Since Sunday, analyzes about the presidential election, won by Emmanuel Macron, have multiplied. It has been analyzed from a political point of view, from an economic point of view, and from a sociological point of view. Let’s try a decryption with the psychoanalyst Claude Halmos.
franceinfo: Do you think we can also do a psychological analysis?
Claude Halmos: The psychological dimension played a very important role in this election and there are lessons to be learned from it. The voters of Marine le Pen, when they explain their vote, highlight two things: on the one hand their material suffering, due to their economic situation. And on the other hand (by giving them, it must be emphasized, as much importance) the psychological suffering that results for them. They express their feeling of being condemned to a life without money (and therefore without freedom of choice), without pleasure, and in constant anxiety; their incessant fear of the future, etc. And above all, and this has been underlined a thousand times, they say they feel that all their suffering, the politicians “don’t care”. With the impression that this gives them of not counting; and the resulting humiliation for them, which was central to their choices. All of this weighed on the election.
How ?
These voters describe themselves in a state of material and emotional distress that evokes the abandoned child who desperately awaits the adult who could save him but would be able, above all, to recognize what he is going through, and to show him compassion. When a voter is in this state, if we present ourselves as the person who finally understands his pain, we have every chance of rallying him to his cause. And to make the adversary appear as the one who, not showing this listening and this compassion, is a hard, authoritarian autocrat, without affects. Marine le Pen knew how to play this card very well. She gave the image of a woman rooted in daily reality, close to people, and listening to them; i.e. the image of a helpful mother figure. And, from there, the criticisms made of his program were no longer audible. Because, for children, moms are supposed to all have magic wands.
You said there are lessons to be learned from this?
Yes, because Marine le Pen was able to appear all the more providential in that the emotions and psychological suffering which come, for citizens, from their social life, are never taken into account either by politicians or by society in general. We work with the idea that psychology would be decisive in intimacy, but secondary in social life. However, this is false, this election shows it, and we should hear it. Because, in a context where despair and anger are no longer brought together by political organizations, for democratic struggles, but by social networks which often transform them into hatred, forgetting that citizens have a psyche and emotions can become ultimately very dangerous.