The Irish Times view on protests in France: uncertainty and discontent

France is facing a critical period over the next six months as voters prepare for presidential elections in the shadow of student demonstrations for better facilities and wider protests over the cost of living which ended in widespread violence by a small minority last weekend. The sense of a rudderless government and an uncertain future has been reinforced as president Emmanuel Macron prepares to depart office without a convincing centrist candidate to replace him. This leaves the field to Marine Le Pen on the far right and Jean-Luc Mélenchon on the radical left.

These educational and socio-economic problems are deep-seated. Many French schools, especially in disadvantaged and immigrant communities, have suffered from a lack of investment and teacher shortages. The student movement makes well-founded demands for improvement and has widespread public support, however much it has taken public authorities by surprise. A general malaise over employment prospects and deteriorating life chances among young people has strengthened its appeal. Trade unions and social movements have rapidly taken advantage of this, in classical French fashion.

Delivering reforms in response to such demands is impossible for the outgoing government, already severely constrained economically by an annual budget deficit of 5.4 per cent of GDP, rising national debt and bond market responses to these trends. Politically they are spancelled by Macron’s failed attempt to secure a majority in the 2024 election he called, resulting in a blocked parliament and budget. Against this backdrop, Le Pen’s Rassemblement National party presents itself as the guardian of order, probably boosting its chances of winning next May. Blaming the protests and violence on immigrants and the left, it suits her – along with centrist candidates jostling for position – to claim that Mélenchon is responsible.

This makes for a volatile mixture of political, social and economic uncertainty – for Europe as well as France. Le Pen’s deep Euroscepticism would disable France’s pivotal role in the EU in line with similar policies from the growing far right AFD party in Germany. Mélenchon’s different demands on debt cancellation and taxation of the wealthy would disrupt the EU’s liberal market consensus. The centrist candidates now have to compete against a background of popular activism and discontent, undermining their appeal.

There is far more agreement across the political divides that these problems need tackling than on ways to do it. Huge cuts in state expenditure versus debt cancellations and taxing the wealthy compete for support between right and left, while centrists agonise on how to balance welfare, pensions and increased defence spending with more taxes. This is French politics today.