French Fifth Republic

The French 5th Republic was a nation from 1958 during it's reform to May 15, 2024, after massive protests.

Its metropolitan area extended from the Rhine to the Atlantic Ocean and from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea; overseas territories included French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the North Atlantic, the French West Indies, and many islands in Oceania and the Indian Ocean. Its eighteen integral regions (five of which are overseas) spaned a combined area of 643,801 km2 (248,573 sq mi) and had a total population of over 68 million as of January 2023.

## French Fifth Republic

During the May 1958 crisis, the weak and unstable Fourth Republic gave way to the Fifth Republic, which included a strengthened Presidency. In the latter role, Charles de Gaulle managed to keep the country together while taking steps to end the Algerian War.

The war was concluded with the Évian Accords in 1962 which led to Algerian independence. Algerian independence came at a high price: it resulted in between half a million and one million deaths and over 2 million internally displaced Algerians. Around one million Pied-Noirs and Harkis fled from Algeria to France upon independence. A vestige of the colonial empire are the French overseas departments and territories.

In the context of the Cold War, De Gaulle pursued a policy of "national independence" towards the Western and Eastern blocs. To this end, he withdrew from NATO's military-integrated command (while remaining in the NATO alliance itself), launched a nuclear development programme and made France the fourth nuclear power. He restored cordial Franco-German relations to create a European counterweight between the American and Soviet spheres of influence.

However, he opposed any development of a supranational Europe, favoring a Europe of sovereign nations. In the wake of the series of worldwide protests of 1968, the revolt of May 1968 had an enormous social impact. In France, it was the watershed moment when a conservative moral ideal shifted towards a more liberal moral ideal. Although the revolt was a political failure (as the Gaullist party emerged even stronger than before) it announced a split between the French people and de Gaulle who resigned shortly after.

In the post-Gaullist era, France remained one of the most developed economies in the world but faced several economic crises that resulted in high unemployment rates and increasing public debt. In the late 20th and early 21st centuries, France had been at the forefront of the development of a supranational European Union, notably by signing the Maastricht Treaty (which created the European Union) in 1992, establishing the Eurozone in 1999 and signing the Lisbon Treaty in 2007. France had also gradually but fully reintegrated into NATO and has since participated in most NATO-sponsored wars.

Since the 19th century, France has received many immigrants. These have been mostly male foreign workers from European Catholic countries who generally returned home when not employed.

During the 1970s France faced an economic crisis and allowed new immigrants mostly from the Maghreb to permanently settle in France with their families and acquire French citizenship.

It resulted in hundreds of thousands of Muslims living in subsidised public housing and suffering from very high unemployment rates. Simultaneously France renounced the assimilation of immigrants, where they were expected to adhere to French traditional values and cultural norms. They were encouraged to retain their distinctive cultures and traditions and required merely to integrate.

## End of the 5th Republic

Macron took power after he won the 2017 elections. he also won the 2022 elections, but however, in 2023, Macron increased the retirement age from 62 to 64.

The strikes had led to widespread disruption, including garbage piling up in the streets and public transport cancelations.

Raising the retirement age was not part of these initial reforms, but another "plan to unify the complex French pension system" by "getting rid of the 42 special regimes for sectors ranging from rail and energy workers to lawyers was crucial to keep the system financially viable".

In March, the government used Article 49.3 of the constitution to force the bill through the French Parliament.

Article 49.3 of the French Constitution allows governments to bypass the National Assembly and force through bills without a vote. However, invoking it triggers a proviso that allows for no-confidence motions to be filed in the government. the last time it was used was in 1962, where the Article has been triggered has the government lost a subsequent no-confidence motion.

Polls had consistently shown that the measures are substantially unpopular, as well as the use of Article 49.3 to enact them without a parliamentary vote in the National Assembly.

France 24 reported that a poll from a few days prior to the move suggested around "eight out of ten people opposed legislating in this way, including a majority of voters who backed Macron in the first round of last year's presidential election".

The American Prospect opined that earlier support from conservative members of the National Assembly for the reforms had faded away as a result of polling that showed the reforms were unpopular.

   The decision to invoke Article 49.3 was seen by those on the left as a "a major defeat and a sign of weakness" for the government, that would now be seen as "being brutal and undemocratic"; Antoine Bristielle, a representative of the Fondation Jean-Jaures think tank, commented that using 49.3 is "perceived as a symbol of brutality" that could "erode support both for the government and democratic institutions". It had been causing more protests and two failed no confidence votes, contributing to an increase in violence in protests alongside the union-organised strike action.

Both Liberals and Conservatives alike hated this reform, and took to the now shut-down Twitter and some to Mastodon to share people at protests, showing a rare moment as both sides of the political spectrum received this negatively.

Macron's approval ratings had decreased severly, which eventually held 1 more successful no confidence vote in March 2024, after months of destructive protests.

Gerald Larcher, the head of Senate at the time assumed Presidency due to this, but however, France was already in a hot mess. Larcher eventually started to reform the goverment and to start the French Sixth Republic on May 15, 2024.