How to interpret the outcome of the 2017 French presidential elections? At one level, a sense of relief prevails: the commanding victory of Emmanuel Macron, the ‘centrist’ candidate, over Marine Le Pen of the fascist Front National appears a revalidation of France’s status as a liberal democracy committed to certain core values, among them liberty of association and expression, the rule of law, and social solidarity, including the repudiation of racism, ultra-nationalism, homophobia and other forms of division. And, indeed, the scale of Macron’s triumph impresses: he gained 66.1% of the valid votes, against 33.9% for Le Pen.
But a closer look at the figures, in the context of the events that have framed the campaign, encourages more cautious conclusions. To start with, Sunday’s vote stood out for the very high level of abstention: 25.44% of eligible voters did not turn out at all, the highest percentage for a second round presidential poll since 1969. Of those who voted, historically unprecedented numbers spoiled their ballots or left them blank; by some estimates, 8.8% of the electorate registered their protest in this way. And it would be dangerous to minimise the scale of Le Pen’s second round electoral achievement: gaining more than 11 million votes for a party intimately and indissolubly connected with the jackboot that was the Nazi occupation of France just a few decades ago.
Above all, this election both highlights and exemplifies the political turmoil in which France is currently engulfed. The two big parties which have dominated the show for the past 40 or so years are both in meltdown and the political-constitutional system itself, as enshrined by the Fifth Republic inaugurated in 1958, appears in the grip of terminal decline.
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