France is in crisis – again. On Monday, Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu resigned after just 27 days in office, making him the shortest-serving premier in the history of the Fifth Republic and the fourth to fall in 13 months. His government collapsed before it was even sworn in, unable to survive the toxic arithmetic of a deadlocked National Assembly that has made France virtually ungovernable.
The problem traces back to President Emmanuel Macron's catastrophic decision to call snap elections last year. That gamble, designed to head off the surging far right, instead entrenched a three-way parliamentary deadlock between the left, the center-right, and Marine Le Pen's National Rally. No bloc commands anywhere near the 289 seats needed for a majority. Worse, Macron’s far-right archrival emerged with just enough seats to topple any government by joining forces with the left on no-confidence votes. The Fifth Republic was designed to concentrate power in the presidency and avoid chronic instability, but the system depends on either a clear presidential majority or a clear opposition willing to govern in cohabitation. Any government emerging from such a deeply splintered National Assembly was destined to be fragile.
The immediate trigger for Lecornu’s resignation was the 2026 budget. France's deficit hit 5.8% of GDP last year, the highest since World War II, while debt climbed to 113% of GDP. Lecornu was hired to do what his predecessors couldn’t: form a government that could bring the deficit down and tackle France’s ballooning debt before the end of the year – politically painful cuts that alienated both the center-left Socialists (who demanded the rollback of Macron's pension reform) and the center-right (which balked at tax increases). When he unveiled his cabinet Sunday night, it looked less like the “rupture” with the past he had promised than a reshuffling of the old guard, complete with the return of Bruno Le Maire, the veteran finance minister widely blamed for adding €1 trillion to France's debt in his seven-year tenure. The backlash was swift. Even Lecornu's center-right Républicains minority coalition partners threatened to walk. He resigned before parliament could vote him out.
In an unprecedented last-ditch move to stem the crisis, Macron accepted Lecornu's resignation but asked him to spend two more days searching for a budget compromise that could provide "action and stability" for a new government. If Lecornu failed, Macron said he would "take all his responsibilities" – universally interpreted as a threat to dissolve parliament and call snap elections for November. Both his fractious center-right coalition partners and the Socialist swing group risk losing seats if elections are held soon.
That threat might have worked. By Wednesday, Lecornu's negotiations had found “possibilities for compromise,” with all parties except the far right and hard left agreeing on the urgency of passing a deficit-cutting budget by year-end, allowing Macron to appoint a new prime minister within 48 hours. The emerging possibility: a Socialist-led, moderate-left minority government. A budget deal would come at a steep price – and wouldn't be guaranteed. Macron would likely have to swallow the suspension of his flagship 2023 pension reform – a humiliating reversal that would increase France's deficit by €3 billion in 2027, with larger longer-term implications – and accept new wealth and business taxes reversing reforms he spent eight years enacting.
Even with the passive backing of Macron’s centrist coalition, such a government would be very fragile, holding 29 seats short of a majority. But that support is far from guaranteed: one centrist leader, ex-Prime Minister Édouard Philippe, said his 29 deputies would never support suspending pension reform. The Socialists have ruled out using emergency constitutional powers to pass a budget, meaning any legislation would require negotiating with hostile blocs. Macron could make massive concessions and appoint yet another prime minister – his fourth in a year – yet he could still end up with a government that collapses within weeks.
Alternatively, Macron could dissolve parliament and call the snap elections he threatened. That would relieve the short-term pressure for Macron to resign – something Macron has firmly ruled out but even some of his former allies, including Philippe, are now calling for. But it wouldn’t solve the underlying problem. Polls suggest Macron’s centrist bloc would be crushed and the National Rally would emerge strengthened but probably fall short of a majority, resulting in another hung parliament – more deadlock, more instability, more market anxiety.
Another hung parliament would make a budget agreement nigh impossible. Macron would appoint a technocrat or elder statesman as prime minister, who’d most likely be toppled within weeks. The president could, in theory, keep appointing new premiers indefinitely – but after losing four in a year and with approval at just 17%, that path would deepen the sense he's ignoring the will of parliament and the people. Macron could also keep a censured prime minister as caretaker for up to a year and roll over the 2025 budget into 2026 using emergency legislation. That would avoid a US-style shutdown but push the deficit toward 6%, spook bond markets further, and make France look even more rudderless. French borrowing costs have already spiked to near-Italian levels; the spread over German Bunds hit 0.88 percentage points on Monday, close to its widest since 2012. Markets are losing patience in Europe’s second-largest economy.
If the National Rally managed to eke out a narrow majority, it’d be able to push through a 2026 budget – but it would struggle to deliver fiscal credibility. A draft budget is supposed to go to parliament by next Wednesday. An election would delay the process by up to six weeks. Moreover, while Le Pen favors more social spending, her de facto number two and likely prime minister candidate, Jordan Bardella, favors tax cuts. Neither aligns with the deficit-cutting that markets, rating agencies, and the EU are demanding.
A National Rally government would also force an unprecedentedly adversarial “cohabitation” between Macron and a far-right prime minister. France has seen cohabitation between presidents and prime ministers from different political camps before, but never between figures so ideologically opposed. Under the Fifth Republic constitution, the president shapes foreign and defense policy, but major initiatives require parliamentary ratification. A hostile National Rally majority could actively undermine not just French fiscal discipline but also EU cohesion and support for Ukraine.
The bottom line is that a snap legislative election wouldn’t fix France’s governability issues – it would just reset the deadlock or hand power to the far right. Only a presidential election can break the logjam in a constitutional system not built to handle this kind of fragmentation. That means either 18 more months of paralysis, market jitters, and mounting public frustration to fuel the populist fire, or a reckoning that brings the far right closer to the Élysée Palace than ever.
Even if Macron limps through the next 18 months, the damage is done. Business investment has declined for two years straight. Household savings have spiked near pandemic levels as consumers brace for instability. Economists estimate the turmoil has already cost 0.5 percentage points of GDP. The longer the paralysis drags on, the worse this gets – and the more attractive the far right looks as the only force capable of breaking the logjam.
The cruel irony is that Macron launched his career in 2017 with a singular mission: save France from the far right by building a durable center that could unite moderates from left and right. He won the presidency twice by framing the stakes as existential – vote for me or watch democracy crumble. But his technocratic centrism and top-down reforms bred resentment, not compromise. His decision to ram through pension reform without a vote, then dissolve parliament in a desperate bid to reassert control, destroyed what remained of his base, entrenched deadlock, and elevated Le Pen to kingmaker.
Whether Le Pen’s appeal of her conviction succeeds or she is barred from office and replaced by Bardella, the far right is positioned to capitalize on the wreckage of Macron’s centrist project. The extremes he vowed to defeat are now stronger than ever. The only question now is whether France reaches that reckoning in the next few months – or in a year and a half.