France’s last parliamentary elections in 2017 gave flesh to President Emmanuel Macron’s pledge of political renewal, staffing the country’s National Assembly with newcomers plucked from the public. As their mandate comes up for renewal on June 12-19, has the promised change materialised?
It’s been five years since Macron pulled a party out of his hat and triumphed in parliamentary elections, sending an army of political unknowns to the National Assembly, France’s lower house of parliament.
Macron, himself a relative novice at the time, had promised to regenerate French politics by injecting new blood into parliament. His list of candidates featured men and women in equal numbers. More than half were newcomers to politics – people in ordinary jobs who had never held elected office.
From that list, a staggering 308 were duly elected to the 577-seat assembly. The extraordinary result confirmed both French voters’ desire for change and their habit of handing newly elected presidents a workable majority.
“In 2017 Macron was able to transform a structural weakness into a communication asset,” said Étienne Ollion, a sociologist and author of a book on France’s most recent legislature, noting that Macron’s promise of renewal and his lack of an established party chimed with the public’s anti-establishment mood.
While Macron urged his lawmakers to “be proud to be amateurs”, his “newbies” were frequently mocked in the first months of the legislature, “often unfairly so”, said Ollion, noting that gaffes and mistakes stemming from inexperience were mostly inconsequential.
“When people stammer because they’re not used to speaking in parliament, or are unsure about certain…
Source : france24
