France Votes For Change: But What?

We shall not know until the second round completes in a fortnight. The two visions of France are at odds with each other in the battle between Macron and Le Pen.  Le Pen has the simpler, many say simplistic, programme for reform; France for the French, leave the euro, halt immigration, Frexit referendum and so on. Macron is more hopeful and uplifting, liberal and pro-Europe, but less specific. Both are riding a high tide of discontent, but it is not clear that either has chartered a reliable course to calmer waters.

France’s problems are structural as much as economic and social as much as political. With its social model, the euro is over valued, causing France to become less competitive. On the other hand its rival and neighbour, Germany, has enjoyed a devaluation, because the euro is much lower than an independent D-mark. This has made German goods cheap, because it has by far the most efficient economy and it has prospered as never before. But it was France who suggested the euro as a means of curbing German power. In the end it has had the opposite effect. Germany is now the economic and political powerhouse of Europe. Eventually it will be decisions taken in Berlin which will decide the fate of France.

There is little that either Macron or Le Pen can do about that. Both have offered a new dawn. Whoever wins will not be able to deliver that promised sunrise, because, as before, the French people will not support the reforms necessary to make it happen.