The Macron divide
The people like him and the media hates him—why?
The view from Paris: Lucy Wadham
One year after his election it’s hard to tell from French coverage of Emmanuel Macron’s presidency that, despite the chaos of demonstrations, train strikes and a string of unpopular reforms, he is more popular at this stage than his three predecessors were. With an approval rating of 44 per cent, Macron has retained the support of nine tenths of those who voted for his En Marche! movement, also winning the approval of half of republican and a third of socialist voters.
Macron has been ushering his country towards a profound social change and in doing so is encountering the usual pushback. Remarkably, he has done this while preserving his popularity—and yet the French media is portraying severe civil unrest and a nation divided. The gap between the media depiction of the Macron presidency and the satisfaction indicated by the polls was laid bare in the television interview held in April to mark Macron’s first year in office.