Antoine Bristielle is an associate professor of social sciences and a doctoral student at the Pacte laboratory (@A_Bristielle). Tristan Guerra is a part-time lecturer at Sciences Po Grenoble, and a doctoral student in the Pacte laboratory (@TristanGuerra_)
Some editorialists and commentators are ironically wondering whether Jean-Marie Bigard, author of a well-received "coup de gueule", won't soon be joining the government (he himself seems to be seriously considering it), and others are more seriously considering the support of the very popular Professor Raoult for a candidacy hostile to the executive in 2022. François Ruffin says he's ready to "pick up the flag" for the next presidential election, and the Élysée Palace makes no secret of its fear that an anti-system figure will soon emerge who can catalyze popular anger and, in so doing, threaten the incumbent's qualification for the second round of the next presidential election.
Warmed by the brutal and unexpected mobilization of the gilets jaunes in autumn 2018, attentive to the protests rumbling on social networks that have become the organizing vector for the new mobilizations, concerned by the media "coups de gueule" of certain personalities enjoying a wide audience, Emmanuel Macron has come to cajole figures as divisive as they are heterogeneous, such as Éric Zemmour, Jean-Marie Bigard, Didier Raoult and even Philippe de Villiers. Without going back over the fact that these characters have nothing in common other than their taste for denouncing the political, economic, media and medical elites, the president's concern is more likely to be the result of staging than genuine fear, given that he has nothing to lose but everything to gain from the rising popularity of such figures.
Populist personalities on the rise
Admittedly, the thesis of the emergence of a personality to aggregate popular anger is an attractive one. First of all, as the CEVIPOF data show, anger is manifest among the population and was reinforced during the coronavirus crisis, with the percentage of citizens declaring themselves very angry rising from 40% to 50% between the start and the peak of the health crisis. It's important to realize that current mistrust has reached such a level that a majority of French people don't even trust something as fundamental and difficult to falsify in a state governed by the rule of law as the number of people who died during the epidemic, giving rise to a proliferation of false information that opportunists are quick to exploit.
Yet the paradox lies in the fact that this anger seems to find only imperfect expression in opposition political formations. Even if certain political movements present themselves as anti-system, the fact that they compete within conventional political institutions means they run the risk of being assimilated to the governing parties they are supposed to be fighting. The rejection of political parties is in fact global, and makes little distinction between traditional parties and populist alternatives. The RN remains the party most rejected by a large majority of French people.
The combination of this anger and the desire to express oneself outside political parties could thus be the ideal - and apparently much feared - catalyst for the emergence of an anti-system movement, spearheaded by social networks. It's a similar situation that was behind the Yellow Vests movement in France, and the emergence of party-movements such as the M5S in Italy and Podemos in Spain, now occupying prominent positions in the political life of these countries.
A populist space already saturated
However, the situation in France and the state of the political forces are very different from those in Italy and Spain after 2008. In France, the current political offer already features a plethora of "anti-system" movements and representatives, so much so that the space dedicated to them already appears saturated. Between the left-wing populism embodied by Jean-Luc Mélenchon's France insoumise, the radical right-wing populism of the Rassemblement National and more minor political representatives such as Jean Lassalle who emphasize their closeness to "the people", as well as a cohort of smaller candidates who flourish during presidential elections before fading almost immediately into oblivion, voters wishing to reject the classic political parties have no shortage of options when it comes to choosing their ballot paper.
It will therefore be difficult for a populist alternative to find its place when long-established players in this new dimension of party competition already fulfilling, in their own way, a tribune function. function. This is all the more true as the discourse associating the triptych the triptych "anti-system - anti-elites - preference for popular sovereignty resonate with the electorate only if it is backed by a broader ideological ideology (for example, when it is combined with economic liberalism economic liberalism, egalitarianism, nativism, etc.), able to provide a more articulate political program than simple simple degagism. In other words, parties and candidates that mobilize a populist repertoire but forget to have economic proposals economic proposals or societal changes, generally fail to distinguish themselves generally fail to distinguish themselves sufficiently to win significant electoral electoral success.
On the other hand, if the economic crisis worsens and difficulties mount, will not automatically benefit the most radical platforms. As we saw during the Great Recession crisis recession: voters turned first and foremost to the opposition parties government parties in opposition that enjoyed managerial credibility credibility - a crucial element when the country is in the throes social and economic tensions - rather than trusting challenger parties challengers who had never held national power. power.
A strategy that pays off?
Playing on the fear of a new populist candidacy, even more anti-system than the populist parties themselves, which in fact encourages it more than it prevents it, is a clever maneuver on Emmanuel Macron's part, provided it's deliberate.
True to the old adage of "divide and conquer", this strategy could lead to a proliferation of political opposition, which would ultimately benefit the Élysée's occupant. In a two-round majority system like the one we know today under the Fifth Republic, the danger represented by three opposition forces each accumulating 10% of the vote is far less than that represented by a 30% movement likely to qualify straightaway for the second round. From this point of view, Emmanuel Macron would benefit greatly from a populist candidacy "pure and unadulterated", which would bite into the lands of both the Rassemblement National and the France Insoumise, electorates that have already been lost anyway. If such an outcome were to materialize, the President could even hope to overtake the RN candidate, provided that a force from the old government parties fails to compete with the President.
By legitimizing the existence and importance of these political currents, and giving them an even greater share of visibility, Emmanuel Macron is in a way assimilating them into the system, and thereby depriving them of their most destructive potential.
Finally, this strategy would enable Emmanuel Macron to embody one of the last roles he is still able to play, that of bulwark against the extremes. In the same way that in 2017, many votes were cast for his name above all to block Marine Le Pen, the choice of the La République en Marche candidate could appear to be that of reason in the face of a multiplication of populist candidacies deemed too adventurous in times of crisis. Moreover, it's a safe bet that the presence of a new political figure at a high level in the polls would in itself be such an event that it would overshadow Emmanuel Macron's record, which, given the circumstances, is unlikely to be favorable to the outgoing president.
This analysis was originally published by Le Figaro on May 27, 2020.