Some polls are showing a 51-49 Macron edge, well within the margin of error.
ETA: And in politics you have what I have called the “David Duke” effect. You won’t tell a pollster that you support Duke, but will mark your (general your) ballot for him. You are somehow afraid to state your belief publicly for fear of social scorn, but will vote how you want. We saw this twice with Trump. Many of Le Pen’s supporters are likely doing the same.
Eh, not especially. French political culture is an odd thing, perplexing to the outsider and non-analogous to other political cultures. You simply can’t draw comparisons if you’re mostly familiar with the US.
The way a French guy in my office explained it to me:
At some point, everyone gets sick of the current guy. It is only partly related to performance; the French electorate comes to a mysterious collective agreement that they’re tired of whoever it is and it’s time for something new. You don’t have continuing bases of support like in the US, where people wistfully look back at Obama or whoever. When a guy is done, he’s done.
When that happens, the floor falls out and his support craters. A new guy gets elected. Then everyone immediately starts complaining about him, opponents and supporters alike. Nobody ever defends him. To the outsider, it looks like he’s in trouble. But the thing is, the complaining is just posturing, and voters act practically when casting ballots, and the outsider is confused when the apparently-hated politician is re-elected.
The floor has not fallen out for Macron, so he should be (narrowly) fine this time. The current situation is best read as a warning of a negative trend for the next election.
(The fact that Le Pen has been hanging around for several elections with a consistent base of support may seem to contradict the initial point above, but it’s just because she’s never actually won national leadership. If she ever gets to sit in the big chair, the same thing will likely happen to her.)
The problem seems to be Le Pen is an accurate reflection of the French people. She may very well win, which would be a Bad Thing. I understand the Russians have influence on her.
Yes, this. You cannot view a French election or electorate through an American lens. They’re not the same at all. Apples, oranges.
Also, this. It’s hard for a sitting president in France to get elected twice, which is exactly opposite of how it works in the US.
Some people will vote for Macron mainly because they are against Le Pen, and nothing more. The French don’t seem to suffer from the ‘Bernie Bro’ syndrome, where voters who are disappointed their preferred candidate didn’t make the cut just stay home. Their voter participation is quite a bit higher than ours.
I agree. I hope Macron and his team will be blasting the airwaves and everything else with Le Pen’s Russophilia. Make her defend her support for Putin in the current context again and again.
I was just reading how the rules of French elections work and noted that the article begins by noting, “President Emmanuel Macron is seeking to become the first incumbent to win re-election since Jacques Chirac in 2002.”
But, to quote from the article on my exact question:
So it is, as @UltraVires said, effectively a Jungle Primary, like California. They just don’t call it that.
Every single populist leader is elected with every outside nation clamoring loudly to the locals that they’re stupidly electing a populist - and that country going right ahead and doing it.
The average person likes a populist and will overlook all of his faults - no matter how heinous. Two ways to avoid it are by avoiding the direct vote - e.g. a genuine electoral college - or by using first-past-the-post - which ensures that half the country is opposed to every candidate.
FWIW, initially the French 5th Republic did elect the President by electoral college of local “notables”, by-passing parliament. Direct election was adopted as a side-step by De Gaulle to forestall a proposal to bring parliament back into the presidential election process.
