From one 49.3 to another, what remains of the original Macronism?

Fflashback. When he returns to Bercy on February 17, 2015, Emmanuel Macron sits at the piano. François Hollande’s Minister of Economy, who needs to get over his nerves, plays wildly, under the sorry eyes of his wife Brigitte. Earlier in the day, the Prime Minister, Manuel Valls, triggered Article 49.3 of the Constitution to pass the bill “for growth, activity and equal economic opportunity”, known as “draft Macron law. This text – the first defended by the 36-year-old minister who is making his parliamentary debut there – aims to unlock parts of the economy, from the extension of Sunday work to the liberalization of coach transport. The Socialist Party (PS) nevertheless has an absolute majority in the National Assembly but some of the rebellious deputies intend to vote against a project deemed too liberal.

Emmanuel Macron is furious. By dint of persuasion (and seduction), he had managed to have all the articles of his text adopted, one by one, chaining the debates in session or in committees, five hundred hours in total. It is within the confines of the “special commission” responsible for examining the text, and around the making of this law, that Macronism was forged.

Convinced of the need to upgrade Parliament, the young minister wanted to demonstrate that it was possible to transform by building project majorities, going beyond the right-left divide and the related postures, deemed sterile. “My conviction is that many things could be done in the intensity of a parliamentary debate, that is to say in detail, explaining measure by measure”he theorized himself in the documentary So be Macron, by Pierre Hurel, broadcast in May 2017 on France 3. “War of position becomes war of movement, he continued, things move, people end up thinking… I saw debates open up. »

“If it works, I’ll call you Socrates!” »

At the time, the deputies of the “special commission” who worked alongside him were won over by the approach. It was in this inner circle that Emmanuel Macron, still a novice in politics, met those who would later become his first “apostles”, his followers: Richard Ferrand (who was then the commission’s general rapporteur), Christophe Castaner , Arnaud Leroy, the three future Macronist ministers Stéphane Travert, Brigitte Bourguignon and Joël Giraud, or even Corinne Erhel (now deceased) and Jean-Jacques Bridey, future pillar of the majority La République en Marche (LRM), who invites the minister of François Hollande in his constituency for his very first political meeting, on March 19, 2015, in Fresnes (Val-de-Marne). “If it works, I’ll call you Socrates!” »launches the deputy Denys Robilard, enthusiastic, at the end of a working session on the “Macron law”.

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