How the French riots will affect the 2027 Elysée battle

The scale of last weekend's riots across France continues to bewilder.

The stunned silence of around 7,000 locals, who gazed at the destroyed 19th century city hall in Limoges, has become emblematic of a broader shock at where the Fifth Republic finds itself: a democracy that seems to have lost control.

Fabrice Février, director of the Media Observatory at the Jean Juarèz Foundation, said the "17 October is destined to become etched in our collective memory as a national trauma".

"One of those historical dates we spontaneously mention without needing to specify the year," he added.

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Watch: Moment Limoges City Hall collapses in flames

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The impact is not confined to France.

The scenes of burning vehicles and looted Parisien boulevards have ripped into pan-European and transatlantic culture wars.

Everyone from US President Donald Trump to far right leaders in Germany, Spain, Portugal and Italy have weighed in, for their own political ends, with highly partisan hot takes over what drove the violence.

With next year’s supercycle of European elections looming, the French riots have inflamed an already febrile political mood - anger over the cost of living, energy prices and the housing crisis has made voters ever more receptive to political extremes.

Copycat violence spread to Brussels, Liege and Milan.

In Italy, Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni is grappling with trucker protests in the south over fuel prices and thousands of Greek students and teachers took to the streets to demand more funding for education, while in Spain there have been huge demonstrations against the housing crisis - the first general strike in 15 years will take place on 11 November.

"The message is coming through loud and clear from France and beyond," said former far left Greek prime minister Alexis Tsipras.

France is no stranger to street violence.

The country endured the so-called Gilets Jaunes protests between 2018 - 2020 over high fuel prices, while in 2023 riots broke out over French President Emmanuel Macron’s pension reforms.

Mr Macron defused the Gilets Jaunes protests through €10 billion in tax cuts and other concessions, but now he has no such luxury since France’s borrowing costs have been rising inexorably.

Since his ill-fated gamble to dissolve the French National Assembly in 2024, Mr Macron does not have a parliamentary majority and has been unable to pass a budget.

He has few levers to control the wars in Iran and Ukraine which have pushed up not just energy prices, but also sovereign borrowing costs.

French debt

The bond markets are hitting France harder than other eurozone economies because of its overspending following the Covid-19 pandemic and because the country has had very low growth for nearly a decade.

At the end of June, France’s debt to GDP ratio soared to 119%, compared to 59.3% in 2001, with a budget deficit of 5.1%.

France now pays significantly more than Germany to issue ten-year bonds and the premium on such bonds reached a 15-year high on Thursday.

Without growth, the cost of repaying that more expensive debt gets higher.

France is projected to face debt repayments worth 3.5% of GDP by 2030, compared to 1.5% in 2021 - the government spent more this year on servicing its debt than on education.

France therefore faces a perfect storm of escalating borrowing costs, a large fiscal deficit, almost zero growth, political paralysis and street violence.

Economists are now openly pondering whether that storm could tip France into a debt crisis that engulfs the eurozone.

"The country’s fiscal woes have only just started and they could shake Europe to its core in the coming months," said Shahin Vallée, senior associate fellow at the German Council on Foreign Relations (DGAP), in a straw poll for Carnegie Europe.

"This will demand an adjustment of historic proportions at a time when politics remains profoundly polarised and where consensus on the need for consolidation is limited," he said.

It is not that France today resembles the Greece of 2010.

It is that because France would be too big to fail, it would require some kind of ECB backstop, but that in turn would put unbearable political pressure on the ties that bind the single currency.

In other words, other eurozone countries would simply not accept having to underwrite a bailout because France has refused to undertake the kinds of pension and other reforms that everyone else has painfully undergone.

Before the Elysée can even begin to address the budget crisis, it is struggling to understand the intelligence failures that allowed the violence to get out of control.

Protests

Following weeks of protests over neglected schools, unions, teachers and students called for a day of protest, which took up the broader cost of living issue.

Across the county, 550,000 people largely demonstrated peacefully, but by late afternoon some of the protests turned violent.

Over the weekend nearly 1,500 businesses were looted or vandalised, while town halls and prefectures were stormed in Marseille, Lille, Angers, Limoges and Bordeaux.

It is now clear that the violence was initially perpetrated by so-called Black Bloc activists - also known as les casseurs, or "breakers" - and then further exploited by opportunistic looters.

Usually dressed in black, with faces covered, these radical left activists attack quickly then disperse.

"Last Saturday we had political and seditious acts by ultra left groups whose aim is to bring down the republic," President Macron said on Thursday after meeting ministers and intelligence chiefs.

Jérôme Fourquet, a director of polling at the Institut Français d'Opinion Publique, told Radio France the protests were driven by "two very different rationales".

"On one hand, a fairly conventional social and trade union mobilisation and on the other - on the fringes - individuals who clearly had an entirely different agenda," he said.

Mr Fourquet said: "These were highly organised elements - Black Bloc, or far-left, types - who targeted symbols of the state and capitalism, and whose primary motivation was, quite simply, to attack the police.

"Then there were others, less politically structured, who showed up to engage in opportunistic crime, or to sow chaos and experience a moment of collective excitement."

What struck Mr Fourquet was the sheer numbers of the latter, their relative youth and the impulse to film themselves engaging in violence or looting.

"One could also draw a parallel with mass narcissism," he said.

"It is quite striking to see how all these individuals film themselves in staged scenarios, acting as if they are collecting trophies, which they then take back home," he added.

The chaos has provided a gilt-edged opportunity for far right leader Marine Le Pen to portray President Macron’s government as having lost all authority and control.

At 8pm on 18 October, 16.7 million viewers tuned in to watch Mr Macron address the nation, the largest audience since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

Fabrice Février, of the Jean Juarèz Foundation, said that in the aftermath of the 17 October viewers "came seeking solutions, but left with only a simple observation".

"In Limoges, Toulouse, and Besançon, the profound feeling that something had been 'taken away’ from the citizens found no real redress in the president's words," he said.

Election

President Macron disappeared the next day for a trip to the Gulf.

By contrast, Ms Le Pen delivered her own presidential style address, warning viewers that the violence was a threat to French democracy.

"In six months, the French people will be able to choose a different path - one of authority and restored security," she said, in front of a bookcase and a French tricolour.

Ms Le Pen launches her campaign for the Elysée this weekend in Orléans.

She has proposed cutting VAT on fuel, a popular move among rural voters, and has been careful to pin the blame for the violence on Mr Macron’s government, rather than to overtly blame immigrants.

Her deputy Jordan Bardella, however, told CNews that "a large proportion of the looters are people from immigrant backgrounds, who do not feel French and who never miss an opportunity to express their hatred towards our country".

But what will the riots mean for next year’s presidential race?

In a mood of bitter political recrimination, all sides are seeking to gain electoral advantage in a contest which, at 16, already boasts the largest ever collection of declared or presumed candidates.

Ms Le Pen is polling at between 34% - 38% to win in the first round of voting, with centrist and centre right candidates Gabriel Attal, of Renaissance, and Édouard Philippe, of Horizons, stuck around 15%.

The latter pair’s problem is that they were prime ministers in Mr Macron’s administrations and are now struggling to distance themselves from his increasingly toxic legacy.

"Many people feel that Macron is leaving a political wasteland behind him," said one analyst.

"That he hasn't developed his own party and that he has played the game of the two extremes by pretending to occupy a centre space, when, in fact, he was certainly seen by the left as being well to the right in terms of economic policy," the analyst added

Raphaël Glucksmann, an MEP with the Socialists and Democrats, is the centre left candidate on around 13%.

That means unprecedented attention on Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the firebrand leader of the far left France Unbowed, or La France Insoumise, or LFI.

Mr Mélenchon is currently on 16%, giving him a credible chance of entering the second-round runoff against Ms Le Pen.

Voters would, in that scenario, be faced with the straightforward choice of a hard right or hard left president.

Mr Philippe and Mr Attal are therefore banking on overtaking Mr Mélenchon in order to give voters the choice between an extreme or a moderate president.

Ms Le Pen leads Mr Mélenchon - 67% to 33% in a runoff, according to pollster Toluna Harris Interactive.

It is no surprise, then, that Mr Mélenchon has come in for fierce criticism from across the political spectrum that years of confrontational rhetoric fuelled the ultra left violence last weekend.

Watching the riots, Mr Mélenchon posted on social media: "The Bastille has been retaken… [students are] voicing their demands in the most beautiful way possible."

Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu told the French National Assembly that Mr Mélenchon’s "political agenda of instilling violence and chaos in the country was now on full display".

There are broad suspicions that Ms Le Pen has focused her attacks on Mr Macron rather than Mr Mélenchon as she would prefer to be up against the latter in the second round, rather than someone like Mr Philippe.

"The politics and economics cut across each other here," said Mujtaba Rahman, managing director for Europe at Eurasia Group.

"Le Pen's political incentive is to face Mélenchon in round two because in doing so that would guarantee she wins the keys to the Elysée Palace.

"The economics cut in a different way because a runoff between the two extremes will imply a very substantial bond market sell-off.

"That in turn means that the fiscal adjustment Le Pen would have to undertake would be orders of magnitude greater than if she were confronting a more reasonable candidate in round two."

Policies

Yet, Mr Mélenchon’s party has succeeded in building support among those younger voters who have taken to the streets and who feel abandoned by the state when it comes to the quality of education and the cost of living.

A Cluster17 poll found that nearly half of 18 - 24 year olds and more than a third of 25 - 34 year olds would vote for Mr Mélenchon next year.

Mr Mélonchon’s weakness remains his ability to win over older voters.

"The perception that Jean-Luc Mélenchon has been too indulgent towards perpetrators of violence is an absolute red line for a large part of the electorate," said Frédéric Dabi, head of the IFOP polling organisation.

Furthermore, Mr Mélenchon’s economic proposals are being closely watched by international investors.

He has promised an €82 billion spending package including higher minimum wage, a 10% pay increase for public sector workers, higher welfare benefits and an extra €1,337 per month for every French student.

To pay for it, he has proposed a 2% wealth tax, higher taxes on inheritances, a cut to France’s EU contributions unless the European Commission abolishes the treaty-based 3% of GDP fiscal deficit rule.

But his most startling pledge has been to cancel 18%, or €488 billion, of French debt by converting the government bonds held in the Banque de France into "perpetual" bonds that would be held by the ECB.

His opponents have decried the idea as "theft", while ECB President Christine Lagarde has called it illegal because it breaches the treaty-based prohibition against central banks directly financing national governments.

"It’s not by taking from one pocket to put in the other pocket that you actually cancel a debt. You don’t," she said.

The Governor of the French Central Bank Emmanuel Moulin called the scheme "illegal, dangerous and useless".

Mr Mélenchon said that if elected president, he would prosecute Mr Moulin for "treason".

By contrast, Ms Le Pen has attempted to show that she would be fiscally responsible and she is already using language around debt sustainability that would have been anathema to her campaigns in 2017 and 2022.

She has proposed a "golden rule" that would make it unlawful for the government to approve a runaway deficit.

She also promised savings of €140 billion by halving France’s contribution to the EU, cutting welfare and other benefits to immigrants, and further savings through reducing fraud.

Critics have said Ms Le Pen’s numbers do not add up and point out that she helped bring down two of Mr Macron’s prime ministers who attempted to rein in the deficit.

She has also called for talks with the ECB on easing French borrowing costs once it gets control of its finances.

But it is both Ms Le Pen’s and Mr Mélenchon’s pension plans that have sparked further unease among investors.

France spends over €440 billion a year, or 14.1% of GDP, on pensions.

Successive efforts by Mr Macron and previous presidents to reduce the pension age have been stymied by huge street demonstrations.

Yet, one clear way to substantially reduce the country’s debt and deficit levels would be to spend less on pensions.

France’s retirement age is currently scheduled to rise from 62 to 64.

Ms Le Pen has promised to bring it back to 62, or even lower it to 60.

Setting out her plans earlier this month, she said she would shave €15- 20 billion off the pension bill.

The details will come later.

Mr Mélenchon has promised to lower the retirement age to 60.

A recent paper by the Brussels-based think tank, Bruegel, warns that such plans are unsustainable.

"French public expenditure is about 57% of GDP, among the highest in the advanced world," the paper states.

It adds: "Social spending, particularly on pensions, is exceptionally large.

"Disposable income of those aged over 65 is 94% of the population-wide average, compared with an OECD average of 87%."

The current bond spreads, which make French borrowing more expensive, suggest that if Ms Le Pen follows through on her plans, and to avoid confronting the pension issue, then the markets will further punish France.

The Economist estimates that for France to get its public finances in order and to avoid a self-reinforcing debt spiral, it would ultimately require a 4pc cut to GDP.

That begs the question: how would French protestors, and their more violent elements, take to an austerity programme forced through at the behest of the markets?

"French voters are increasingly concerned about the public debt, but concern should not be confused with support for the measures required to bring it down," noted Bruegel.

"Marine Le Pen … would therefore face an awkward choice," it said.

"Oppose spending restraint and appeal to economically populist voters, or demonstrate to markets that a Rassemblement National-led France would take fiscal sustainability seriously," it added.

What next?

This all means a turbulent six months ahead of next April’s first round, not least because the externally driven cost of living crisis shows no sign of letting up and France has precious few funds to throw at its problems.

The Rassemblement National (RN) could support President Macron’s next budget - one that cuts the deficit by only 0.4%) - or reject it, triggering another no confidence motion and the fall of Macron’s administration.

He could either trigger fresh legislative elections, or appoint a new prime minister and try again.

Either way, the RN leader is in a better position than ever as she prepares her fourth bid for the Elysée.

It is also Mr Mélenchon’s fourth attempt.

Diplomats suggest that Ms Le Pen is by no means a shoo-in, even if she wins the first round, pointing out polls which show that 60% of voters could change their intentions between now and next April.

Her policies will come under more scrutiny as election day approaches, and her plans to effectively dismantle significant parts of the EU while simultaneously begging the ECB for help will lose her credibility both at home and abroad.

Yet, she will ride into the elections on the crest of a broader right wing, populist wave that could see strongly eurosceptic parties entering government in Spain, Portugal, Italy, Poland, Estonia, Finland and Greece.

So, what happens in France will affect voters and governments across Europe.

"If you walk to central Paris at the moment, around the Marais or Pompidou Centre," said one diplomat, "all of the shops are boarded up".

The diplomat added: "We're coming into the pre-Christmas period which is key for economic growth.

"French economists are really worried that if all of this dampens consumption and spending then France could be really into a negative spiral of recession and debt at the same time."