Macron has many political „sins,” but he is not solely to blame for the mess that is paralyzing France. The ultra-presidential governance system also plays a significant role.
Charles de Gaulle created the Fifth Republic of France in 1958 with the main priority of establishing a political system that would ensure total stability.
As if to prove this himself, de Gaulle was the first of only eight presidents who have succeeded in the 67 years since then - and the new structure granted him powers equal to those of a monarch.
But cracks in the system are starting to show. Now, with Emmanuel Macron besieged witnessing the resignation of a prime minister after only 26 days in office, France is by no means stable. De Gaulle's creation is being tested to the breaking point, notes Politico.
Flaws of an ideal system
Watching the French political scene engulfed in flames in recent months, it would be tempting to place most of the blame on President Macron. After all, it was his decision to dissolve the National Assembly and call for parliamentary elections last year, triggering the crisis that has so far led to a succession of five prime ministers and could very well bring the sixth by the end of the year.
However, blaming Macron alone means overlooking the even bigger issue - that the Fifth Republic of France is inherently incapable of accepting compromises and power-sharing, as noted by the cited publication.
Conceived as an antidote to the highly fractured Fourth Republic, which went through 21 different administrations in 12 years, de Gaulle's system was optimized to produce one result: an all-powerful president, supported by an absolute majority in Parliament.
Every institutional mechanism is tuned to this end, including the two-round presidential elections that force voters to rally around the most consensual option and the fact that legislative elections take place immediately after the presidential vote.
The Fifth Republic works perfectly as long as the president's party holds a clear majority in Parliament. The government then becomes a kind of glorified advisory body serving the Parliament's agenda.
Suspicion, intolerance to compromise, deadlock
The problem with this system is that in any other configuration, it generates chaos. If the Parliament is dissolved and an opposition party takes power, the result is cohabitation, which in France is synonymous with paralysis.
In the case of a suspended Parliament - which France had after the June 2024 elections - it's even worse. Parties have no institutional interest or cultural inclination towards compromise. Any outward sign of cooperation is viewed with suspicion. Power is so tilted towards the president that even if parties were to cooperate, it would be nearly impossible for them to have any real influence.
Instead, party leaders calculate coldly that in such a scenario, the best thing to do is to stay out of the government and do everything possible to hasten the next presidential elections - even if that means changing one prime minister after another.
That's exactly what is happening now.
"In reality, everyone is only thinking about the presidential elections," said Gilles Gressani, director of the French magazine Le Grand Continent and president of the think tank Groupe d'études géopolitiques. "In France, almost all mid-to-high-level political actors, as well as economic ones, are really thinking about what they could do to become the president of the French republic."
The results of this system and its evident weaknesses have been visible in the last 17 months.
One after another, five prime ministers have tried, with varying levels of skill and sincerity, to reach an agreement on the budget with the largest parties in Parliament. And each has concluded that it's madness, so they left their post quickly - in the case of the current prime minister Sébastien Lecornu, we're talking about a record, less than a month.
Lecornu, who resigned as prime minister last Monday, only to be reappointed on Friday evening, acknowledged that the presidential ambitions of influential politicians were interfering with the country's political stability.
As a result, he said, his future ministers will have to "commit to disconnecting from presidential ambitions for 2027."
Easy to say, hard or almost impossible to do in the current French political system.
Even Italy can teach France lessons
This unrelenting chaos shows no signs of abating, causing some French politicians to look nostalgically at parliamentary systems where coalition agreements are part of the political DNA.
Standing next to German Chancellor Friedrich Merz in August, Macron implored the parliamentarians of his own country to take an example from their German counterparts who had just crafted a coalition agreement between the center-right and center-left.
"On the other side of the Rhine, it seems that a conservative party and a socialist party are managing to work together. This is happening not too far from us and it works, so I think it is possible," said the French president.
Even Italy, which has often been in a politically challenging situation, now seems more stable than France. This is largely due to the experience of its parties in successful coalition agreements, such as the one under Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, which has lasted for almost three years, says Marc Lazar, a professor at Sciences Po University in Paris.
Unfortunately for Macron, however, there are few signs that the leaders of French parties are on the brink of a compromise. Immediately after Lecornu announced last week that he was stepping down, far-right leader Marine Le Pen threatened to oust the next prime minister of the country, whoever it may be.
An expired system
In a country obsessed with politics, observers are not immune to the problems of the Fifth Republic, notes the publication.
Analysts have lamented for years that the system reduces Parliament to a powerless puppet, fueling a "burn it all down" mentality among opposition parties. They emphasize that at a time when insurgent political forces are increasingly effective at challenging incumbents, it might be logical to grant them at least some measure of influence, for example, through proportional representation in the government.
Jean-Luc Mélenchon, a left-wing firebrand and multiple-time presidential candidate, partly based his 2022 campaign on the idea that France needs to transition to a "Sixth Republic." System party leaders rushed to reject this idea, arguing that it would primarily serve his interests.
But as France stares into the abyss, it might be time to start thinking outside the box. Perhaps de Gaulle's creation has outlived its time, concludes Politico.
T.D.