Macron, Le Pen And The Perils Of Polarization

It’s hard to feel “bad,” as such, for Emmanuel Macron. He not a terribly sympathetic figure, and he anyway doesn’t cut one.

That said, the picture emerging of Macron ahead of a two-round snap vote his party’s guaranteed to lose is unfortunate, for lack of a better word: Isolated, erratic and desperate. Increasingly, his decision to dissolve parliament’s described not just as a shock and a gamble, but as reckless — crazy, even. I don’t think that’s accurate, let alone fair.

France was mired in two years of legislative gridlock. At some point, a responsible leader’s compelled to do something about that to the extent they can. By the time the EU parliamentary elections rolled around this year, the structure of the French legislature plainly didn’t reflect the electorate’s preferences. The results of the EU vote underscored as much. If you’re committed to representative government, you should, in theory, avail yourself of any and all expedients to align the people’s assembly with the people. If you don’t, what does that make you? There’s a fine line between paternalism and autocracy.

Considering the (very plausible) argument that a snap vote was inevitable at some point anyway, Macron’s decision to dissolve parliament was probably the right one. The fact that, in this case, it was also the “right” one, which is to say preordained to deliver something very close to a majority for Marine Le Pen’s National Rally, isn’t an excuse for not taking it (the decision) absent a clear, present and unequivocal danger to the republic and/or the world.

To be sure, I think Le Pen counts as a clear and present danger, and so do a lot of other people. Perhaps even a slim majority of the French electorate believes that. But to be fair (and I try to be, even when it’s not necessary, which it isn’t here), Le Pen, were she to secure the presidency in 2027 with a legislative majority, isn’t going to rule as a literal Nazi dictator. That’s completely ridiculous, personal and party genetics notwithstanding.

A Le Pen presidency would be a political (and geopolitical) earthquake of epic proportions. There’s no question about that. Two weeks ago, I called Le Pen “the mother of all tail risks.” “Le Pen in the Élysée would be a coup no less consequential than Donald Trump in the White House,” I wrote. I stand by that and I think it’ll be borne out in the event she does become head of state. It goes without saying that her father’s abhorrent, that major parts of her platform are too and that she’s a demagogue who panders to prejudices and preys on fear to mobilize votes. She could do irreparable damage to France and its international reputation.

But in light of the rather pitched tenor surrounding France’s imminent political reckoning, it’s incumbent upon honest people to address, directly, the questions implicit in much of the anti-RN campaigning. Is Le Pen (the daughter, of course, not the father) a genocidal maniac? I don’t think so, no. Is she going to get “blitzed” on coke and meth and try to take over the world? No. Definitely not, and it anyway wouldn’t much matter because — with apologies — France isn’t capable of such an undertaking.

When I call Le Pen “führer-in-waiting” (and I do that from time to time) I don’t mean to suggest she’s going to grow a toothbrush mustache and draw up plans for immigrant gas chambers. Just last month, she disavowed the modern German far-right after one of Alice Weidel’s lead candidates for the EU parliament suggested that not every Nazi was a bad Nazi. “It’s enough,” Le Pen said, of Maximilian Krah and AfD. “It’s just one provocation after another.” (Krah was eventually excluded from AfD’s delegation in Brussels.)

It’s also worth noting that France may well get to experience Jordan Bardella (seen above getting a big kiss from Le Pen) as prime minister for a couple of years before voters are compelled to decide whether they want President Le Pen. If PM Bardella doesn’t work or, more likely, turns out to be an embarrassment, the odds of President Le Pen would diminish commensurately. That’s surely part of Macron’s gamble.

All of that said, it’s never a good thing when the electorate polarizes such that the political center collapses entirely, which is what’s happening in France. Le Pen dismissed Macron’s “civil war” warning, delivered during an interview earlier this week, as “scaremongering.” “He always campaigned on ‘It’s me or chaos,'” she told French media on Tuesday. “He thinks he’s lost this election.” She’s right, of course. But so was Macron when read in context.

What Macron actually said, during an appearance on the “Generation Do It Yourself” podcast, was that both Le Pen and France’s far-left seek to “reduce people” to their religious, ethnic or socioeconomic identities and that such efforts invariably pit people against one another. Whether that’s conducive to “civil war,” as he went on to warn, is debatable, but his overarching point isn’t. Because it’s a tautology: Political polarization is polarizing. And a polarized people is a divided people.

There’s an argument to be made — it’s the argument I’d make — that if you can’t win an election without resorting to demagoguery, you’re not a legitimate candidate. That goes both for the right and left. Say what you will (and God knows I’ve said plenty) about the inglorious legacy of modern, centrist neoliberal politics, the recent history of the far-right and far-left isn’t just worse, it’s wholly macabre, wholly dystopian and in some instances both at once. Le Pen in power wouldn’t be that. But it could be a lot of other things, most of them bad.

I wish Macron the best. And, to reiterate, I hope he doesn’t resign.