ANALYSIS. The subject is politically sensitive, Le Havre is aware of it. For the moment, he is groping, but he will not be able to avoid the question.
“And the generational divide?†says Clément Tonon, thinking he is well inspired – after all, it is his role as shadow advisor toÉdouard Philippe. The candidate’s response is curt: “No, especially not this campaign axis. Pitting the French against each other is a political impasse.” The subject is dismissed. Point. Still, his adversaries could quickly get him there. When he entered the campaign last week, Gabriel Attal justified his candidacye in these terms: “I refuse to allow a generational divide to take hold in our country. Young people who work but who are no longer able to become property owners, whose wages are stagnating and who have the feeling of being abandoned: we cannot accept this.”
If Le Havre is recalcitrant in taking up this subject, unlike its younger brother, it is first and foremost for arithmetic reasons – and therefore tactical! Those over 50 today represent the majority of the electorate (51.6% according to INSEE) and vote more assiduously than those over 50. young people, but they also constitute the strongest base of the central bloc During the early legislative elections of 2024, more than a third of voters over 60 chose an Ensemble candidate for the Republic or the Republicans, while those under 34 turned very largely towards the Republicans. extremes, from the National Rally to the New Popular Front.
Talk to young people without cutting yourself off from old people
The fact remains that Édouard Philippe will not be able to avoid the subject for long. And it is not only his adversaries who could force him to do so, but the very logic of the political project he intends to carry. He, the champion of budgetary balance, who counts if he is elected to propose to include “a golden rule” in the Constitution, will have to propose to the French complex arbitrations in a context of bloodless public finances. When we know that pensions, for example, are responsible for half of the surge in debt public since 2017, what response should we provide? Ask more of the generations concerned today or of those who will be tomorrow? Probably a bit of both. But where to place the cursor? Dilemma.
It’s there the challenge that awaits Édouard Philippe: not to cut yourself off from your predominantly elderly electoral base, while outlining a project capable of speaking to new generations. “The difference between the politician and the statesman, Churchill noted, is that the first thinks of the next election, the second of the next generation.†It is up to him, on subjects such as pensions, housing or taxation, to propose sufficiently ambitious measures to respond to the expectations of some without weakening its electoral base, and to reduce, as much as possible, a generational divide which runs through French society today. Whether he admits it or not.
/2026/06/11/6a2a587d92a18977447817.jpg "Controversies at the 2026 World Cup: \"Football is political and the World Cup even more so\"recalls journalist Grégoire Margotton")
/2026/06/11/6a2a4348af5cc819977602.jpg "Editorial. 2026 World Cup: a month of football… and political recovery!")
