In retrospect, the implosion of Sebastien Lecornu’s government was not a surprise but an inevitability, a political venture that was doomed from the moment of its conception. The fundamental contradictions of its mission and the environment it was born into made its rapid collapse a foregone conclusion.
The government was doomed, firstly, by its creator. It was an administration appointed by President Emmanuel Macron, a leader who lacks a majority and is intensely disliked by a large part of the electorate and political class. Any government bearing his stamp was automatically inheriting a massive political deficit.
Secondly, it was doomed by its composition. The decision to make the cabinet “largely unchanged” in a country desperate for a new direction was a fatal, self-inflicted wound. It was a solution that completely misdiagnosed the problem, guaranteeing it would be rejected by the patient.
Thirdly, it was doomed by its context. It was born into a perfect storm of economic crisis, with record debt, and political crisis, with a hung parliament. It had no hope of navigating these treacherous waters, especially given its own inherent weaknesses.
Given these factors, the backlash and resignation were not a shocking turn of events, but the logical and inevitable outcome of a flawed project. Lecornu was given an impossible task under impossible circumstances. His government didn’t fail; it simply followed the inevitable script that had been written for it from the very beginning.
