“Be ready for compromises, be ready for radicalities.” From his town hall in Le Havre, Edouard Philippe reveals in the spring of 2024 his conception of the exercise of power. It would be a mixture of audacity and temperance. Contradiction of those who wish to embrace all the qualities? Subtlety of the one who measures the complexity of the Elysian charge?
In small touches, the mayor of Le Havre sketches the contours of his method of action for 2027. There is this promise of “massive transformations”, with the reverse of an EnkySté assembly. “I am a candidate for the Presidency of the Republic to revive French power,” he said this Sunday, March 16 during a meeting in Lille. The councilor arises in reverse mirror by François Bayrou, supposed embodiment of immobility. And too bad if the Prime Minister mocks his desire to “brutalize the company”. “There is no majority for that. It is the opposite of what I think,” he said.
Legislative ambition is intended to be dense. It coexists with a prudent strategy, where the compromise is king. Edouard Philippe wishes to build it with all the political forces of the central block. The presidential measure measures the solidity of the tripartition of political life, resulting from the emergence of macronism. So he pleads for a coalition ranging from the “Mitterrand left to the conservative right”. “Today we have a block block and an RN block, we must therefore organize the central block,” he confided, clinical, in 2023. “He traces this path to be unifying, because it will be difficult to obtain absolute majorities in the years to come,” says a faithful. His supporters praise realistic Philippe, who apprehends a real and unmidked political scene. Bruno Retailleau, apostle of the left-right divide, rather deplores his fatalism.
“Lie concerned”
Edouard Philippe has the reputation of placing himself willingly on the side of the sachants. However, he intends to build a compromise with the people. If the Norman enters the Elysée, he will organize three referendums at the same time as anticipated legislative elections, resulting from the dissolution of the National Assembly. These consultations will relate to pensions, the “administrative organization” of the country and will authorize the government to legislate by means of orders in matters of education, justice or health. The idea may seem incongruous. Isn’t the presidential election used to purge the country’s major files? Nicolas Sarkozy thus theorized his hostility to the referendum during the 2007 presidential campaign. “Do you think, if I am elected, I will immediately tell the French: ‘Excuse me, I need to ask you your opinion on another subject?”
Except that France has changed. Edouard Philippe considers that the supreme election no longer has his winner of the same political legitimacy as before. The emergence of the national rally, combined with growing distrust of the political class, has changed the nature of the ballot. “The president is elected in the second round by French people who sometimes voted more against his opponent than for him,” he noted in Lille, warning against an “interested lie”. No, these voters do not validate the first round program on this occasion.
Hence the need to give the Head of State a second layer of legitimacy. The compromise with the people is here the prerequisite for any magnitude reform. It is even the condition. It is still necessary to win the vote, at the risk of putting an end premature in the five-year term. “This proposal will empower the French. There is less risk to lose this referendum than to be blocked in your ambition of reforms,” defends the secretary general of Horizons Pierre-Yves Bournazel. The idea sums up the ambivalence of the Philippe method. Here, an order project – symbol of verticality and speed – to transform the country. There, its popular validation upstream – horizontality emblem – to protect yourself from any blockage. Radicalities and compromises. A Renaissance framework smiles from this roadmap: “As in the whole history of the right, it may end on the contrary. Radical in the method, compromised on the bottom.” Loaded by Edouard Philippe to hold his horizon line.
.