Benjamin Morel is a lecturer in public law at the University of Paris II Panthéon-Assas.
The election of Emmanuel Macron, his probable large victory in the legislative elections and the appointment of the new government represent a challenge for our political system.
What margin of choice does the nation have today to determine its destiny?
If the various elections and acts mentioned above do not pose any problem of legality or legitimacy, they are the symptom of a blocked, ossified political system, from which democracy seems to be withdrawing.
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Let us first examine the electoral state of our country.
Our institutions were made and designed to structure a bipolar political life.
The first round of the legislative and presidential elections made it possible to determine which candidates from the left and from the right best represented each of these two political camps.
The second round allowed the country to choose between these two options which structured political life.
Admittedly, the Gaullist voter found himself poorly represented by Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, but his deputies were part of the majority.
The communist voter was not very happy with the election of François Mitterrand.
However, he felt that his political camp was in power.
L'
vast majority of voters were represented and felt that their political camp could come to power.
The alternation was possible and the duels not opposing the two camps, as in 1969, seemed more accidents than the reflection of a structural state of the country.
The tripolarization of political life with a strong center induces inertia in our political life.
Benjamin Morel
This is no longer the case today.
The tripolarization of political life with a strong center induces inertia in our political life.
In case of tripolarization indeed, the formation present in the center enjoys a structural advantage.
If his candidate is in the second round, his victory is almost assured.
Emmanuel Macron easily won against Marine Le Pen, because the left played the beavers.
He would have won just as easily against Jean-Luc Mélenchon.
It would then be the right-wing electorate who would have turned into rodents adept at dams.
This is what is happening for the legislative elections.
According to surveys, "
Together
" comes behind Nupes in the first round, but will probably have a large majority.
The size of the gap between the two blocks is of little importance.
Whether it's two or ten points, the same phenomenon is likely to occur in most ridings.
A majority of right-wing voters will fall back behind the centrist party.
In the few constituencies that will oppose the right to "
Together
», it is the voter on the left who will make the extra money for the president.
Yet very much in the minority, the centrist electorate therefore enjoys a situational rent which installs it, whatever happens, structurally in power, with little hope of alternation.
However, unlike the vote of the Communist or Gaullist voter voting Mitterrand or Giscard, the RN voter will not feel more represented by the Macronist majority for which he will have voted by anti-Melechonism than the Melenchonist voter having blocked it a month ago.
Thus the current political system condemns three quarters of French people to feel structurally unrepresented.
The majority electorate itself can no longer be considered as truly represented as its vote does not reflect the choice of any clear line on fundamental issues.
Benjamin Morel
To this first crisis is added a second.
The appointment of Pap Ndiaye can outrage or enchant, it is nonetheless a perfect opposite to the line worn for five years by Jean-Michel Blanquer.
Even beyond the question of National Education, it seems rather inconsistent with the choice which seemed to have been made, even a week ago, to appoint Catherine Vautrin to Matignon.
The President of the Republic has therefore gone in a week, from an orientation on societal subjects permeable to the Demonstration for all, to an orientation not incompatible with the CRAN.
But when did the electorate have a say in these shifts?
The democratic choice, implied by a campaign, can only be the selection of a candidate.
It is also the choice, if not of a program, at least of
a line.
This line allows the electorate to know for whom, and for what, they are voting.
The appointment of Pap Ndiaye would have been welcome if it had been made by Jean-Luc Mélenchon.
The latter makes no secret of his opinion on the subjects involved and his election would mean a popular anointing granted to this line.
But which voter voting Emmanuel Macron a month ago could have done so considering that the scope of his vote would have been this?
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It is the event, unforeseeable, which will reveal it.
Our political system is therefore a game of three where in the end, whatever happens, it is the center that wins;
center which can be everything and the opposite of everything, because its only characteristic is to have none.
Alternation has therefore become, for structural reasons, improbable, leading to a profound lack of representation.
The majority electorate itself can no longer be considered as truly represented as its vote does not reflect the choice of any clear line on fundamental issues.
Our democracy has never been so sick and it should come as no surprise that, over the next few years, the voting booths are emptying and the roundabouts are still filling up.