The parties aren’t the problem. Macron holds the presidency and appoints the PM. The largest (coalition) party is giving him a candidate AFTER compromises and he’s refusing STILL because he only wants a PM from his own party, who came in second (edit: not third, my bad, they did beat National Rally. They did come in third in the first round of voting though).
The big debate is on whether he “appoints” the PM or “picks” the PM.
The constitution doesn’t exactly specify which, and usage was that he would appoint the one issued from the majority vote (but there’s no majority, there’s just one group that’s a wee bit larger). So he’s having his fun, pretending to have a chat with everybody, while knowing all the time that they can really all fuck off and the he’ll do as he pleases.
In the end he’ll most likely have what they call a “technical” government made of non political ministers that will just do as they’re told, because the chambers will be too busy infighting to do anything about it.
It sounds like the candidate PM would not have the confidence of the Assembly though because the center doesn’t want to play ball with the left and the left doesn’t have a majority.
That’s why I’m suggesting elections. Keep going until either a majority is elected (in which case I assume the president is obligated to appoint its leader) or the parliamentary math changes.
If Macron and the center are serious about keeping the cordon sanitaire against the far right, they should obviously play ball with the left. The fact that they are not tells me that they are not serious. The left should be able to make that argument to the electorate and hope to convince a majority.
Edit: not only is Macron showing lack of seriousness in keeping the far right at bay, he is also undermining the legitimacy of the presidency by playing parliamentary shenanigans and triggering such a constitutional crisis. I never really understood the fundamentals of France’s semi-presidential system, but in a parliamentary republic like Germany, or Ireland, or Greece for example, the president does not get to play politics with the parliament’s confidence like this. I don’t understand why the French think this is a good system.
The parties aren’t the problem. Macron holds the presidency and appoints the PM. The largest (coalition) party is giving him a candidate AFTER compromises and he’s refusing STILL because he only wants a PM from his own party, who came in second (edit: not third, my bad, they did beat National Rally. They did come in third in the first round of voting though).
The big debate is on whether he “appoints” the PM or “picks” the PM.
The constitution doesn’t exactly specify which, and usage was that he would appoint the one issued from the majority vote (but there’s no majority, there’s just one group that’s a wee bit larger). So he’s having his fun, pretending to have a chat with everybody, while knowing all the time that they can really all fuck off and the he’ll do as he pleases.
In the end he’ll most likely have what they call a “technical” government made of non political ministers that will just do as they’re told, because the chambers will be too busy infighting to do anything about it.
It sounds like the candidate PM would not have the confidence of the Assembly though because the center doesn’t want to play ball with the left and the left doesn’t have a majority.
That’s why I’m suggesting elections. Keep going until either a majority is elected (in which case I assume the president is obligated to appoint its leader) or the parliamentary math changes.
If Macron and the center are serious about keeping the cordon sanitaire against the far right, they should obviously play ball with the left. The fact that they are not tells me that they are not serious. The left should be able to make that argument to the electorate and hope to convince a majority.
Edit: not only is Macron showing lack of seriousness in keeping the far right at bay, he is also undermining the legitimacy of the presidency by playing parliamentary shenanigans and triggering such a constitutional crisis. I never really understood the fundamentals of France’s semi-presidential system, but in a parliamentary republic like Germany, or Ireland, or Greece for example, the president does not get to play politics with the parliament’s confidence like this. I don’t understand why the French think this is a good system.