France is desperately searching for a government
Party rivalry threatens deadlock before compromise
After the relief, the confusion. France pulled back from the brink on July 7th when it rejected Marine Le Pen’s hard right at a final parliamentary vote. The electorate instead relegated her alliance to third place, and returned a hung parliament in which no bloc is close to holding a majority. But this has plunged France into new uncertainty. “Now what do we do?” asked the front page of Le Parisien, a daily paper, above a photo of a perplexed-looking President Emmanuel Macron.
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This article appeared in the Europe section of the print edition under the headline “The elusive art of compromise”
Europe July 13th 2024
From the July 13th 2024 edition
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