BtH: Elections in France, the United Kingdom and Germany
The Beyond the Headlines, or BtH, series at the Fredrick S. Pardee School of Global Studies at Boston University continued on April 25, 2017 with a panel discussion that focused on the recent and upcoming elections taking place across Europe including in France, the United Kingdom and Germany.
The panel included Professor of International Relations and History Erik Goldstein, Professor of the Practice of International Relations Joseph Wippl and Professor of International Relations and History William Keylor. In addition to discussing their predictions for the upcoming elections across Europe, the panel also offered thoughts on how the elections would impact the United States.
Goldstein discussed how calling a June 8, 2017 snap election will benefit British Prime Minister Theresa May by adding legitimacy and authority to her current position.
“All polling indicates that the current Prime Minister, Theresa May, and her conservative party are likely to win probably with an increased majority. They have about 17 seats at the moment, which gives them enough room to do everything they want to do, but it means rebels in the party can cause difficulties,” Goldstein said. “Theresa May herself never won a general election nor a leadership contest by competition for the Conservative Party. This is going to give her the added authority and legitimacy of having this direct mandate.”
According to Goldstein, the upcoming snap election likely won’t affect views on the June 2016 referendum in which United Kingdom voters opted to leave the European Union.
“Does it actually suggest that there’s a change of view that’s likely to happen in the country about Brexit? Probably not,” Goldstein said. “Across the country, of the 600-plus constituencies, seven out of 10 of them voted for Brexit. The only parts of the country that were heavily non-Brexit were London, where about 40 percent of the population is not born in the United Kingdom, and Scotland.”
Keylor discussed France’s upcoming runoff presidential election in which voters will choose between candidates Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen. According to Keylor, while Macron is in favor of France maintaining current membership status with both NATO and the EU, he could shift to the right if he wins the election on issues related to trade.
“He is in favor of remaining in the EU and in NATO. She is opposed to both, so it would be good news if he wins for the United States with regard to those issues,” Keylor said. “However, he is going to be dragged I’m afraid to the right on a number of issues particularly with regard to trade. There’s a very powerful sentiment to protectionism in France, and opposition to globalization. It’s possible he may tip to the right on that become a protectionist, which would not be good news for the U.S.”
Keylor also discussed comments made on Twitter by United States President Donald J. Trump that appeared to indicate his support of Le Pen’s candidacy.
““We don’t know exactly what he thinks about this election, but he did seem to indicate that he favored with Le Pen,” Keylor said. “A couple of tweets would lead one to infer that. We’ll have to see what happens if Le Pen is elected. If it’s Macron, we don’t have any idea what Trump’s attitude would be toward France.”
Wippl said current polling in Germany indicates that incumbent Chancellor Angela Merkel will again lead a coalition. According to Wippl, the election in Germany differs from those in France and the United Kingdom in that employment in the country remains high with wages on the rise.
“It looks like to me that there’s a good chance Chancellor Merkel will again lead some sort of coalition,” Wippl said.”Some things that Germany has going for it compared to France and in a different way from the United Kingdom is it has pretty much full employment and very little youth unemployment, which I think is going to keep things in a sense more moderate. Wages are increasing as well.”
While current polling indicates a victory for Merkel, Wippl said one of the issues facing the current coalition is that with Merkel set to begin her fourth ministry there could be an urge among voters for fresh leadership.
“A weakness I sense in the present coalition is that its kind of a grand coalition, and grand coalitions can run out of steam,” Wippl said. “This is the second one Chancellor Merkel has led. The problem with it is it becomes like an Austrian situation where these two parties are constantly in coalition which can result in a more radical type of third party organizing itself and appealing to people. One of the things about democracy that people don’t like is seeing the same old faces. It’s a little bit of a problem with Chancellor Merkel who would be going into her fourth ministry.”