"Emmanuel Macron, the French president, has announced that he is dissolving the national assembly, and calling for legislative elections on June 30 and July 7.
The French president said that he can’t pretend nothing has happened, that the outcome of the EU election is not good for his government and that the rise of nationalists is a danger for France and Europe."
Maybe French elections are different to American ones…but isn’t this essentially “I didn’t win, therefore I invalidate the election”?
If the people voted, and this is what they want, even if you don’t like it, isn’t that what the people want?
Sorry, I should have been clearer: his party scored badly in the EU elections, so he lost credibility in France and is calling snap elections in France. I’ll edit my comment above to clarify.
So the EU vote includes offer countries then right? So like, “I’m not as popular among the other countries, do you still want me around France?”
People vote for EU members from their own countries (so France in this case). Macron’s party underperformed in those elections, so he’s hoping to get ahead of any further decline, maybe with the hope that the EU vote was more of a protest vote, rather than a sincere desire for the far-right to be in power.
No, it isn’t. His party “lost” in the EU parliamentary elections, not those of the national parliament. It’s a very bold and bizarre strategy.
It’s bold but not bizarre. It’s all about confidence in the next election. Better to have an election when you think you can still win than when you think you wont
if you equate USA with Europe …
then France will be one of the states …
and Macron would be the governor of his state who would decides to call state election because on the federal level his party lost (while there was not yet elections at the state level)
Also : this election called by Macron calls for a possible change of his government but his own seat as president is not challenge until the next election in 2027.
So you’re saying the election he’s in hasn’t even happened, but a bigger election DID happen, but a bigger election his party lost. So this is more like a preemptive surprise election?
I don’t support the far right, but I also don’t support these tactics. I’m sure if I looked into it I’d find tactics I don’t support on the far right. But you can’t lower yourself to that level if you’re trying to shield your people from those types of tactics.
You can’t be the savior of the people by being the poster boy of what the people are afraid of.
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That is a ballsy move then. Maybe even a little dumb, if the far right just won the EU elections.
Most of the time the far right gains power is because people don’t show up. The best moment to win in such an scenario is the moment the results are in. Because anti far right people will freak out and will hopefully show up. If they let this fester the right will just gain more votes.
Right it is ballsy but it also has metits. The eu election that macrons party did poorly in is bigger in that it involves all of europe, but it has almost no direct power in france(someone please correct me if its flat out wrong to say that) but its not insignificant.
The leader of france or any country has long term planning to do and he just got shown his opponents CAN best him.
But this election isnt the most important one for france so a lot of people dont take things as seriously. They vote in ways they wouldnt in more important elections.
By admitting his weak position it rallys people to actually turn out and vote for realzies this time.
The way the world is Macron likely thinks if he waits and has to run an election later its going be bad. But also he will risk needless opposition at home making his job significantly harder domestically. If its harder to manage france its much harder to be a good helpful member of the un and the right is gaining power.
Could easily backfire, but he wouldnt do if he himself didnt think it was his best chance. And if he gets the boot he can become the oppostion focusing all his efforts on JUST fighting against the right which he may see as the most important thing right now
No, it isnt anything like that. The EU elections are different than the national ones and they arent explicitly connected in any way.
But they are implicitly connected. His party just did very badly in the EU elections. He could technically continue to govern till the next national elections or he could go to early national elections and ask the voters “hey, you didnt vote for me in the EU elections, do you still want me to rule this country or not? Please confirm that you still continue to support me”.
Basically Macron is saying “You just saw how fucked things are, with the far right getting over 30% of the votes in the EU elections. Vote for me or the fascists will win”. It is a move intended to rally the voters to his party but he also risks losing the elections(resulting in a fascist government).
As a general rule, in many countries the governing party does worse in the EU elections, because the EU elections are often used as an opportunity to vote for small/minor political parties or protest vote. The EU parliament isnt as legislatively relevant. They dont make laws, they just approve/reject laws proposed by the EU Commision.
The EU Commision isnt directly elected by the voters. The european country governments appoint EU Commission members(one from each country) and the EU parliament votes for the EU Commission leader. This is a point of contention.
Technically it is “democratic” because eventually everything comes down to either national european governments(who are democratically elected) or the EU parliament(which is also democratically elected). But many people think it is weird to have the most powerful EU institution appointed instead of directly elected. The procedure isnt as transparent as people would like and it involves a lot of backdoor “politicking”.
PS On the other hand, directly electing the EU Commission would give its members a lot more political power, basically on par or higher with the elected country leaders. Being directly elected greatly increases your political power.
This is somewhat analogous to the way midterm elections are treated in the US, and a decent comparison would be when Mitch McConnell blocked Obama from appointing a Supreme Court Justice towards the end of his second term.
The Democrats lost seats in Congress during that midterm season, which the Republicans used to claim that the American people had no faith in the Democrats and therefore no faith in Obama. They then used this claim as an excuse to block the Democrats ability to govern.
In this case, the people of France have voted for another party to represent their interests internationally to the EU parliament.
Macron will now face claims within the French government that the people voting against them in the EU elections indicates that they have no faith in his party’s leadership and that will make it difficult for him to govern.
With this move, calling an election early, they will have a clear indication of who the French people wish to lead them internally and, if they reelect Macron’s party, can dismiss the claims from opposition parties that the people don’t trust them.
It’s worth mentioning that many governments around the world don’t have fixed election cycles the way you do in the US. Instead many countries have an end date by which the election must occur, but a new election can be called at any time before that date if the government thinks it’s necessary. A similar thing is currently happening in the UK where the Conservative Party has called an election for early July, even though the election didn’t have to take place until late January 2025.