Chirac Ties France’s Destiny to EU Vote

In an attempt to avert a resounding French rejection of a proposed European constitution, President Jacques Chirac told voters Thursday that they have a “historic responsibility” to approve the proposal.

Chirac’s prime-time speech marked the official end of the campaign ahead of Sunday’s referendum and reflected the measure’s high stakes and darkening prospects. Opinion polls predict that French voters will turn down the bid to speed the continent’s political integration by strengthening institutions such as the European Union’s presidency.

Polls suggest that many French citizens are disgruntled with their government and the EU and seem eager to punish both. Blue-collar voters in particular worry about France’s stubborn unemployment and economic stagnation. For many, the constitution symbolizes an aloof, fast-growing EU bureaucracy, and the recent addition of 10 countries to the alliance threatens to endanger French living standards by weakening social programs, spurring immigration and driving jobs to low-wage countries.

Chirac urged voters not to hurt both France and Europe by using the referendum to express generalized displeasure.

“The rejection of the treaty will be seen by Europeans as a no to Europe,” Chirac warned. “It will open a period of division, of doubt, of uncertainty.... What a responsibility before history if France, a founding country of Europe, caused the risk of breaking the union of our continent.”

The blow would be especially hard because France has been one of the political and economic motors of the European Union for five decades. French leaders argue that a unified Europe augments their nation’s global influence and builds a counterweight to the United States, China and other power blocs.

A “no” vote Sunday would by no means destroy the European Union, which would continue to function based on previous treaties. But it would stall, if not cripple, Europe’s attempt to become a more unified political entity.

The constitution tries to streamline decision-making by establishing a two-year EU presidency rather than the current six-month rotation, creating the position of alliance foreign minister and allowing some initiatives to be approved by a majority of member states rather than the unanimous vote now often required.

“Europe can’t advance without France,” Franco Frattini, vice president of the EU’s governing commission, acknowledged in an interview this week. “If there were a negative result, we would have all lost a great opportunity, not just the French. Because the conclusion will be that, for now, the constitution will not take effect.”

As EU commissioner for justice and security issues, Frattini has joined leaders from across Europe campaigning in France and the Netherlands, where the constitution faces an uphill fight in a June 1 referendum. A Dutch rejection would cause further turmoil in Brussels, the EU headquarters, where political integration has been more difficult than opening borders and economies.

All 25 EU members must approve the constitution, either through a referendum or passage by a legislature, for it to take effect. Chirac and others have warned that there will be no negotiation or new opportunity to vote on this text. It would probably take several years to hold a new vote or, especially, to rewrite the document.

Weighing in at 252 pages in French, it reads in many parts like a cross between a municipal tax code and instructions for a household appliance.

In Paris, the referendum could reshape the political landscape and the future of Chirac, a 72-year-old political veteran who reportedly intends to run for a third term in 2007. His entourage is girding for a negative outcome and an ensuing Cabinet shake-up, and his allies and potential rivals are jockeying for position.

Undecided voters and the vagaries of turnout could still theoretically help the “yes” vote come from behind. The bulk of the pro-constitution camp are conservatives over 50, who tend to go to the polls in force.

The problem is that the electoral mood and calculus have changed little since 2002, when a far-right candidate came in a surprising second in the first round of the presidential election. Half of the voters in the first round opted for dissident and extremist parties, though Chirac’s center-right coalition won the subsequent runoff handily.

Profound disenchantment with mainstream parties persists. The far-right National Front, an ardent foe of the EU, still accounts for at least 15% of voters. On the other end of the spectrum, Communists and Trotskyites dismiss the constitution as a stalking horse for unbridled free-market economics, exactly the kind of rapacious capitalism that Chirac warns will be the consequence of a “no” vote.

The issue has divided the center-left Socialists, who officially support the constitution. The party’s No. 2 leader, former Prime Minister Laurent Fabius, has audaciously positioned himself as the standard-bearer of resistance. Fabius and a large chunk of the rank-and-file describe themselves as proponents of a unified Europe who nonetheless see this political model as a menace to France’s generous welfare state and public services.

“The left has succeeded in presenting the idea that you can be favorable to the construction of Europe but against this constitution,” said Pierre Giacometti of the Ipsos polling firm, which Thursday reported the opponents leading with 55% of intended votes.

The French discord over Europe is full of ironies. The author of the constitution, Valery Giscard d’Estaing, is a former French president whose text ensures a 50% increase of French representation in EU voting. In fact, some British voters see the initiative as a tool of tyrannical Franco-German bureaucrats.

Moreover, Giscard strongly opposes a campaign for Turkey’s eventual membership in the EU, and most French voters see Turkey’s size, relative poverty and Islamic culture as incompatible with Europe, polls show. Yet the suspicion endures here that eventual Turkish membership is a hidden agenda of the constitution.

Another obstacle is the stodgy text itself. The voters who have slogged through it are the ones who like it the least, according to a recent Ipsos poll.

Chirac gambled on holding a referendum rather than submitting the question to his legislature, as Germany did. And his political future may intertwine with the results of Sunday’s vote.

“Worries and expectations have been expressed, and I will respond,” Chirac promised Thursday. “But Sunday, it’s Europe, it’s the future of France in Europe, that is at stake.... On Sunday, each one of you will hold in their hands a part of the destiny of France.”