Having received 34.9 percent of the vote share in the second round of the latest French presidential elections and by doubling the rate of support her father enjoyed 15 years ago, Marine Le Pen broke a record in the history of the French far-right. However, what was highlighted in the election period was the victory of Emmanuel Macron, who was elected as the new president of France by defeating center right, center left and far-right parties. Time Magazine featured Macron on its front cover as “The Next Leader of Europe.” In a tweet he wrote in French, the European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker congratulated Macron by saying: “Happy that the French have chosen a European future. Together for a stronger and fairer Europe.”

A research shows that the fortunes of the richest 500 business people in France increased by %13 during 2018 by increasing three times over the past decade.

Being the finance minister of the socialist president, François Hollande’s cabinet, and a former employee of a long-established and renowned Rothschild Investment Bank, Macron resigned and founded his party, namely “La République En Marche!” becoming the youngest president in French history at the age 39. He was promising for quite a bit and achieved a parliamentary majority. However, although the course of events had already reversed their direction, the situation became visible only a year after En Marche came to power.

Hollande, who went down in history as a terribly ineffective president, impressed all the Frenchmen for the first time when he nicknamed Macron as the president of the richest. In the meantime, a research published by the French weekly Challenges showed that the fortunes of the richest 500 business people in the country increased by 13 percent during 2018 compared to the previous year and reached 650 billion Euros in sum by increasing three times over the past decade. The research also indicated that the number of billionaires making the list of the wealthiest people exceeded 100 for the first time.

Although it seems at first sight that the protests broke out because of the rises in diesel fuel prices, the Yellow Vests received the support of %80 of the French population since its outbreak and staged four big protests that witnessed serious cases of violence, which led to severe casualties.

On October 18, in the Brittany region of France, a woman named Jacline Mouraud asked: “Where are we going to? What do you do with the money you are taking from us?” Mouraud criticized the price rises and published a video message that finished with “Enough!” The video went viral, shared by more than 6 million people on social networks. On November 17, a truck driver named Eric Drouet called people to protest by saying that “let’s block France.”

Now, there is no need to ask how they ended up organizing since the experiences around the world so far have already proven that it is now very easy to do that with present means of communication. Although it seems at first sight that the protests broke out because of the rises in diesel fuel prices, the Yellow Vests received the support of 80 percent of the French population since the outbreak of the events and staged four big protests that witnessed serious cases of violence, which led to severe casualties. While 4.099 people have been detained, four were killed and hundreds were injured during the incidents.

Although the demands of the French embodied in the Yellow Vest uprising were not answered, it cannot be said that Macron and the government remained unresponsive for three weeks. For instance, while the protests were ongoing, Macron said: “The perpetrators of this violence do not want change, they want chaos. They will be identified and put on trial.” According to French Interior Minister Christophe Castaner, the protests “created a monster.” Foreign Minister Jean Yves Le Drian stated that he understood how fragile democracy is when he heard about some uprising calls following the protests ongoing for three weeks, adding that all these jeopardize institutions and means of coexistence. Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire stated that the violence means a catastrophe for the economy and added that this is a national and social crisis of democracy. Although their justifications look different, the situation is the same for the Yellow Vests and the majority siding with them – although they did not take to the streets. What has been observed in developed countries since the 2008 crisis is a social and national crisis of democracy.

Eventually, after the fourth violent protest and prior to the fifth one, President Macron addressed the public, saying: “I take my share of responsibility. I might have hurt people with my words.” Then he announced some relief measures, which include eliminating social security tax in pensions for retirees earning less than 2.000 euros a month, and the minimum wage in France, which is around 1.200 euros, will be raised by 100 euros beginning in 2019 without setting any burden on employers. His statement on the raise in minimum wage caused some confusion, upon which journalists inquired the Elysee Palace. In fact, as required by law, the government already has to raise the minimum wage by 20 euros at the beginning of 2019. The remaining 80 euros was projected to be provided with the state’s renunciation of some social cuts. However, Macron refused one of the leading demands of the Yellow Vests, reinstating a tax on the wealthy, which he ruled out during his first term in office. 

Macron seems to have lost 15 points in support, including the votes of his own supporters over the past two months, whereas far-right Le Pen and far-left Melenchon are on a slight rise.

All in all, Macron came to be known as the president of the wealthy and the finance groups. Two different surveys conducted after his announcement show that Macron could not convince 59 percent of the French public. Also, he seems to have lost 15 points in support, including the votes of his own supporters over the past two months, whereas far-right Le Pen and far-left Melenchon are on a slight rise. This aspect of the story can be summed up in the best way with the tweet written by Steve Bannon, a former Goldman Sachs banker who was an advisor to Donald Trump. Having come to Brussels for a conference organized by far-right groups in a way reminiscent of the wolf disguised as the grandmother of the little red riding hood, Bannon tweeted: “To run a country I would rather have 100 yellow vests than 100 Goldman Sachs officials.”

Paris is burning with protests that started in reaction to the government’s announcement of a new tax on diesel fuel. As many analysts have already pointed out, the protests did not emerge and escalate to violent riots exclusively for this sole reason. Hence, we should not do the same mistake that Europeans do on the Middle East: “It’s all about oil.” This does not mean that the price hike did not play a role though, it really did trigger the protests. However, the latent concept we are looking for here is not oil. The word we are looking for, and many have long found it, is populism.

Populism has been in the center of political debates from the U.S. to Europe particularly since Trump’s electoral victory in 2016. The elections in Europe since then have only exacerbated this debate. This is an interesting development given that the West is well-known for its well established, institutionalized political scene. In Europe, for many long years, politics was not about the masses or the charismatic leaders but mostly about the faceless institutions, technical procedures, and political correctness. Populism, on the other hand, is the wave of politics famous for defaming all three, in short – “the establishment.” It is the movement that gives hope to people in a way that their voice, for the first time in a long time, will be heard. It is the message to the masses, which claims that the time has come to take revenge from the corrupt elites by stripping them off their privileges and giving the “real” citizens what they deserve.

Populists want their states to be sovereign, which implies restraining the hyper globalization of the flow of finances out of and people into their country. Now, the West is facing with a trilemma of sovereignty, hyper-inflation, and democracy.

Populists want the citizens to have their due, not the immigrants in the case of right-wing populism nor the rich in the case of left-wing populism. They want their states to be sovereign, which implies restraining the hyper globalization of the flow of finances out of and people into their country. The demand for sovereignty is also related to the call for “real” democracy, not the one hijacked by “corrupt elites.” In other words, as suggested by Dani Rodrik, a Turkish economist and scholar of political economy at Harvard, this trilemma of sovereignty, hyper-inflation, and democracy is the problem the West is facing. In some places, the problem to solve this problem led to the election of new faces to the highest spots with the hopes of bringing a magical solution to the deepest problems their countries are in.

In fact, Macron was just one of these examples who came to office with popular vote and with high, if not magical, expectations. In some sense, Macron’s election was revolutionary in the eyes of the many. After all, he was not from “the establishment.” Nevertheless, revolution devours its own children, to nobody’s surprise in France. When people realized that there was no magic in real life, populism turned violent. The country that elected Macron for a revolution is now pushing him to the edge for another revolution. Around 1000 arrested, over 100 injured in the ongoing events in France, and still counting. This looks like Macron’s hopes have faded away quick.

The country that elected Macron for a revolution is now pushing him to the edge for another revolution.

While the rise of populism has led to crucial changes in world politics, Turkey seems to be a country among the least affected from the populist surge. This is partly because Turkey has been giving its own fight with “the establishment” over the past 17 years. And this fight is not unchecked and left to the masses, but is carried out by the new political elites of the ruling AK Party. After all these economic hardships, security threats, millions of the immigrants having flooded into the country in the past few years, Turkey has still not fallen victim to populism. In fact, the ruling party still stands behind the Syrian immigrants despite the populist discourses of the CHP and Iyi Party. The AK Party again resisted the opposition parties by not flexing the budget and it chose to keep the social security system intact. Hence, unlike many observers’ claims, Turkey and its ruling party is still not following the populist surge in Europe or elsewhere.

The latest “Yellow Vest” protests did not break out all of a sudden. Since 2016, yellow vests have been mandatory in all French vehicles for cases of breakdowns or accidents. And lately, thousands of French people poured into streets by wearing these luminous vests to speak out about the serious breakdown in the system.

The fact that the French pay the highest prices for fuel across Europe is not the sole reason. And it is not only because the Macron government increased diesel prices by 20 percent as of the new year despite the general decline in oil prices, or because the 23 percent and 15 percent raises planned for diesel and gasoline prices under the name of “green tax.” If this were the whole issue, the surveys would not show that around 80-85 percent of the French find the Yellow Vest uprising rightful, which started on November 17 with the protests of around 300 thousand people. Or, when the government stepped back or at least postponed the price rises for 6 months, they would halt the protests in the midst of wintertime. However, they announced that they will continue, stating that while the government is offering them crumbles, they want bread.

The notion of democracy they embraced seems to have reached its limits, and now people see the streets as the only viable solution, which is dangerous although valorized in French history, especially in the current context.

This case cannot also be explained solely through macroeconomic figures and their results. It is true that the public debt of France reached around 99 percent in proportion to gross national product, whereas foreign debts reached 461.5 billion Euros. It is claimed that the Macron government tries to manage the internal debt through the taxes levied ostensibly for environmental concerns. The tax cuts from salaries climbed up to 37 percent whereas tax reduction is implemented for large companies and the wealth tax levied on the wealthy were abolished. But they are not enough to explain the uprising. Neither can it be explained through the amendment in the working law that would make dismissals easier in France, which is one of the strongest social states with solid job guarantee presenting the most favorable working conditions.

Of course, the French complain about all of them, but these aspects are not enough to explain the despair prevailing France. Formerly, people used to believe that a new government could resolve the problems with a change in political choices, which is no longer the case. Although far-right groups are the leading ones giving the quickest and sharpest reactions; people have realized that the situation will not change whether socialists or right groups take over governance.

According to reports issued by a global management consultancy company, in some industrialized countries and in five European countries including France, millions of people, both blue-collared and white-collared, will permanently lose their jobs.

Thousands of people from various backgrounds took the streets for different motivations. They mostly comprise the people living in the peripheries of metropolitan cities. They are not the poorest of the country. Even in the cities and towns with lower income levels, those taking to the streets do generally have their own houses and cars. It is not a rural movement against the urban, either. They are furious at having to pay extra costs but they are not anti-environmentalist. Muslims or blacks are not the preeminent groups in protests. Contrarily, most of them are white French people, and according to surveys, more than 50 percent of them have right-wing allegiances. But this is not an identity movement, as they suggest that they are apolitical. This very aspect is the actual threat posed against the state since they seem to have lost their belief in politics, democracy, law and the system in general. For this reason, there is no party or union active in the protests.

The yellow vests uprising is not an identity movement. This very aspect is the actual threat posed against the state since they seem to have lost their belief in politics, democracy, law and the system in general. For this reason, there is no party or union active in the protests.

In fact, the presidential elections divulged this situation. In the 2002 presidential election, Chirac’s vote share against Jean Marie Le Pen was 19.88 percent in the first round but he received more than 82 percent in the second round. Some dissident groups and media outlets, particularly socialists, propagated that Chirac was elected due to the fear of Le Pen and therefore he would reside in the Elysee Palace in the same manner as Queen Elizabeth. 15 years later, in 2017, the largest parties of both the right and left were defeated in the first round in the presidential elections that had 77 percent voter turnout, which was unprecedented.

In addition, with his newly-founded party, Emmanuel Macron received 24.1 percent vote, which was only 2.7 percent higher than Marine Le Pen’s vote share. In the second round, Le Pen received almost two times more votes than the votes her father received in 2002. So, even against the fear of Le Pen, Macron’s vote share was less than Chirac’s as he went through the elections by receiving 66.6 percent. Notwithstanding, Macron has never been looked down on as Chirac, but rather represented as a promising political figure that could save France and the EU by the current perception management tools. This is how tricky the post-truth world is!

Today, the presence of a system in which the elected governs the electorate has become a highly debated issue. Even the EU and its bureaucrats that stand as the scapegoat in this context can be considered innocent here. Since 2008, the forces of banks and finance centers have been slapping the masses in the face. People in the U.S. and Europe are aware of this fact. So, they believe that there will not be any difference no matter who comes to power in elections. On the other hand, even though they cannot fully comprehend that the dark process started with the Enlightenment four centuries ago and resulted in the mechanization of humans and humanization of machines, they can feel the darkness looming over in the air.

Everyone is apprehensive. This feeling has many manifestations, and one of them is this: According to reports issued by a global management consultancy company, in some industrialized countries and in five European countries including France, millions of people, both blue-collared and white-collared, will permanently lose their jobs. The notion of democracy they embraced seems to have reached its limits, and now people see the streets as the only viable solution, which is dangerous although valorized in French history, especially in the current context.