The year of Macron

The Brainstorm long read: it has been an eventful first year as president of France for Emmanuel Macron, so has he lived up to his promises and potential?

It's 7 May 2017 and a young man had just managed the biggest heist the Fifth Republic had ever witnessed. I can still remember the strong emotion I felt watching Emmanuel Macron, a man unknown to the French people two years previously, solemnly walk through the courtyard of le Louvre to Ode to Joy, the European anthem.

As a fervent pro-European, who has embraced the opportunities that globalisation and a Europeanised France bring in terms of mobility, studies and employment, Macron spoke to me. However, even then, many voters rejected his radical reform programme for France or felt concerned about it.

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Macron was elected in the second round with a record low level of participation of 74.7 percent. For many, he was the lesser of two evils, since his opponent was Marine Le Pen from the Front National, who had performed abominably during the traditional televised duel three days prior. It was difficult to argue that many more than the 24.01 percent who voted for Macron in the first round did so in the second out of conviction that he was the right man for the job.

So who was this terribly young man in terms of past French presidents who had been elected without the structural support of a political party? He had never been elected to any position prior to the presidency. He had graduated from Sciences Po and then l’ENA, finishing in the top of his class which allowed him to pick the most coveted of posts, that of general auditor.

Four years later, Macron moved to the private sector and worked for the corporate bank Rotschild & Cie Banque for a few years. Even though he never was a card-carrying member of the Socialist Party, he became deputy general secretary in François Hollande’s cabinet when Hollande was elected president. Plagued by numerous scandals, Hollande had to reshuffle the government several times. In 2014, on his Prime Minister’s insistence, he appointed Macron as his Minister for the Economy, Industry and Digital Affairs, one of the biggest portfolios in the French government.

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From RTÉ Radio One's Drivetime, Philip Boucher Hayes profiles then presidential hopeful Emmanuel Macron

While it might look strange to an Irish citizen to have a civil servant rather than a parliamentarian as a minister, it is relatively common in France. Even parliamentarians who become ministers have to give up their seat while they serve as minister to avoid any type of clientelism.

By February 2016, with the French presidential elections looming, Macron was convinced that the extremely unpopular outgoing president Hollande could not seek a second mandate. This was a gamble at a time when Les Républicains were gearing up for its first ever primaries to select a presidential candidate. They seemed destined to win the 2017 contest in a traditional movement of pendulum in the Fifth Republic, after a socialist president comes a conservative one. This crystallises what Macron is about: a risk-taker who has an immense belief in himself. In public meetings or impromptu conversations with French citizens, He often says you have to take your own risk.

Fast-forward past the epic suicidal campaign by the Republicains, one which saw the disintegration of its candidate François Fillon in a series of scandals, and we arrive at 7 May 2017 with our newly elected president who pledges "to serve us with love". His creed during the campaign was "and left and right", what he called "and at the same time" (et en même temps). He was going to take the best from both sides of the political divide, something which involved largely economically liberal reforms and left-wing social measures which he clearly flagged during the campaign.

From RTÉ Radio One's Morning Ireland, Agnès Poirier, UK Editor of the political magazine Marianne, discusses the potential impact of various scandals on François Fillon's campaign

Macron was also the only candidate who expressed an optimistic vision of the future of France in an increasingly integrated European Union. At a time when Eurosceptics saw their support increase in France as well as most EU countries, this was a very bold position to take.

At this point, it might be interesting to mention that Macron worked very closely with the philosopher Paul Ricoeur who inspired Macron in two ways. Firstly Ricoeur had a certain understanding of the French national history and considered that national identity is always evolving according to "the narrative identity", subject to the other and time changes. Secondly, Ricoeur develops the idea that one has the capacity and the will to say and to do, which contrasts with the leitmotiv of French decline and bashing of the last decade. As a result, Macron developed an optimistic discourse during the campaign which he has kept ever since.

On the first anniversary of his accession to power, the question is if he has managed to positively affect the life of French people. The country has gone through three decades of mass unemployment as well as low competitiveness and a declining influence on the international stage. In many ways, it is still too soon to answer. We will have a better picture of his failure or success around mid-term, in another 18 months. However, it is interesting to go back over what Macron promised in terms of style of governance or reforms and to see what he has achieved so far.

From RTÉ Radio One's Marian Finucane Show, John O’Brennan, Professor of European Integration at Maynooth University and Brainstorm contributor, talks about Macron's presidency a year on

Macron and his communication team keep saying that everything which is being done was announced during the campaign: he is doing what he promised. In this sense, Macron has modelled his presidency as the mirror opposite to the Hollande presidency, which was perceived as meek and changing with the direction of the wind.

In polls, Macron is strongly credited by supporters and opponents with fulfilling his promises, which is considered unusual for a politician. For his age and lack of experience, he has also taken on the costume of president with panache. Finally, he is regarded as having restored the state’s authority, keeping to his reforming measures despite disputes and insisting on the rule of law being strictly implemented everywhere on the territory.

The flipside of this is that he is also considered as arrogant. He is accused of having a very centralised, top-down vision of power, far removed from the more horizontal deliberative one he promoted during his campaign. He does not care for intermediary bodies of negotiation.

During his campaign, Macron made about 80 promises around reform and has launched 20 of them to date

Despite talking about a new way of doing politics, his advisers at l’Elysée come mostly from Hollande’s team of advisers. Nothing has changed there. However, he has picked a government of experts or technocrats who have proved to be outstanding in their respective area, but lack the necessary political savviness to sell their reform to the French voters. He has renewed the personnel taking up ministries, as French voters wanted, but these same voters are complaining that they have no idea who their Ministers are. This probably suits Macron since nobody will take the spotlight away from him.

The institutions of the Fifth Republic set up the president as a republican monarch. Some have resisted the role, such as Hollande, but Macron is embracing it. In 1958, Charles De Gaulle envisaged this institutional set-up so the president could be above daily politics and not have to act as the arbiter of mundane political quarrels. Macron, a man who compared himself to Jupiter at the start of his mandate, certainly agrees with this vision. It is also facilitated by the total lack of recomposition of the political landscape. Both the Socialists and Republicians are absent as audible oppositions in the debate, leaving the two divided extremes, La France Insoumise and the Front National, which makes Macron’s job much easier.

During his campaign, Macron made about 80 promises around reform and has launched 20 of them to date. This is quite impressive and, again, was done as a counterpoint to the previous presidency, which suffered from starting its proper reforms halfway through and therefore not reaping the benefits in time for re-election. Macron has imposed a crazy schedule on his team and ministers. He only sleeps five hours a night and expects a similar rhythm from his team, which explains the frenzy of reforms engaged.

From RTÉ Radio One's Drivetime, journalist and broadcaster, Nabila Ramdani discussed the demonstrations against Macron's reform agenda

On the economic front, Macron announced reforms to the labour market and a reduction of France’s public deficit. He picked ordnances to reform French labour laws, which largely reduces the possibility for debate in parliament and increases the speed of adoption of those reforms.

Four months after his arrival to power, this reform was implemented after his extremely expert Ministre du Travail (minister of labour) Muriel Pénicaud carried out negotiations with the trade unions. The system is meant to resemble the Danish system of flexi-security. While the flexibility in hiring and negotiating contracts exists, the security piece is still largely missing. This was a first test for Macron and the reform was passed without any significant demonstration or strikes, which surprised quite a few given France’s tradition of social protest.

Regarding France’s public finances, Macron had promised that the country’s public deficit would finally move back within the range imposed by the Stability and Growth Pact. France is now in the process of moving away from the excessive deficit procedure which was activated in 2009. Here, it could be argued that Macron has enjoyed the benefits of reforms started by Hollande as well as a positive European economic cycle. Moreover, the European Commission has pointed out that France has not yet done enough structural reforms to durably reduce its public deficit. Yet getting the public deficit back below three percent of GDP had been flagged by Macron as essential to rebuild France’s credibility with Germany, a crucial partner to further European construction.

A year later, this divide seems more entrenched than ever

However, he had not mentioned a few fiscal measures he has introduced, namely the significant change to the eligibility criteria for wealth tax and the upcoming suppression of the exit tax which penalises French citizens moving out of France. These two moves, as well as a badly timed increase on an indirect tax which affected pensioners earning a low threshold of more than €1,200 per month, contributed to the label of president of the wealthy for Macron, a label that has stuck as poll after poll shows.

This image is also combined with that of an urban president who demonstrates social contempt. Macron was largely elected by the winners of globalisation or those who believe that it can work for them. On the other hand, Le Pen scored highest in areas which feel abandoned by the French state and threatened by Europeanisation and globalisation. A year later, this divide seems more entrenched than ever.

One other significant measure announced during his campaign and acted on is legislation on immigration. Macron’s discourse at the time of the campaign was quite ambiguous and we were lead to believe that there would be a welcoming aspect to the legislation for a nation which claims to respect human rights.

"Macron is widely credited domestically with giving back to France its place on the international stage"

This is an emblematic example of Macron’s presidency one year later. Even if some of his most influential left-wing advisers were angered by what they considered as a tough immigration bill, 63 percent of people consider that there are too many immigrants in France. The moderate left-wing voters who voted for him largely consider that he has turned out to be a right-wing president, on both economic (which they were ready to swallow) and societal issues. A recent poll shows that 50 percent of people consider La République en Marche to be a right-wing party. In this sense, Macron has hoovered up the moderate right wing of the Republicians, leaving its leader Laurent Wauquiez searching for a new political space in between Macron and Le Pen.

Currently, Macron is going through his real first test with a number of significant protests against reforms. The government’s plan to reform the national railway company SNCF has led to 15 strike days so far, including during the Easter holidays, and it is difficult to see an honourable exit on both sides. The second protest came from students who blocked a few major universities in France protesting at the reform of access to third level education. While some exams have had to be cancelled, it does not look like a new May 1968 is on the cards.

The final threat comes from Notre Dame des Landes, a state-owned land occupied illegally for decades by a few hundred people to protest against the building of an airport. The government decided at the end of last year to give up on the airport and requested that the occupants leave the land. This did not happen and, after sending 3,000 gendarmes to re-establish the authority of the state, nothing is solved and the state looks defeated in limbo-land again. This could end up being costly for Macron since he has publicly committed himself to have "the law of the Republic respected everywhere".

From RTÉ Radio One's News At One, Paris-based journalist John Lichfield on how Macron's efforts at labour reform are resulting in strikes

Then, there's the European Union and Macron sees himself as one to leave a mark on history through furthering European integration. He has an excellent relationship with German chancellor Angela Merkel and knows that integration can only happen if led by the Franco-German engine. She made the trip to Aachen to make the official speech when Macron was awarded the Charlemagne prize for work done in the service of European unification. While this seems quite premature since he has not managed to get his idea of transnational lists for European elections or any other treaty change accepted, it shows a willingness by Merkel to keep his ideas alive.

Macron had pledged a reform of the directive on "posted workers" (those temporarily working in another EU state) which many considered impossible yet achieved some decent compromise after lobbying Romania, Slovakia, Bulgaria and Czech Republic. However, his ambitions are much broader than this directive and have been developed in landmark speeches at La Sorbonne, Athens, the European Parliament in Strasbourg and Aachen.

The new guard and the old guard: French president Macron with German chancellor Angela Merkel and British prime minister Theresa May

The French president's work on the Posted Worker Directive was a step in this direction. His insistence on taxing digital multinationals more efficiently as well as harmonising the corporate tax base (before moving on the tax rate) is another. This is probably something Ireland and other countries opposed to any fiscal harmonisation should watch. While this has been more difficult than Macron thought, a supportive position of member states during Brexit negotiations could be balanced against a move on corporate taxation.

His key idea revolves around the notion of European sovereignty which complements the national sovereignty in areas in which the nation-state is too weak. He wants to change the European treaties, a phobia for many in France since the defeat of the 2005 referendum on the European Constitution. He places the Eurozone at the heart of a more integrated Europe which is organised in concentric circles and talks about budgetary transfers within the Eurozone as well as a Eurozone Finance Minister and a Eurozone budget. He has also promised a more protecting and social Europe which works for citizens rather than multinationals.

So what would Macron say about his own first year in power?

On a broader note, Macron is widely credited domestically with giving back to France its place on the international stage. He has made 43 visits abroad, many with his wife Brigitte, who is internationally known and liked. He was the first foreign leader that US president Donald Trump invited for an official state visit. He has welcomed Trump and Vladimir Putin to France and has talked to Saudi Arabia's heir apparent Mohammad bin Salman.

His diplomacy tends to be pragmatic and firm. During his press conference with Putin in Versailles, he condemned the interference of Sputnik and Russia Today as tools of propaganda. During his trip to the United States, he criticised the withdrawal of the US from the Paris climate change agreement. He talks to everyone, seems to play the game but sticks to his beliefs and principles. He sees his mark in history at the European level and he has established himself as the leader of the European Union since Theresa May is embroiled in the Brexit crisis and Merkel is weakened in a coalition government.

From RTÉ Radio One's Morning Ireland, commentator Marion McKeown discusses the French president's visit to Washington

So what would Macron say about his own first year in power? Would he concede that his plans for further European integration are stillborn? Would he agree that he is the president for the wealthy? Would he consider remedying his lack of success with the working class, which is due to a lack of protection in the more flexible France that he is creating?

I don't think so. I believe that he would be very happy with his progress and convinced that he has the answers that decades of past politicians were too weak to implement. So far, French citizens have been quite expectant, wondering if their gamble of May 2017 is going to pay off.

As a young man, Macron wanted to be a novelist and he is constructing his life as if in a novel. He has already written the ending and is convinced that the sacrifices will be worth the ride for the French people. The next electoral test is not until May 2019 with the European elections so he has 12 months to make sure his policies start showing results. Otherwise le Front National will be the leading political party in France at European elections for the second time. And that would be a real blow for the leader of Europe.

The views expressed here are those of the author and do not represent or reflect the views of RTÉ

The year of Macron

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Emmanuelle Schön-Quinlivan