Employment and labour market policy during the Hollande presidency: a tragedy in three acts?

Abstract

This article provides a critical overview of labour and employment policy under the Hollande presidency, evaluating the extent of continuity and change between 2012 and 2017. Although the term of office may be divided into three broad phases, with a shift towards more liberalising, business-friendly policies over time, it is argued that the period as a whole shows a high degree of continuity, with liberalising measures evident from 2012. The policy output may be characterised as a project of 'bounded flexibility' in which marketisation is contained within certain limits as defined by trade unions' ability to set the agenda of social partner negotiations. However, towards the end of the presidency the push towards labour law reform, whilst falling short of a wholesale revision of France's protective legislative architecture, ushered in key changes which the Macron presidency intends to take forward and radicalise, leading to a potential 'tipping point' of labour market deregulation. The Hollande presidency therefore holds important lessons for our understanding of social democracy at times of economic crisis and austerity. RésuméCet article présente une évaluation critique de la politique de l'emploi poursuivie sous la présidence de François Hollande, en identifiant les éléments de continuité et de rupture. La période entre 2012 et 2017 se divise en trois phases, qui marquent l'évolution vers une approche plus libérale et dérégulatrice, mais en termes de méthode et de contenu certains éléments de continuité subsistent, notamment l'adoption de lois 'cadres' qui ont pour effet de diluer l'impact dérégulateur des innovations. En ce sens la présidence se caractérise par la volonté de porter un projet de 'flexibilité circonscrite'. L'adoption de la loi travail (ou la loi El Khomri) marque un changement de méthode et porte un projet potentiel, mais inachevé, de refonte plus radicale, ouvrant ainsi la voie à la version 'macroniste' de dérégulation où les limites de la flexibilité, définies par la négociation collective décentralisée, seront assouplies jusqu'à un' point de bascule' éventuel. La période 2012-2017 met ainsi en relief les difficultés de la social-démocratie européenne en quête d'une conciliation entre compétitivité économique et protection sociale en période de crise.

A more liberal France, a more social Europe? Macron, two-level reformism and the COVID-19 crisis

“…Others by contrast point to deep liberalising reforms imposed unilaterally and without significant concessions, especially under Hollande (Rathgeb and Tassinari 2020 ; Syrovatka 2020 ). The difference in these assessments may in part be due to the more recent analyses including the later years of Hollande’s mandate, which were marked by a distinct turn to orthodoxy (Milner 2017 ). It could also turn on whether the analytical emphasis is on the traditional sectors of the welfare state as opposed to the ‘informal welfare state’ of employment and wage regulation.…”

What’s Work Got to Do with It? How Precarity Influences Radical Party Support in France and the Netherlands

“…An analysis of the French legislative election in 2017 (Krouwel et al, 2019: 21–22) shows that La France Insoumise and the radical left Dutch SP were positioned on the left on labour market protection compared to established parties, but also that the Front National and PVV presented elements of welfare chauvinism that placed them (in part) on the left side of the left–right quadrant on socio-economic issues. While the 2012–2017 French socialist government promoted labour market reforms oriented towards deregulation (Milner, 2017), the 2017 elections saw a polarisation between En Marche ’s pro-labour market reformism position and the radical camps of La France Insoumise and the Front National , which offered alternatives to Macron’s pro-liberalisation of the labour market (see also Vitiello et al, 2017). As shown by Michel (2017), between 2007 and 2012 the Front National (FN) substantially accelerated its programmatic shifts towards a leftist labour market agenda (e.g.…”

Theorising French neoliberalism: The technocratic elite, decentralised collective bargaining and France’s ‘passive neoliberal revolution’

“…But it also involved a shift ‘away from legal to collectively agreed regulation of work’ (Milner, 2017, p. 438). Indeed, one of the key elements of Hollande’s labour reforms, which eventually materialised into the El Khomri law ( loi travail ), was that firm-level agreements ‘should have precedence over labour law’ (Amable, 2017, p. 220).…”

“…It also prompted the emergence of a fairly short-lived but not-insignificant social movement known as Nuit Debout , which severely condemned the precarisation of work, among other things. The El Khomri law effectively laid the groundwork for Emmanuel Macron’s own labour market reforms, which strengthened the regulatory role of firm-level bargaining and further relaxed legal protections concerning redundancy (Milner, 2017).…”

“…The different stages of firm-level bargaining entrenchment reviewed above, then, could be regarded as stepping stones in the flexibilisation of the French labour market, culminating with Emmanuel Macron’s ‘UK-style neoliberal model of labour market regulation’ (Milner, 2017, p. 439). Particularly striking, though, is the active role played by left-wing governments in the neoliberalisation of the French economy.…”