France’s Fifth Republic is in unprecedented turmoil

France has been plunged into a fresh political crisis after Sébastien Lecornu, the newly appointed prime minister, unexpectedly resigned on October 6th after less than four weeks in the job. Mr Lecornu came under intense pressure the moment he unveiled a new minority government on Sunday night, keeping most of the incumbent ministers in big jobs in place. Opposition parties cried foul, and threatened to vote down his government with a no-confidence motion as early as this week. Even his coalition partners on the centre-right said they might quit. Mr Lecornu saw the writing on the wall, and decided to leave rather than be forced out.

France has now lost its fourth prime minister in little over a year, and Mr Lecornu becomes the shortest-serving prime minister under the Fifth Republic. A messy situation is fast turning into a crisis, prompting market worries as well as political uncertainty. On Monday morning the yield on France’s ten-year government bond rose nearly eight basis points to 3.6%, close to its highest level since 2011. The shares of France’s two largest banks fell by over 4%.

President Emmanuel Macron appointed the 39-year-old Mr Lecornu, a close political confidante, on September 9th. The new prime minister promised a “rupture” with the outgoing government, which was toppled by parliament the previous day after nine months in office. But when Mr Lecornu named his new team on October 5th, after weeks of discussion with different parliamentary parties, he kept most of the key ministers in place. It was less a new government than a recycling of the old one.

Even Mr Lecornu’s new friends on the centre-right were aghast. Bruno Retailleau, the Republicans’ leader and interior minister, threatened to leave the government. The appointment that really enraged the opposition on the left and the hard right was the return of Bruno Le Maire, this time to be the new defence minister. As Mr Macron’s finance minister for seven years until a year ago, he is regarded by many opposition politicians as responsible for the country’s mounting debt, which is now worth nearly 116% of GDP.

The new government, declared Jean-Luc Mélenchon, was made up of a “procession of revenants”. Olivier Faure, the Socialist leader, called it a circus. Marine Le Pen, of the hard-right National Rally, said the return of Mr Le Maire was “pathetic”, and called for immediate new parliamentary elections. Speaking after his resignation, a surprisingly serene-looking Mr Lecornu blamed “partisan appetites” from all sides, and the lack of a culture of compromise for the stalemate. Now that the new ministers have been officially named, they will become the caretaker government. These include Roland Lescure, a former industry minister, who takes over as finance minister.

The truth is that France has been unstable ever since Mr Macron dissolved the lower house last summer, and fresh legislative elections then entrenched a deadlocked parliament, split into three mutually hostile blocs. The president has now gone through five prime ministers since he was re-elected in 2022. The turnover resembles the chronic instability of the previous, fourth, republic, which Charles de Gaulle brought to an end with a new constitution in 1958. In 1948 and 1950, two prime ministers lasted only two days.

Mr Macron’s centrist project, designed to bring about post-partisan consensus and keep out the extremes, is unravelling fast. Mr Macron has no good options for resolving the political stalemate. It is hard to see how the appointment of yet another new prime minister would break the impasse, even if he picked a leader from outside his centrist grouping. But if the president decides instead to call snap elections, his own centrist party would face collapse—to perhaps only 50 seats in the 577-seat lower house, says one of his deputies. The most likely beneficiary would be Ms Le Pen’s RN, which could win close to a majority, and therefore be in a position to form the next government. Either way, it is little wonder that the markets are rattled.

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