French elections: The effect of party primaries, and redefining the left and right

Ms Yvonne Guo, PhD candidate from the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at NUS, observed that for the first time in the Fifth Republic, neither representative of the two main parties on the left and right managed to win either of the top two spots in the first round to move into the next. France’s adoption of open party primaries saw its two main parties choosing “hard-left” and “hard-right” candidates, which allowed Mr Emmanuel Macron, a centrist, to reclaim the political space vacated.

• The Straits Times, 17 May 2017, Opinion, pA20