Technocratic Populism à la Française? The Roots and Mechanisms of Emmanuel Macron’s Success

Abstract

This article focuses on the roots and mechanisms of Macron’s success, arguing that in 2017 two conditions were essential in Macron’s rise—the implosion of the established system of the French Fifth Republic in which the two main parties were alternating in power; and the rise of anti-establishment populist challengers on the right and on the left (cf. Stockemer, 2017; Zulianello, 2020). It was anti-establishment appeal that put Macron on the map, but the appeal to technocratic competence that won him the presidency. Technocratic populism transcends the left–right cleavage and, as a result, has a broader appeal than its left- and right-wing counterparts. Emmanuel Macron was an insider taking on the (crumbling) system and positioning himself as an outsider—refusing the traditional labels, including centrism, elite recruitment patterns, and mediated politics. Instead, Macron and <em>La Republique en Marche</em> attempted to create new forms of responsiveness by ‘giving voice to the people,’ while relying on technocratic competence as a legitimation mechanism. In power Emmanuel Macron attempts to balance responsiveness and responsibility (cf. Guasti & Buštíková, 2020).

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“…Technocratic populism politicizes expertise to gain legitimacy and instrumentalizes governance (Aprasidze & Siroky, 2020;Perottino & Guasti, 2020;Verzichelli & Castaldo, 2020). However, it is a variant of populism (Bickerton & Accetti, 2017) rather than the rule of experts (Dargent, 2014).…”

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“…Instead, LaREM was comprised of local online-constituted committees with no formal hierarchy (Fougère & Barthold, 2020). Subsequently, the salience of anti-elite themes remained high for LaREM in comparison to most other French parties (except FN and Unbowed France; Perottino & Guasti, 2020).…”

“…These leaders tend to marry technocracy with populism by creating an anti-establishment and anti-elitism rhetoric which combines attacks on the corruption of the established parties with technocratic promises that target the inability of established parties to deliver in terms of governance (Bickerton & Accetti, 2018;Buštíková & Guasti, 2019;Guasti, 2020). Both Andrej Babiš and Emmanuel Macron emphasize their technocratic credentials as a tool to solve the challenges faced by their respective societies.…”

“…Macron has also described himself as a political leader who is uniquely capable, through the expert knowledge he gained working as a Minister of Economy under former president François Hollande, to address problems facing the French people. While in power, Macron continued using populist appeals, claiming to defend his expert decision-making on behalf of the peoples' interests against those of the illegitimate, imprudent elites on the other side of the society (Perottino & Guasti, 2020). These anti-establishment tones were also reflected in Macron's En Marche!…”

“…First, technocratic leaders are often described as non-ideological, "ideologically unfocused" (Havlík, 2019), or ideologically "thin" (Buštíková & Guasti, 2019). This vagueness is strategic in so far as it enables these leaders to overcome the left-right divide and combine a broad variety of policies across both sides of the political spectrum (Guasti, 2020). Unconstrained by the need of ideological consistency, technocrats have the flexibility to choose from a wide array of policies, including both redistributive and/or neoliberal policies (Guasti, 2020).…”