For Macron, the fight has only just begun

Many remarkable things happened in this year’s French presidential election. Emmanuel Macron became the youngest president of France. The extremist party garnered highest-ever scores. And for the first time, none of France’s traditional parties were represented in the final vote.
Despite these extraordinary developments, the 39-year-old president’s future in office is full of challenges. He has daunting tasks ahead. Macron has inherited a lackluster economy that is lagging the euro-area average for the past three years. The chronic unemployment still shows a 10 percent, which is almost double the level in the UK and Germany. Macron will have to tackle immigration issue with a great deal of caution. People see immigration as an invasion on economy and their cultural and religious identities. And the country is still officially under emergency rule after a string of terror attacks since 2015.
“The challenge of the next five years will be to avoid letting our country unravel, by spreading success, by enlarging the field of opportunity, and by ensuring, as Paris does so well, that everyone benefits from globalization and the openness of our country,” Macron said in a speech.
Macron defeated the National Front’s Marine Le Pen by 66 percent to 34 percent. But what contributed to this winning margin is the electorate’s desire for fresh faces and solutions of their perennial problems. Polls show that at least half of those who voted for Macron did so to keep out Le Pen, who planned to leave the euro, impose trade protectionism and stop immigration. Despite Macron’s pro-European and pro-business campaign, half of the voters in the first round of voting chose Le Pen and other candidates who opposed France’s place in NATO and the European Union. It reflects how splintered the French electorates are.
Macron’s youth vote was disappointingly low for somebody who is the youngest president in French history. Far-left candidate Jean-Luc Melenchon did better than Le Pen among the 18-to-24 age group in the first round. But the National Front candidate still received 40 percent of 25-to-34 year old vote.
Around a quarter of French aged 18 to 24 are unemployed, more than double the overall unemployment rate. Drop-out rates are too high. Macron will have to woo and win the trust of the youth voters by assuring them employment and equal opportunity for growth. He will have to work hard to make the youth believe that they would be better off in 2022 than in 2017.
To implement his vision and policies, Macron needs to have majority in parliament. France is going to vote in parliamentary election on June 11 and June 18 in which Macron’s movement En Marche (On the Move) is presenting candidates for the first time. Rivals who backed Macron in the presidential election to counter Le Pen are working to defeat him to elect their own party members to National Assembly. It is still not clear how the French are going to vote in the upcoming elections. Would the electorate replicate what they did in presidential election and reject the traditional party candidates? Nobody can say for sure.