the right-wing-but-not-Macronist UDC (7%) was not very supportive of the bill - contrarians, proud, and a bit clueless too. But some of them truly believe the bill sucks, which is nice. They're not *all* unreasonable.
So Elisabeth Borne used her favorite secret weapon that we were beginning to miss:
i hope you appreciate my quality montage
Borne 49.3'd her way through the bill, inviting everybody to gang up on her for a vote of no confidence.
The next day, Friday, two motions were submitted:
the first one by LIOT, the center alliance. It was the most likely to be approved, contrary to...
the second one by RN, the right-wing party. It wasn't likely to be approved because the RN is (rightfully) stigmatized.
The votes would take place on the following Monday, after the weekend.
5) MONEY IS MAN'S BEST FRIEND
"Nobody asked you." (Arkunir proceeded to ratio Elon Musk a few more times, as well as Macron himself.)
Do you know how to easily get the approbation of a people who's protesting against a financial reform? Just get a billionaire to support you! I'm sure this will not make anything worse. Macron loves dem billionaires, after all he gave the Légion d'Honneur (an official reward) to Jeff Bezos, you know, the Amazon guy, earlier during his second mandate. Macron also has very shady links to McKinsey...
So anyway, what a weekend. Americans started speaking out, complaining about us lazy French (to them, I'll reply: mobilize for your rights!), in particular Elon Musk, who proceeded to get ratio'd (the Twitter equivalent of getting owned) multiple times by French people.
Meanwhile, Aurore Bergé, controversial chief of Macron's party for her many bad faith arguments at the National Assembly, enjoined the right to own up to what some of them had been saying against the bill for weeks. So she basically unintentionally motivated some right-wing deputies to vote favorably to the motions of no confidence.
"Let's all get behind Aurore Bergé!"
Naturally, a lot of people joked about it. Some of us almost thought she was trying to destroy the party from inside.
Monday arrived, and I couldn't do anything except watch the hours-long stream of the National Assembly, starting at 4pm.
One member of every party gave a speech, basically repeating what they'd been saying. It was boring, endless, and it ended with Adrien Quatennens, and oh my god I haven't even talked about him but who cares, he's irrelevant for this portion of our history, but I still had to mention him as he represented people who don't belong to a specific party. I'll probably explain the deal about him when the time comes to talk about the 2027 presidential elections. This post is already long enough as is.
Then the votes finally happened. There was an agonizing 30 minutes to vote, and at the end of the first one (LIOT's)... It hadn't been approved. Basically all of the left, the far-right and LIOT had voted, and we only needed about 25 members of LR (the right who's not with Macron). We got a few of them, but not enough. The second vote was irrelevant. We had lost.
OR HAD WE?
Protests kept going. Actually, protests got bigger. Without much consultation, protests took place in the evening just after the vote.
In fact, as I'm writing this, the protests haven't stopped.
6) So, are we in a totalitarian state?
Study.com did a helpful explanation of what is a totalitarian state that I'll condense in simple points:
Rule by a single party: Macron certainly likes to think that's the case.
Control of the media: You could make a case for this. Officially, we have freedom of speech. Unofficially, journalists can't contradict the president. The medias love to pretend they're neutral when they're decidedly not (and a lot of big medias are owned by a fascist billionaire).
Control of education: Does defunding public education count? Possibly. The state of education in this country is regrettable, in spite of a lot of professors trying their very best.
Control of the population through propaganda, terror and intimidation: Police brutality is generalized, and Darmanin, Minister of Interior, wrongly declared that it was illegal for unwarned protests to take place. The cops enforce this fake rule by fining people who're there with no reason. There is definitely an attempt to quell the rebellion, not by listening to opponents, but by pushing through.
Control of the economy: 11 uses of an anti-democracy failsafe for the economy certainly looks like it.
The Council of Europe, Amnesty International, Reporters Without Borders and Iran (yeah...) called out France for its police brutality. My university has been blocked for a week and a half and has already confirmed that it will be blocked next week as well. There are recordings - actual recordings! - where cops threaten young people, and we know this isn't a rare case at all. Lots of aggression.
A kid just died during his high school final exam because the adults refused to help him.
Marion Game, the French voice of Lois in Malcolm in the Middle or Mallory Archer in Archer, died. She was a beloved actress. I'll miss her.
Not all of this is linked to the rest, but France is having a hard time right now.
7) Remember who the real enemy is
On March 22nd, Macron did an interview at 1pm, obviously speaking to the only part of the population that loves his pension reform: people who're already retired. He repeated what he's been saying for years: "The French people elected me for my program." even though he acknowledged, when he got re-elected, that a consequent (the majority, in fact) part of his voters had only done so to counter the far-right.
Macron also said, "The [Insert offensive term for people who only earn minimal wage] have never had a better purchasing power," which is bold, both because he was even more condescending than usual, and also because EVERYTHING IS HORRIBLY EXPENSIVE.
Around the same time, the French journal Libération said the following:
"When on March 21, Macron said that 'the mob, whichever it is, has no legitimacy compared to the people who affirm its sovereignty through elections', he disowns democracy three times. First off, he disowns any popular aspect of the protests, regardless of what they are, because if the mob has no legitimacy (although it is supported by unanimous unions) over one of the biggest opposition protests of the history of the 5th Republic (even with the support of the vast majority of society, especially among the workforce)... It means a social movement can't be recognized as the voice of the people."
The two other ways, summarized:
Macron's opinion isn't the voice of the people, as he can still act against the nation's interest
opposing "the crowd" and "the electors" disowns social democracy, ie. workers unions, through which the people also speak
I think it's a great formulation of what's going on.
What do you mean, that's not a King Charles?
Things aren't that bad, though. Macron had to ask King Charles III to not come visit France right now. He didn't expect the protests to get worse (for him) after the failed vote of no confidence.
Adèle Haenel, one of the leads in Portrait of a Lady on Fire and real-life lesbian, spoke out in favor of the workers and said feminists had to take part in the fight.
We got our own version of MinetaGate: in an interview given to the main gay magazine in France, Têtu, Olivier Dussopt, the Minister of Labour, said two things:
He came out as gay, which is something that we, the gay community, immediately rejected
He said that the government might need to use 49.3 again
It worked out so well last time...
Anyway...
I'll simply conclude with what the chief of the General Worker's Confederation said in regard to this interview:
"Either [Macron]'s completely unfamiliar with our system and that's very serious, or he's fucking with us."
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