Macron faces a crucial week in his attempt to change France from the roots

PARIS – A favorite phrase of Emmanuel Macronthe French president, is that in life “you have to take risks”.

He did, and rose from nowhere to lead France at 39.

Now, six years later, he has decided to risk his political future by redesigning France where it is most resistant to change.

Macron’s battle with France over his plan to raise the statutory retirement age from 62 to 64 is expected to culminate this week in a tie-breaking vote in both houses of Parliament on Thursday.

Before that, if the past few weeks are any guide, the president can expect more than a million French citizens to join protests across the country, hoping to undo the change.

In Paris they will demonstrate in the streets full of trash, not collected due to strikes.

In his attempt to overhaul the French pension system, Macron has addressed the problem fierce French resistance to a world of rampant capitalism, the nation’s deep attachment to social solidarity and the pervasive idea that a long and grueling sentence of work is compensated only by the liberating rewards of a life in retirement.

It’s a huge bet.

“Every country has a soul, and the soul of France is equality,” he said. Francois HollandeMacron’s predecessor to the presidency.

The advantage remains suspicious to many French people, who see it as a subterfuge of the wealthy.

The 1.28 million demonstrators on the streets of France last week – 3.5 million, according to unions – had an unequivocal message for Macron:

“Work less to live more,” ran a slogan.

Macron, 45, appears unmoved, steadfast in his belief that change is essential to France’s economic health because today’s workers pay the pensions of a growing number of retirees who are living longer.

If France is to invest in the transition to a green economy and wartime defense in Europe, it cannot, according to Macron, run up deficits by funding a retirement age that reflects the lower life expectancy of a bygone era.

“It’s simple,” Macron said last year.

“If we don’t solve the problem of our retirees, we won’t be able to invest in everything else.

It’s nothing more than a choice of the company we want.”

It may make sense, but the reserve of sympathy Macron could once depend on has evaporated.

The turning point of his second term, which is still less than a year old and accompanied so far by a sense of drift, seems imminent.

He won re-election last year more as a bulwark against Marine Le Penthe far-right candidate, what else.

The prodigy of Europe is wounded.

To some extent, it is vulnerable.

However, he insists, in the quixotic style he has often flaunted, on the most difficult changes at a time when 40% of French families say they have difficulty making ends meet.

“It’s a matter of DNA,” says Clément Beaune, a government minister who knows Macron well.

As a former minister of the economy, he wants a strong and growing France at the heart of Europe.”

When asked about the most important legacy of his first term, he always replies that he drastically reduced unemployment.”

The unemployment rate has fallen to just over 7%, low for France, from 9.5% when Macron took office in 2017, a reflection of his sweeping changes to free up the labor market, which has helped attract one more foreign investment.

However, the enlargement of the workforce does not speed up the beating of French hearts.

Yes, the six days of strikes and demonstrations of the last two months yes.

The protests were accompanied by an outburst of sympathy.

Polls suggest that at least two-thirds of the French they don’t want raise the retirement age.

Solidarity funds support strikers who lose their salary.

Unions, from the far left to the centre, have acted in unison in unusual ways.

They attacked Macron’s relative silence as “a serious democratic problem which inevitably leads to a situation that could become explosive,” as they wrote in a letter to Macron last week.

The degree of explosiveness will be revealed in the coming days.

Macron’s centrist political party, Renaissance -formerly known as La République en Marche-, with the support of centre-right republicans, is expected to prevail, but support seems to be faltering and the outcome is unclear.

Renaissance has 260 seats and Los Republicanos 61, so 289 votes are needed to get a majority.

“It is not certain that the reform will be approved,” says Alain Duhamel, author and political commentator.

A month ago I would have said 80% approval; Now I would say 60%”.

Macron made a risky bet.

Your logic is obvious, but not its urgency“.

For Macron, prone to radical ideas, the urgency seems to lie precisely in logic.

France is an extreme case.

The retirement age in Europe has generally been raised above 65.

In Germanyis 65 years and 7 months.

In Italy67 years old.

In the Holland he will reach 67 next year.

It’s inside Spainin 2027.

But since France sees itself as a separate model, it tends not to be impressed by these comparisons.

For Macron, France must compete; it cannot, in his view, be weighed down by obsolete rules.

“His core value, or belief, is work,” Duhamel said.

“Work harder to grow more”.

But Macron’s message, or narrative, on pension reform has been difficult for many French people to follow.

At different times it was about justice, precarious public finances, even the implementation of a leftist agenda.

“The pension reform is a reform of the left,” Olivier Dussopt, the French minister of labour, employment and economic inclusion, told Le Parisien newspaper.

“It may have been driven by a social democratic government“.

This happened in Germany two decades ago, under the Social Democratic chancellor Gerhard Schroder.

It’s not happening in France.

Macron walked out of the Socialist Party only to tear it apart.

He has shown that his economic views are more associated in France with the right wing, the source of some of the fury that often turns against him.

Exactly what “macronism” is, however, aside from the right to change one’s mind and a move to occupy the entirety of politics’ middle ground, remains a mystery.

But both in pension reform and in his commitment to the European Union, he was adamant.

In the absence of parliamentary approval, the Government could resort to art article 49.3 of the French Constitution, which was used to pass laws without a vote.

But in an issue of this magnitude and conflict, this would almost certainly smack of contempt for the democratic process and could cement the accusations against Macron of distant, top-down governance.

“Today, what is happening is enormous,” Marylise Léon, deputy leader of the French Democratic Confederation of Labour, France’s largest and most moderate union, told Le Monde newspaper.

“Mr Macron cannot behave as if the movement did not exist. It would be madness”.

Macron declined to meet with union leaders, although he said the government was open to dialogue.

He seems to assume a not infrequent position among the presidents of the Fifth Republic:

lay down the broad lines of policy and let Élisabeth Borne, the prime minister, lead the hard work of passing legislation.

If anything, this policy has left the president more isolated.

His inner circle is small, dominated by his wife, Brigittethat protects you intensely, and for Alexis Kohler, general secretary of the Elysée and a staunch supporter of reforms, has been at the president’s side since Macron became economy minister in 2014.

Inevitably, with Macron limited to two terms, his legacy began to count.

His commitment to a strong Europe of greater “strategic autonomy” remains essential, and he clearly believes that only a modernized France with a balanced budget capable of investing deeply in education, technological innovation, industrial independence, renewable energy, the military and nuclear power can drive that momentum.

In this sense, the modification of pensions is part of the European ambition Macron is broader

If he can push through the reform, Macron will no doubt follow up on compensatory social measures, including attempts to improve working conditions and expand on-the-job training.

Beaune, the deputy transport minister, described the central idea as “Work harder, but work better“.

It is not clear whether this will be enough, should the legislation be approved, to bridge the gap that has opened up in France on pension reform.

Much will depend on this, because a France at war with itself risks benefiting political extremists of the right and left.

“Macron’s obsession is that Le Pen shouldn’t succeed him,” says Beaune.

“Because if it does, that’s what people will remember.”