François Bayrou of the UDF (Union pour la démocratie française) is the emergent center candidate, who sometimes looks to be making a real horse race of the French presidential contest. And then again, maybe not.
M. Bayrou, a farmer turned scholar turned politician, hails from the Pyrénées-Atlantiques department (64). He served as education minister (Ministère de l'éducation nationale, MEN) between 1993 and 1997 in the conservative governments of Édouard Balladur and Alain Juppé. Since 1998, he has been the president of the UDF. In 2002 M. Bayrou was an also-ran in a field of 16 candidates, placing fourth with 6.84% of the vote. Today he polls second or a strong third in a field of 12.
At present, he is having a little trouble refining his message.
FRANCOIS BAYROU SAYS FRANCE NEEDS UNITY
PARIS March 19, 2007 (AFP)
BAYROU TAKES HITS FROM THE LEFT AND RIGHT
Bayrou takes hits from the left and right
PARIS March 21, 2007 (AFP)
BAYROU WANTS 'REVOLUTION' AGAINST LEFT AND RIGHT
PARIS March 21, 2007 (AFP)
In France center candidates are inherently weak as France has no strong center constituency. The France most of us know from headlines is metropolitan and liberal and at odds with a provincial and conservative France.* In the Sénat the UC-UDF has a total of 33 seats (10%), the PS 96 (29%), and UMP 156 (48%); in the Assemblée nationale, UDF 29 seats (5%), PS 149 (26%), and UMP 359 (62%). With his own party so thinly represented, were M. Bayrou to win, the question becomes where would he find the necessary bodies -- much less the talent -- to govern?
As a centrist, M. Bayrou has spent much of the presidential race in the background. He caught his break when the front-runners adjusted messages to either broaden or secure their bases. Broadening weakens the base and securing narrows the base. M. Bayrou has picked up the disaffected from both. But while the pundits trumpet M. Bayrou's gains, the truth is most of this support will evaporate as many disaffected return, grudgingly, to vote their first loves.
* The French labels "conservative" and "liberal" do not represent the neat dichotomy of American politics. France is completely vested in big government, so both conservatives and liberals are essentially socialists, which Americans would construe as "liberal".
The left presents itself as the politics of the French people, while the right presents itself as the politics of French grandeur. The French left has the most fractious political geography with a political horizon that extends left all the way to the Soviet gulags of yesteryear and beyond to le Comité de salut public. The right extends right from gaullisme to poujadisme and all the way back to pétainisme and beyond to the First Empire. French centrists presumably share the rational borders of the right and left, explaining why they are such small players in the scheme of French politics.
PFFT (What is this?): Holding a center blown on the wind 2 | Low percentage play 4 | High percentage play 1| Rayonnement français 0
