Macron’s new coalition moves France a step to the right

meEUROPE IS a continent of coalition governments, painful to form and fragile to maintain. Most European politicians are familiar with their challenges. But for the new French government of Michel Barnier, which met for its first cabinet meeting on September 23, this form of government is a surprising novelty. For the first time since the establishment of the Fifth Republic in France in 1958, the country is governed by a minority coalition government formed by rival parties that faced each other in the parliamentary elections. Its survival depends on holding together its uneven mix of centrists and right-wingers, and on dividing the opposition against it.