Emmanuel Macron Isn’t Gaullist. He’s Just Angry at Germany.

(Bloomberg Opinion) -- It’s become fashionable of late in central Europe to accuse French President Emmanuel Macron of being a “neo-Gaullist” who touts the cause of “European sovereignty” as a cover for expanding French power, cozying up to Russia and keeping the U.S. at bay. Worse, he’s undiplomatic about it all, arrogant, “Jupiterian.”

This interpretation may be understandable for the Poles and Balts. They feel most threatened by Russia and most dependent on the U.S. They distrust French dreams of Gallo-European grandeur. But for France’s most important partner, Germany, rejecting Macron’s ideas is downright hypocritical. If anybody is to blame for his iconoclasm, it’s the Germans who have left him hanging for two years now.

Since the 1950s, it has been generally accepted that a so-called Franco-German “tandem” is necessary to pull the rest of Europe forward. Whenever the two historical-enemies-turned-friends agreed on more European integration, it went ahead; whenever they didn’t, it fizzled out.

The relationship was based on an implicit deal. Germany was the economic leader but wouldn’t boast about it. France would pay lip service to the economic reforms the Germans demanded, while remaining continental Europe’s diplomatic, political and military leader — with nuclear weapons, a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council and post-colonial tentacles.

The deal was captured symbolically in 1962, when Chancellor Konrad Adenauer met Charles de Gaulle in Reims cathedral for a mass of reconciliation, and de Gaulle’s chair was slightly taller than Adenauer’s. Subsequent chancellors followed the pattern. Helmut Kohl ostentatiously bowed three times to the French tricolour before nodding once to Germany’s black, red and gold.

Behind the pageantry there were huge ups and downs. For every time a German chancellor and a French president held hands on some blood-drenched former battlefield, there were phases of mutual sulking. Gerhard Schroeder and Jacques Chirac spent half a year in the late 1990s barely talking. But it never mattered, because both sides realized that they were stuck with each other.

In the years following the euro crisis, Berlin’s fears about France’s economy grew. Germans were already wary of bailing out Mediterranean countries. They knew that if the French ran into trouble too, the game would be over. Playing into stereotypes about lecturing Teutonic know-it-alls, Chancellor Angela Merkel and her ministers harangued a succession of French presidents about “structural reforms” and “austerity” (saving, basically).

German fears verged on panic in the spring of 2017. The right-wing populist Marine Le Pen, using Germany as bogeyman in her oratory, seemed to have a shot at becoming French president, calling the entire European Union into question. Berlin’s cognoscenti were unanimous that if her opponent, Macron, prevailed, Germany would make big concessions to strengthen him.

Macron did prevail, and turned out to be, on paper, a Frenchman of German dreams. At last, here was a president who not only promised but undertook reform: first of France’s calcified labor market, now of its absurdly fragmented pension system. His style could’ve been less brash. But he showed political courage, and has been paying the price in riots and strikes.

Macron’s vision is also European and geopolitical. Soon after taking office, he voiced big ideas for reforming the euro area, which remains vulnerable to another crisis. He wants joint deposit insurance for the region’s banks, a large collective budget to be used for counter-cyclical fiscal management, a euro-area finance minister to run this budget, and more.

Berlin listened politely, then ignored him. Germany couldn’t act, Merkel’s people explained, because they were campaigning; then because they were in coalition negotiations; then because they were in a coalition that isn’t stable.

Meanwhile, Merkel, as is her wont, kept slicing Macron’s big ideas into ever smaller pieces until they became unrecognizable. Just one example: The euro area may still get its own budget, but it’ll be small enough to be drowned in the proverbial bath tub and will have enough strings attached to be useless for fiscal stimulus, its original purpose.

Geopolitically, Macron (like Merkel) is scared by U.S. President Donald Trump and a rising China. He fears that in a bipolar world the EU could lose its “autonomy.” So he wants to fortify Europe’s own defenses — obviously with a lot of French hardware — and also pry Russia out of China’s embrace.

Not all of this is plausible or sagacious. But Macron’s bigger goal is simply to start the necessary conversations. That’s also why he blocked accession talks for Albania and North Macedonia. His message is that before the EU metes out veto powers to even more small countries, it must become deeper and stronger.

The Germans, meanwhile, keep hiding behind their platitudes. “We’re the ones always saying no,” admits Sigmar Gabriel, a former German foreign minister. This is a tragic denouement to fears during the euro crisis about German “hegemony.” Instead of too much German leadership, Europe now has none.

The tandem, Macron has realized, has only one rider. Frustrated, he’s decided to keep peddling without Merkel. He won’t stop challenging and provoking her. And why should he? Somebody has to ask the big questions. Instead of whining about this, the Germans could give it a try.

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Timothy Lavin at tlavin1@bloomberg.net

This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.

Andreas Kluth is a member of Bloomberg's editorial board. He was previously editor in chief of Handelsblatt Global and a writer for the Economist.

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