// Archives

From wannabe to president: how Emmanuel Macron beat Marine Le Pen to win the French election

Paul Smith, Associate Professor in French and Francophone Studies at the University, writes about the French election result for The Conversation. After a tense and often antagonistic election campaign, Emmanuel Macron is to become the next president of France. The result is, of course, in all sorts of ways extraordinary. In a little over a …

Profile: Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the far-left candidate shaking up the French election

Dr Paul Smith, Associate Professor in French and Francophone Studies writes for The Conversation about the far-left candidate shaking up the French election. The French call it Mélenchonite, a feverish excitement brought on by over-exposure to left-wing populism. There was an outbreak of it during the country’s 2012 presidential campaign, when, just a fortnight before the …

A hologram, a family scandal and a man on the march: the French election just got really exciting

Paul Smith, Associate Professor in French and Francophone studies, writes for The Conversation Embattled presidential candidate François Fillon probably looked at the political calendar in the first week of February and thanked his lucky stars that the spotlight shifted, for a weekend at least, to other candidates in the French election race. Lyon became the …