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I know the author is trying to be cute, but this: > the sole real seat of power is the office of the presidency is plainly wrong. The president still can lose

I know the author is trying to be cute, but this: > the sole real seat of power is the office of the presidency is plainly wrong. The president still can lose their majority in parliament, they still can have an hostile prime minister, and they still don’t control the judges. There are many examples of the 3 powers slipping away from the president at various times after De Gaulle. A minority president is also becoming more and more likely as the candidates struggle and the parties keep shooting themselves in their respective feet. Not a great start. > The key difference of course is that in the US the President cannot dissolve Congress at his or her leisure. Dissolving the parliament, whilst a possibility, is politically very risky and quite often works against whoever is doing the dissolving (there are many historical examples in France and elsewhere). It is a threat, but a hollow one. It is quite similar to the motions of non confidence in that respect. > It was the last time a French parliament truly exercised its powers, on the cusp of losing them all. The parliament, of course, did not do itself any favour with the constant bickering, instability, and general ineffectiveness in the couple of years and decades before that point. Not that long before that parliament itself committed democratic suicide with Pétain. It’s a bit hypocritical to lament the shifting of the political centre of gravity in the context. > People know it is the only election that really matters, and they use it as an opportunity to count themselves, that is, the relative size and power of their parties or factions, and yes, to protest. This is also very debatable. Of course, some people think this, and it is reinforced by the popularity contest that the presidential elections have become. However, the cabinet is responsible for most policies, and who ends up there is determined by the legislative elections. The cabinet is useless only when act as the president’s foot soldiers, but they don’t necessarily have to. Anyway. The article mixes interesting takes and information with questionable interpretations.

pjerem 5y ago
> The president still can lose their majority in parliament, they still can have an hostile prime minister TBH, it’s now really difficult to have this setup now that presidential and parliament elections are scheduled every 5 years, few months appart. The people will give roughly the same parliamentary power ratio to the elected president than its election ratio. And most of the time, it will be even more because the President will do all it can to appear « good » on the first few months. And that’s understandable. You want to give the benefit of the doubt to the elected President and the schedule doesn’t let you the time to see which counter power is needed.
- kergonath 5y ago
  > The people will give roughly the same parliamentary power ratio to the elected president than its election ratio. And most of the time, it will be even more because the President will do all it can to appear « good » on the first few months. It was designed to be that way, but I am not sure it will keep happening. With parties fracturing and current political stupidity, it is not hard to imagine a candidate getting elected president with the bare minimum and their party getting 30% in the legislative. For example, there might be a centrist and a nationalist (xenophobe, populist, you know who they are) facing off in the runoff. Most people slightly on the left would tend to vote for the non-racist candidate and then turn around to vote for their party of choice in the legislative. Remember that it was almost inconceivable that Chirac would lose his majority in 1997.
  - mytailorisrich 5y ago
    I think it would be more productive to try to understand why Le Pen and Zemmour poll so high rather than dismissing them and especially the people who vote for them as "xenophobe", "racist", etc. This has been going on for years, decades now and the only result is that Le Pen polls higher at each election. For Presidential elections, second round: 18% in 2002, 34% in 2017, and polling at 45% now. As someone who lives in the UK, this is what happened for years here to people labelled "Euroseptics" who supported Brexit. Their concerned where ignored and they were dismissed as racist and uneducated. This did not end well, or it did depending on your views.
    - kergonath 5y ago
      > I think it would be more productive to try to understand why Le Pen and Zemmour poll so high rather than dismissing them and especially the people who vote for them as "xenophobe", "racist", etc. I am not dismissing them. This is just a statement of fact: they use latent xenophobia, phoney patriotism, and general anxiety as a weapon. They are nationalists and xenophobes. Which is why their only presence in a runoff guarantees that the other candidate gets elected. Until now at least: as you point out the difference gets smaller every time. > As someone who lives in the UK, this is what happened for years here to people labelled "Euroseptics" who supported Brexit. As a French Londoner since 2013, this hits very close to home. I am not dismissing them, and I do not think I underestimate the threat they represent. This is why whoever ends up facing them would need to be utterly corrupt for me not to vote for them. This is also why I despair reading French media these days, a they do not seem to realise what they are doing.
southerntofu 5y ago
> The president still can lose their majority in parliament, they still can have an hostile prime minister, and they still don’t control the judges Technically, yes. But the justice system is famously a ritual authority abiding by the execute power (see Michel Foucault), while the legislative body is ignored by the executive branch whenever they feel like it without any form of consequence (that became a national debate under Sarkozy, and is still a scandal with the health pass). France is a republic on paper, but in practice is an electoral monarchy with absolute powers for the president. Also worth noting, all these people from the legislative/executive/judiciary are from the same caste/class and are very conscious of their material interests. They may disagree on a few policy details, but when it's about fucking the people to protect big corps and State corruption, they all stand as one.
jnaddef 5y ago
> > the sole real seat of power is the office of the presidency > is plainly wrong. The president still can lose their majority in parliament, they still can have an hostile prime minister, and they still don’t control the judges. There are many examples of the 3 powers slipping away from the president at various times after De Gaulle. A minority president is also becoming more and more likely as the candidates struggle and the parties keep shooting themselves in their respective feet. Not a great start. Since 2002 you are wrong. The reason being that the president is elected every 5 years, and the parliament is also elected every 5 years, only a few months after the presidential election. This means there is no such thing as "losing their majority in parliament". If people elected a president, 2 months later they will vote for the parliament the president wants as there is no time for the president to f*ck up in the meantime and make people change their minds. When the presidency was 7 years then the president could indeed lose their majority in the parliament.
- OJFord 5y ago
  Does France not have snap elections or delays for some reason or another - or if there are, it always affects the presidential election too? Or, lower probability sure, what about by-elections? Say you have a majority of one, someone resigns/dies/does something awful, vote goes the other way in the by-election?
  - jnaddef 5y ago
    > Say you have a majority of one This rarely happens if the parliament is elected right after the president is. Electing members of the parliament becomes: "do I want the president to be able to rule the country, or do I want nothing to happen in the next 5 years?". The clearest example of that was in 2017, when Macron was elected, and people voted in over 300 people that had never been elected before, often were completely unknown to the public, the only thing they did was declaring : "I will vote for whatever the president asks me to vote for" (not an actual quote, but in order to get support from Macron they had to sign a paper saying they would vote "yes" for every proposition emanating from their group, and "no" to every proposition from the opposition)
- 5y ago

pjerem 5y ago

> The president still can lose their majority in parliament, they still can have an hostile prime minister TBH, it’s now really difficult to have this setup now that presidential and parliament elections are scheduled every 5 years, few months appart. The people will give roughly the same parliamentary power ratio to the elected president than its election ratio. And most of the time, it will be even more because the President will do all it can to appear « good » on the first few months. And that’s understandable. You want to give the benefit of the doubt to the elected President and the schedule doesn’t let you the time to see which counter power is needed.

kergonath 5y ago
> The people will give roughly the same parliamentary power ratio to the elected president than its election ratio. And most of the time, it will be even more because the President will do all it can to appear « good » on the first few months. It was designed to be that way, but I am not sure it will keep happening. With parties fracturing and current political stupidity, it is not hard to imagine a candidate getting elected president with the bare minimum and their party getting 30% in the legislative. For example, there might be a centrist and a nationalist (xenophobe, populist, you know who they are) facing off in the runoff. Most people slightly on the left would tend to vote for the non-racist candidate and then turn around to vote for their party of choice in the legislative. Remember that it was almost inconceivable that Chirac would lose his majority in 1997.
- mytailorisrich 5y ago
  I think it would be more productive to try to understand why Le Pen and Zemmour poll so high rather than dismissing them and especially the people who vote for them as "xenophobe", "racist", etc. This has been going on for years, decades now and the only result is that Le Pen polls higher at each election. For Presidential elections, second round: 18% in 2002, 34% in 2017, and polling at 45% now. As someone who lives in the UK, this is what happened for years here to people labelled "Euroseptics" who supported Brexit. Their concerned where ignored and they were dismissed as racist and uneducated. This did not end well, or it did depending on your views.
  - kergonath 5y ago
    > I think it would be more productive to try to understand why Le Pen and Zemmour poll so high rather than dismissing them and especially the people who vote for them as "xenophobe", "racist", etc. I am not dismissing them. This is just a statement of fact: they use latent xenophobia, phoney patriotism, and general anxiety as a weapon. They are nationalists and xenophobes. Which is why their only presence in a runoff guarantees that the other candidate gets elected. Until now at least: as you point out the difference gets smaller every time. > As someone who lives in the UK, this is what happened for years here to people labelled "Euroseptics" who supported Brexit. As a French Londoner since 2013, this hits very close to home. I am not dismissing them, and I do not think I underestimate the threat they represent. This is why whoever ends up facing them would need to be utterly corrupt for me not to vote for them. This is also why I despair reading French media these days, a they do not seem to realise what they are doing.

southerntofu 5y ago

> The president still can lose their majority in parliament, they still can have an hostile prime minister, and they still don’t control the judges Technically, yes. But the justice system is famously a ritual authority abiding by the execute power (see Michel Foucault), while the legislative body is ignored by the executive branch whenever they feel like it without any form of consequence (that became a national debate under Sarkozy, and is still a scandal with the health pass). France is a republic on paper, but in practice is an electoral monarchy with absolute powers for the president. Also worth noting, all these people from the legislative/executive/judiciary are from the same caste/class and are very conscious of their material interests. They may disagree on a few policy details, but when it's about fucking the people to protect big corps and State corruption, they all stand as one.

jnaddef 5y ago

> > the sole real seat of power is the office of the presidency > is plainly wrong. The president still can lose their majority in parliament, they still can have an hostile prime minister, and they still don’t control the judges. There are many examples of the 3 powers slipping away from the president at various times after De Gaulle. A minority president is also becoming more and more likely as the candidates struggle and the parties keep shooting themselves in their respective feet. Not a great start. Since 2002 you are wrong. The reason being that the president is elected every 5 years, and the parliament is also elected every 5 years, only a few months after the presidential election. This means there is no such thing as "losing their majority in parliament". If people elected a president, 2 months later they will vote for the parliament the president wants as there is no time for the president to f*ck up in the meantime and make people change their minds. When the presidency was 7 years then the president could indeed lose their majority in the parliament.

OJFord 5y ago
Does France not have snap elections or delays for some reason or another - or if there are, it always affects the presidential election too? Or, lower probability sure, what about by-elections? Say you have a majority of one, someone resigns/dies/does something awful, vote goes the other way in the by-election?
- jnaddef 5y ago
  > Say you have a majority of one This rarely happens if the parliament is elected right after the president is. Electing members of the parliament becomes: "do I want the president to be able to rule the country, or do I want nothing to happen in the next 5 years?". The clearest example of that was in 2017, when Macron was elected, and people voted in over 300 people that had never been elected before, often were completely unknown to the public, the only thing they did was declaring : "I will vote for whatever the president asks me to vote for" (not an actual quote, but in order to get support from Macron they had to sign a paper saying they would vote "yes" for every proposition emanating from their group, and "no" to every proposition from the opposition)
5y ago