The Groundhog Day Crisis: France Relives the Same Political Failure

France appears to be trapped in a “Groundhog Day” crisis, forced to relive the same disastrous political failure over and over again, with Sebastien Lecornu’s resignation as the latest loop in the cycle. Each new day, it seems, the country wakes up to the same reality of a collapsed government and a paralyzed state.
The script for this recurring day is painfully familiar. The President, Emmanuel Macron, appoints a new Prime Minister, hoping that this time, things will be different. The new Prime Minister attempts to form a government and assert their authority.
But then, the day resets. The new government is immediately attacked by a hostile parliament, often over the same issues of spending and legitimacy. The Prime Minister’s position becomes untenable, and they are forced to resign. The country goes to sleep in a state of crisis, only to wake up and repeat the entire process.
Lecornu’s experience is the most compressed and frustrating version of this loop yet. He lived out the entire cycle of appointment, failure, and resignation in just a few weeks. His two predecessors, Bayrou and Barnier, played out the same script, just in slightly slower motion.
The fundamental problem with this “Groundhog Day” crisis is that no one seems to be learning from the previous day’s mistakes. The President and the parliament continue to make the same moves, expecting a different result. Until one of the actors decides to break the cycle, France seems doomed to repeat this political failure indefinitely.