France’s new parties are personalizing politics, aiming to bring the man or woman at the top to power. Everything else comes later. What that means for politics – and for people’s trust.
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Nadia Pantel, Paris
Basically, one should not imagine a French party like a local SPD association in the 1970s. A party in France is not a family substitute, not a bond for life. Rather, the parties have developed a dubious reputation in the 20th century. After the failure of the third and fourth republics, the political parties became the scapegoats of the system. They would have blocked the country by insisting on particular interests and constant disputes. In 1958 Charles de Gaulle finally built the fifth republic on the skepticism towards the parties: the president should hover over everything without being tied down. “The regime of the parties means chaos,” said de Gaulle.