Macron has made France ungovernable

France’s shock election result giving the radical Left-wing New Popular Front coalition the largest grouping in the National Assembly signals a u-turn for French politics. But the overall result implies something far more grave for the Fifth Republic. France now has a tripartite lower chamber where all groupings, NPF, Macronists and National Rally, are a country mile from the 289 outright majority. For a political system which for 66 years has had no culture of compromise, forming a durable European style rainbow coalition will be painful, and may test the regime to destruction.

When General de Gaulle designed and built the Fifth Republic, it was to put an end to the chronic instability of the Fourth, which in the space of 12 years got through 22 governments. Instability was a lesser evil than immobilism. The regime froze in the face of major crises and eventually collapsed when confronted by the Algerian War.

For the General the culprit was too much legislative and not enough executive. That is why the Fifth Republic is an astute blend of British parliamentarianism and American presidentialism. It produced stable governing majorities until Emmanuel Macron dynamited the major parties in 2017 by creating his extreme centre. Convinced that France had attained centrist nirvana he paid little heed to the radical fringes. Now they have engulfed his world.

Political scientists describe the Fifth Republic as semi-presidential. Herein lies its magic. Yet for the last seven years Emmanuel Macron boasted of his hyper-presidentialism, Jupiter, maître des horloges. The National Assembly became a mere rubber stamp for presidential policies. When the Chamber dared contest them, like pension age reform, a constitutional device railroaded bills through without a vote.

That hubris got its comeuppance yesterday. A three way hung parliament is potentially ungovernable. What it signals is that the National Assembly becomes the focus of French politics and government. These elections have de-presidentialised the Fifth Republic. 

Just desserts, perhaps. But who will govern and how? A minority NPF government could attempt to govern by pushing through some reforms by decree, such as the 20 per cent minimum wage increase or the prices freeze. A retort to Macron’s rule by fiat. However, reform legislation would always be at the mercy of a censure motion. That leaves building a baroque structure that excludes the RN and the extreme left fringe of the NPF and working with the Macronists whom the NPF detest.

This takes the political system down the route of the old Fourth Republic: back-room deals, insipid policies, lurking no confidence motions, chronic instability and a frustrated electorate. And to boot the constitution does not allow another dissolution for a whole year. Can France limp on in this state haemorrhaging financially and hoping against hope that no new crisis - political, social, financial, foreign- sweeps away the institutions of the Fifth Republic itself?

Perhaps the Fifth Republic has outlived its original efficacy. After all, France has had 16 different constitutions since 1789, not to mention three monarchies, two empires and five republics. Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the firebrand Robespierre admiring leader of the the NPF’s main party, France Unbowed, has been calling for a Sixth Republic for years. For the first time in the history of the Fifth Republic a serious constitutional wind of change is blowing.