Through the thick air from my open windows, I hear seagulls screech, a newborn’s wail, the blasting of music from someone’s car and occasional outbursts from the denizens of the corner cafe behind my building. During the relative quiet of night, a not so distant train rattles the rails. Ah, the suave sounds of summer.
Last week we had our annual scirocco, the hot, sticky wind from North Africa that dropped dustings of sand everywhere for two days and roiled the sea. It is spent now, and our mornings and evenings this week will be cool. Still, I have my seasonal getaway to less extreme climes coming up in early July, hopefully before the canicules begin.
This summer I will be keeping a closer watch than usual on what transpires in my adopted country. President Macron has called a surprise election for the country’s legislative body, the Assemblée Nationale, and France is confronting, for the first time in modern history, a stark electoral choice of dangerous extremes.
Macron’s own centrist party is way behind in the polls, with the far right, anti-Europe, anti-immigration, socially intolerant party of strident anti-semitic origins, the Rassemblement Nationale, leading with a sizable margin. Just behind is a brand new alliance of leftist parties, the Nouveau Front Populaire, with the most visible of its leaders, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, an anti-semite with autocratic, Stalinist tendencies. What is at stake should either of these political movements assume leadership? For starters, a functioning government, international confidence in the French economy (a pillar of the European Union), the euro, support for Ukraine and Israel, and peace of mind for France’s minorities. Also, democracy.
No one really understands what Macron was thinking when he took this step, and he is now generally viewed as impulsive, hubristic and prone to unilateral decisions. These are the faults that have made him widely unpopular (even though French Presidents are always widely unpopular no matter what). Whatever the results of the two-phased elections on June 30 and July 7, Macron will remain President until his term expires in April, 2027. But he will rule with little power in a set up the French call “cohabitation” with a Prime Minister from whichever of the extremes wins a majority.
I have heard from Jewish French friends that they will leave France if 28-year old leader, Jordan Bardella of Le Pen’s National Rally or the 72-year old Mélenchon become Prime Minister. The fear is that anti-semitism, on a sharp rise in France especially since war in Gaza, will be normalized.
One French friend’s son who was planning to repatriate to France has put those plans on hold.
I’ve also heard that some Americans in the process of buying property have reconsidered.
The question however is this: where is there a clear alternative? It is not a pleasant question to contemplate given a rising tide of right wing populism all over the world. Time was, you could seek to emigrate to the U.S.
One small hope is that Nouveau Front Populaire will have the good sense to nominate a moderate candidate for Prime Minister and steer clear of Mélenchon and his ilk, to draw a majority from the few Macronistes still left and voters reluctant to vote for extremists of either side. The left is unlikely to be anti-democratic, even if its economic plans threaten chaos. With the right, France would get both.
Whatever the outcome, it is clear that people of non-French nationality, including multiple nationals, are increasingly being perceived as a threat to national identity.
For a shard of hope, I look to the UK. Eight years ago, a majority chose the Tories to get the UK out of the European Union. Today, a very large majority accepts that leaving the EU was a big mistake, and the Tories are on their way to electoral defeat. I suppose it is possible that at the end of Macron’s term, his gambit will have worked. After two and a half years of whichever side takes over the legislature, the French might be ready to move back to the center. It’s all I’ve got.
kmazz 