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MACRON’S GOAL FOR THE EU: MAKE EUROPEANS PROUD AGAIN
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His proposals rely firstly on the traditional
Franco-German axis, which he wants to
strengthen in order to give his ideas the needed
political momentum. Unlike his two predeces-
sors, Nicolas Sarkozy and François Hollande, his
approach is not to attract partners against
Germany but to side with Germany. He has dis-
played the most Germanophile government
France has ever had. His prime minister, Edouard
Philippe, his finance minister, Bruno Le Maire,
and his Sherpa for foreign affairs, Philippe
Etienne, are all fluent in German, as was his first
defence minister, Sylvie Goulard.
To gain trust from Germany – and EU mem-
bers at large –, he has insisted on finally respect-
ing the 3 % of GDP public deficit threshold.
Thus his national fiscal policy and, more broadly,
his internal structural reforms of the French
economy, such as the one of the labour market
last Fall, must also be analysed from a European
perspective, as a way to earn respect from Berlin
– and Brussels – in order to regain the political
influence France had lost over the past years.
His quest to restore his country’s reputation in
Europe is a milestone of his European policy and
has been facilitated, at this stage, by a positive
global economical and financial environment
that provide him with convincing figures.
But to echo Macron’s famous
en même
temps
(at the same time), his European policy
must also be understood from a domestic po-
litical perspective. His personal investment last
summer on the posted work issue sets a clear
example. Macron travelled to Salzburg (Austria)
to meet leaders from neighbouring Slovakia and
Czech Republic to get their needed political
support on this social reform, while openly and
harshly criticizing the Polish government. From
a diplomatic point of view, he managed to
weaken the so-called Visegrad countries (Czech
Republic, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia) by dividing
them. But from a domestic political view, he
touched on entrenched French sentiments,
which seem to have never fully accepted the great
EU enlargement to the East of 2004 and still fear
the famous “Polish plumber”. He also positioned
himself against the Polish government at a mo-
ment when its reforms on the judiciary are criti-
cized, even more among left-wingers. Macron
did so while, at home, his liberal labour reform
was unpopular among the same voters. In a nut-
shell, he balanced his “right-wing” policy at
home with a “left-wing” policy in Europe.
For domestic reasons, he can even refuse the
outcome of a European agreement, despite his
pro-EU positioning, as happened on the glypho-
sate issue. Although a majority of ministers of
agriculture of the EU authorized this herbicide,
with suspected carcinogenic potential, for an-
other five years, on November 27th, Emmanuel
Macron tweeted on that same day, after the EU
vote, that France would unilaterally ban glypho-
sate within three years at the latest. Divisions
within his government on this hot button issue
reflect the ones that the French executive has on
agriculture at large. He is giving the impression
in Brussels that, unlike his predecessors such as
Chirac and Hollande, Paris has not yet com-
pletely settled its position on the Common agri-
cultural policy that it has always supported –
and benefited from – until now. The upcoming
discussion on the next multiannual financial
framework (EU’s budget for 2021-2027) will
serve as a live test to watch whether Macron
supports new funding priorities for Europe, ac-
cording to his “Europe that protects” agenda or
sticks to traditional French positions.