France's New Politics

...In any case, all those who refuse to be yes-men to either side, and who are eager to work out honest and positive solutions to the problems of modern France, must regroup both inside and outside of Parliament...

...The system would check the formation of a political class that is increasingly cut off from the realities of daily life...

...The dramatic Communist gains, providing a 22.5 per cent first-round total, represented a recovery of about half the votes lost when General de Gaulle came to power...

...Yet no one any longer pictures them with "a knife between their teeth...

...But no matter what the Gaullists do, the Left is also going to find itself in a precarious position in the coming months...

...The gap between the different economic sectors and between the different regions has widened because of the Common Market's success, the on set of the new industrial revolution, and the actual progress of the French economy...

...The greatest danger would be for the Left to overestimate its forces...

...This majority is obviously incapable of governing, but it does exist...

...As for the Gaullists, they are in a difficult position...

...In fact, for the first time a coalition of "Nays" has paid off...

...The symbol of la France and the power of arbitration should therefore be transferred to another organ, the Constitutional Council...

...The opposition did the same thing by challenging not only government policy but also "the regime" itself...

...it would suffice to give it the power to decide that a law or decree entails a revision of the Constitution and cannot be promulgated without a popular referendum...

...Still, the Leftist coalition would have lost if it had not picked up support from the classic Right?from the old Vichyites and former oas partisans who hate de Gaulle so much they do not hesitate even to vote Communist...

...Maurice Faure's rout signified that local notables, whose seats had seemed secure, sometimes for generations, can no longer be certain of election...

...Its impotence was compounded during the campaign by the total confusion between the candidates' stand on government policy and their position on the institutions of the Fifth Republic...

...President de Gaulle will certainly want to orient his policy further toward the Left, and he can correctly point out that wherever Left-leaning Gaullists ran, they did pick up a substantial number of votes on the first ballot...

...And this resurgence proved all the more significant in the second round runoff balloting, where both the Communists and the non-Communist Federation of the Left honored their agreement not to cancel out each other's candidates in closely contested districts...

...In effect by laying out the program he would adopt if elected, each presidential candidate accepted the revision of the President's functions...

...The unions run the risk of becoming involved in general strikes which, given present economic conditions, can only lead to defeat...

...The Assembly balances the President's power of action through its day-to-day control of the administration by interpellation, and through its right to challenge governmental responsibility by a motion of censure...

...support for the unaffiliated independents dropped all the way to 1.6 per cent...

...Furthermore, polls conducted during the campaign revealed the hostility of the majority to the social policies of the government...

...a procedure for handling demands and conciliation at the rank-and-file level...

...This relationship changed during the Algerian war when, faced with the government's request for special powers to put down the revolt in the Army, the Assembly accepted a Socialist-mrp amendment stating that "ordinances will be promulgated under the signature of General de Gaulle, President of the Republic...

...The second round was a contest between the Gaullists and the Leftists...

...If the deputies offer no more than the old impassioned debates, they will succeed in once again discouraging the French public...

...The Democratic Center, with fewer candidates now in the running, lost over 1.7 million votes, dropping from 12.4 to 8.9 per cent...

...The electoral campaign itself has already made a profound change in French politics...

...In the current situation, conditions for the formation of a strong Leftist opposition are more favorable than they have ever been or are ever likely to be...

...indeed, during his recent visit Soviet Premier Kosygin came across on French television as a competent, though rather dreary businessman...

...At this point, a new team should be brought in to concentrate on putting through certain specific reforms, such as recognition of union shops...

...France's improved relations with the USSR made it difficult for the Gaullists to hold, not to mention attract, those Communist supporters who have voted for them...

...In coming years, the Assembly should take on new life and regain much of its importance...

...Their most serious task is to propose counter-projects that they could actually carry out if they were in power today...

...In addition, 1967 promises to be a year of crisis...

...Thus, despite some success at reorganization and winning over certain splinter groups, the Federation failed to arrest the slow erosion that has overtaken the Socialist-oriented parties since the Liberation...

...The shortage of living quarters is a severe hardship for many families, especially for young couples...

...Since the government can only become increasingly unpopular during the coming year, its wisest course might be to wait until 1968, after the worst is over, before making a move to the Left...

...The Center coalition received 12.8 per cent of the votes on the first ballot????much less than its leader, Jean Lecanuet, got in last year's Presidential elections, and also markedly less than the 16.7 per cent the Mouvement Ri-publicain Populaire (mrp) and the Moderates polled in 1962...

...This very procedure underscores the fact that the President is no longer an arbiter, but rather the captain of a team: No matter how painful it may be for General de Gaulle, he must realize that he is no longer France, but only the head of the ruling party, contested by half the nation...

...But France has yet to accept the logical conclusions of this evolution, namely that the country now has a Presidential regime within a Parliamentary framework...

...In contrast, total votes for candidates "without a label" increased 3 per cent to 6.6...

...The Federation of the Left itself, meanwhile, received only 18.8 per cent of the initial vote????less than the combined total for the Socialists, the Radicals and the Radical Socialists five years ago...

...Similarly, candidates repudiated by their respective parties were crushed, and unaffiliated mavericks were only rarely elected...

...The opportunity could fade by the time of the next elections if the ruling majority manages to survive the difficult years of transition and is able to redefine its policies...

...Most important for the stability of France's political institutions is the separation of the system from the majority party or coalition...

...Support for the entire Left, Communist and non-Communist, dropped from 44.5 to 43.5 per cent...

...On the other hand, Giscard d'Es-taing's conservative group controls 42 votes in the Assembly that are indispensable for a majority, and will surely attempt to block any evolution to the Left...

...The decline of French export trade has, in turn, slowed down economic growth over the last few months, bringing a consequent rise in unemployment...

...intervention in Asia...

...The important result of the second round, therefore, was the reintegration of the Communist party into French political life...

...Such emotional votes were decisive in the 52 districts carried by a majority of less than 1,000...

...When censured, the President must either replace the Premier or support him...

...Half the candidates would thus be new faces, or old ones who have completed a five-year sabbatical working at their professions...

...One final suggestion seems worthy of consideration at this point...

...If the project were rejected because Giscard d'Estaing withheld his 42 votes, the Assembly could be dissolved over the question...

...Teachers, students and parents are shocked by the incredible disorder that characterizes the French educational system at present...

...Perhaps it would then be possible, and necessary, to perfect Social Security by nationalizing the pharmaceutical industry...

...The unions are openly bitter over their impotence and feel slighted by government and management, since both refuse to enter into a direct dialogue...

...It will also be necessary to bring Social Security payments and income into balance by raising assessments, doing away with ceiling schedules and reducing coverage for small claims, all of which can be expected to provoke loud protest...

...in the second case, this means dissolving the Assembly...

...The transfer led to the election of the President by universal suffrage, which was accepted by a large majority and never challenged during the Presidential elections...

...Today, all the French parties have a common interest in modifying and rejuvenating their structure and methods in order to attract the younger generation, whose vote will be decisive in 1972...

...The move reflected the deputies' mistrust of Michel Debre, Premier at the time, and transferred power and responsibility for essential decisions to the Presidency...

...This would establish a regular procedure for revising the Constitution...

...What, then, would be a constructive policy for the majority and for the opposition at this time...

...The Leftist Parliamentarians run the risk of opposing government projects on the basis of purely negative demagoguery...

...The role of the Assembly is to see that this program is neither repudiated nor applied under conditions that impair the legitimate interests of special groups or of the local and regional authorities...

...The President designates a Premier who is in charge of coordinating the Administration's actions (something that is lacking in the American system), following the policy guidelines set by the President...

...There is no ignoring reality: A majority of Frenchmen, nearly 55 per cent, are dissatisfied with the present government????for diverse and contradictory reasons...

...This brings us to the critical question: Will it now be possible for the Left, with or without the Communists, to agree on an honest and constructive program that would attract the Left-leaning Gaullists and prepare the way for them to rally to the Left at the hour of succession...

...To achieve this, would it not be possible to introduce the Yugoslav system under which no deputy can serve more than two consecutive terms...

...Nonetheless, the public seems to have reacted against the vulgarity of certain approaches and responded to serious campaigns oriented to regional problems such as Mendes-France's campaign in Grenoble...

...In this general climate of dissatisfaction, the Left might have scored a resounding success if, instead of challenging the institutions of the Fifth Republic, it had concentrated its efforts against de Gaulle's economic and social policies, offering a serious and constructive program for each problem-area...

...The apparent success of the Leftists, indicated by the number of seats they now hold, threatens to generate a feeling of complacency that could thwart what little interest in self-renewal they now have...

...If the same opposition majority is then re-elected, the President resigns and lays before the people his program of action and the overall policy that he intends to follow...

...The President is elected by the people on the basis of a political program to which the majority is committed and which the minority must respect...

...Such crises have been more severe in Germany, England, Belgium and Holland, but the difficulties of these countries have reduced their demand for imports and indirectly hurt France...

...At the same time, Mao Tse-tung's attacks on Soviet "bourgeois revisionism" have reassured the French petit bourgeoisie...

...AFTER THE BATTLE France's New Politics By Andre Philip Paris Last month's parliamentary elections did alter the French political scene, giving new life to the Communists, but not so radically as some observers have suggested...

...These reforms could get a majority vote in the Assembly...

...involvement in the Vietnamese war has by contrast bolstered the USSR's image as a pacifistic, realistic and conciliatory power????intervening to restore peace between India and Pakistan, and responding with the utmost prudence to U.S...

...However, the majority of the electorate apparently voted on the first ballot to support the present political institutions, and on the second to criticize the regime's policies...

...And in order to increase investments, de Gaulle will have to prevent any rise in wages and salaries...

...The Gaullists added 1.2 million votes, moving up from 34.4 to 43 per cent in districts where a runoff was required...

...The entire Leftist coalition gained 1.2 million votes, increasing its share from 43.5 to 45.5 (largely because of the 2 per cent increase in abstentions...

...The Gaullists in particular drew upon Madison Avenue techniques...

...While the Gaullists are now two short of a majority in the Assembly, it would be wrong to speak of "Gaullism" being in retreat: The Union for the Fifth Republic actually emerged from the first-round balloting with 38 per cent of the vote????two per cent more than in 1962...

...There is an urgent need to raise public service rates (postal service, railroads, gas and electricity) to reduce the artificial deficits within the nationalized enterprises...

...In certain cases these developments have generated painful crises of adaptation...

...And U.S...

...It is unnecessary to transform the Council into a supreme court, ruling on the constitutionality of the law...

...If the Gaullists continue to call themselves the "Association for the Fifth Republic," if their chief continually seeks to identify himself with the whole of the nation, they will weaken the present political structure and pave the way for institutional disorder on the day de Gaulle steps down...

...Nor does the idea that the Communists will eventually participate in the government terrify the public today...

...The Gaullists created this confusion by mrining their men under the banner, "Association for the Fifth Republic," thus asking the people to endorse the Republic as well as the candidate...

...According to the original Constitution, the President (elected indirectly by a college de notables) was to be an arbiter, the keeper of the rules of the political game and guardian of the nation's highest interests...

...It must be remembered that even though a few "outsiders" sneaked into the new Assembly under the Federation label, the majority of the Federation's 116 seats are firmly controlled by the Socialist party apparatus...

...The centralized campaigns, moreover, were marked by expensive and elaborate efforts...

...In certain cases, too, the Federation and the Communists supported a reactionary to defeat a member of the Gaullist government, e.g., in the contest between Frederic-Dupont and Couve de Murville...

...the Premier was to be responsible for the conduct of political affairs...

...The French Communists have delayed reforming their party structure and adapting it to the new Soviet policies...

...collective agreements based on real rather than minimum wages...

...The sharpest decline, however, was suffered by the so-called Democratic Center, which has in fact become the representative of the classic Right...

...Now is the time for all parties to negotiate an agreement formally adopting the new political structure...

...To bring order to this chaos, it is important now for everyone????beginning with the President of the Republic????to accept once and for all the evolution of the Fifth Republic's institutions...