{"id":2664,"date":"2017-05-11T14:34:04","date_gmt":"2017-05-11T13:34:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/expatriatus\/?p=2664"},"modified":"2017-05-11T14:34:04","modified_gmt":"2017-05-11T13:34:04","slug":"the-french-election-shall-we-keep-calm-and-carry-on-globalizing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/expatriatus\/2017\/05\/11\/the-french-election-shall-we-keep-calm-and-carry-on-globalizing\/","title":{"rendered":"The French Election: Shall We \u2018Keep Calm and Carry on Globalizing\u2019?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Flag_of_France_and_EU\"
Wikimedia Commons\/Flag of France and EU.jpg<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This Sunday was an important day. Yes, it was the second round of the presidential election<\/strong> in France<\/strong>, but the results seemed to be quite important far beyond its borders. Namely, the second round of the French presidential race was viewed by many as a race between globalization<\/strong> and populism<\/strong>\/nationalism, between further European integration and \u2018Frexit\u2019, between free trade and protectionist policies. This opposition is not new, yet given the recent global populist and protectionist tendencies<\/a>, globalization<\/strong> seemed to become the underdog in this race. And Brexit and Trump didn\u2019t really encourage hope for any other trend either. So, this Sunday was an important day, because the surge of the populist movement was broken, and globalization<\/strong> won!<\/p>\n

Walking out to deliver his victory speech the president-elect Macron<\/strong> was accompanied by the EU\u2019s Anthem of Europe, which clearly speaks for his standpoint of continued European integration, globalization<\/strong> and societal pluralism. So, what does Macron\u2019s victory mean? Should globalization<\/strong> supporters drink champagne and just \u2018carry on globalizing\u2019?<\/p>\n

As noted<\/a> by Dominique Reynie, politics professor at the Sciences Po institute in Paris, \u201cThis election is about the defense of the euro. And it\u2019s about the fracture running through France<\/strong> like other western democracies between those who succeed thanks to globalization<\/strong>, and those who pay the price for it.\u201d Although the pro-globalization side won this time, the fracture is still there. In other words, it is too early for champagne, as the challenges and concerns that have fueled populism<\/strong> remain. As discussed in my previous blog posts, globalization<\/strong> does indeed create \u2018winners\u2019 and \u2018losers\u2019, and the benefits of globalization<\/strong> are not available to everyone. Macron is taking over a France<\/strong> with 10% unemployment rate, stagnating economic growth and continuously increasing feelings of insecurity. And even though Le Pen<\/strong>\u2019s far-right vision of changes may have seemed too radical for the majority, Macron\u2019s voters most probably still voted for change. Why else would you vote for a political outsider, right?<\/p>\n

The way it unfolded, globalization<\/strong> has not worked, and we cannot \u2018carry on globalizing\u2019 without any change. Globalization<\/strong> needs a \u2018course correction<\/a>\u2019, and Macron<\/strong> provides Europe with the chance to take it. Should Macron<\/strong> and Europe fail though, populist movements might regain their momentum. As summarized by David Bach in Yale Insights<\/a>, \u2018Should Macron fail, the backlash could mean that Le Pen would be the main beneficiary five years from now\u2026 Globalists are right to feel they had a lot at stake on May 7\u2014however, what happens next in France and in Europe will matter even more\u2019.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This Sunday was an important day. Yes, it was the second round of the presidential election in France, but the results seemed to be quite important far beyond its borders. Namely, the second round of the French presidential race was viewed by many as a race between globalization and populism\/nationalism, between further European integration and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":345,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18330],"tags":[722,782,102549,97982,97392,102547,97380],"class_list":["post-2664","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-views-and-news-about-expatriates","tag-france","tag-globalization","tag-le-pen","tag-macron","tag-populism","tag-presidential-election","tag-protectionism","megacategoria-mc-leadership-and-people-management"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/expatriatus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2664","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/expatriatus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/expatriatus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/expatriatus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/345"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/expatriatus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2664"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/expatriatus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2664\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2667,"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/expatriatus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2664\/revisions\/2667"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/expatriatus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/expatriatus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2664"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/expatriatus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}