Chapter 3: The Pinay Presidency
When Pinay assumed the French presidency in October 1962 he sought a return to the Fourth Republic approach to politics, projecting himself as a more consensual and less interventionist head of state. A moustachioed man in a homburg hat, he cut a much more understated personality that the strapping, bombastic de Gaulle. To ensure a sense of continuity Pinay initially retained Pompidou as Prime Minister, although enacted a significant cabinet reshuffle changing the political balance of the cabinet to include more members of the non-Gaullist right and centre and fewer UNR Ministers. Both Pinay and Pompidou were essentially pragmatic conservatives, and despite hailing from very different political pedigrees were to work well together in office.
The 1963 Legislative Elections
In November 1958 the Gaullist UNR and its centre-right allies had won a landslide victory in elections to the National Assembly, forcing the socialist SFIO and centrist Radical Party to the political fringes, and the reducing the Communist party to fewer than a dozen seats – a husk of its former self. The legislative term was not due to end until November 1963, however the governing Gaullist coalition had broken down over de Gaulle’s Eurosceptic pronouncements in the summer of 1962, and before the General’s assassination it had appeared a snap legislative poll that autumn was likely. Upon succeeding to the presidency Pinay had quickly ruled out the option of a snap poll in 1962, making a legislative campaign the following spring a near certainty and in effect firing the starting gun on the electoral campaign.
Despite attempting to remain above party politics, President Pinay was closely associated with the right wing CNIP, and regarded by many as the party’s de facto leader. This greatly strengthened a party which only a year before had seemed in its death throws. The party itself had tended to be a rather loose coalition stretching from mainstream conservatives to those who had sympathies to the extreme right. The party’s former leader Roger Duchet had been ostracised due to his opposition to Algerian independence and had subsequently left politics. His successor was the rather bland former Minister Camille Laurens, but it was clear the dominant figure within the party remained the President.
Without de Gaulle as leader the UNR had lacked its main campaigning force, and source of party unity. By early 1963 forces in the party had split into three camps. Supporters of former Prime Minister Michel Debre advocated adopting a more Eurosceptic, nationalistic, and conservative line. The group around National Assembly President Jacques Chaban-Delmas rallied around a more progressive, left wing form of Gaullism with an emphasis on social reform and political decentralisation. A third ‘pole’ developed around Prime Minister Pompidou, which in effect advocated a third way between the other two factions with the ultimate intention of turning the UDR into a mainstream liberal-conservative party. This factional upheaval, and the lack of a clear leader, was to greatly hinder the UDR’s legislative campaign.
The MRP’s election campaign was led by Senator Jean Lecanuet. Although not the party’s leader, Lecanuet cast himself as France’s answer to John F. Kennedy, and was a charismatic politician of the liberal centre.
The parties of the left were still bruised from their bitter defeat in the legislative elections of 1958. The SFIO in particular, under the leadership of Guy Mollet, appeared stuck in the politics of the 1950s and wildly out of date. The potential for a broader ‘’Union de la Gauche’ was proposed by some, including the former Minister Francois Mitterrand – himself not an SFIO member – but was eventually stymied.
The legislative elections held on 17th and 24th March 1963 saw a victory for the parties of the right. Internal divisions amongst the potential Gaullist dauphins had hampered the UNR’s campaign, and saw the party lose over half of its seats. After a long and bitter war in Algeria and the turmoil of a Presidential assassination the French voters opted for stability. A combination of economic prosperity and peace had won the day. However despite a victory for the governing ‘Presidential Coalition’ the parties of the left had made a significant comeback from their historic defeat in the elections of November 1958, with the SFIO, PCF and Radical Party each making considerable gains.
| Party | Seats |
| CNIP | 144 |
| MRP | 89 |
| UNR | 75 |
| Miscellaneous Right | 13 |
| Total Right | 321 |
| SFIO | 77 |
| PCF | 44 |
| PR | 43 |
| PSU | 3 |
| Miscellaneous Left | 3 |
| Total Left | 170 |
| Total | 491 |
Enter Giscard
With the Gaullist position within the Right bloc greatly weakened Pinay opted to remove Pompidou as Prime Minister. His replacement was the 37 year old Finance Minister Valery Giscard d’Estaing, an
enarque technocrat who came from a wealthy, upper-middle class, Auvergne based family with aristocratic connections. Giscard’s promotion at such a young age was a surprise, but Pinay had previously chosen him as his deputy when he was Minister for Finance. As Finance Minister since 1962 he had introduced a tough, anti-inflationary stability plan reminiscent of that advocated by Pinay a decade earlier, and as the third most important politician in France had gained a high public profile despite his relative youth. His unimpeachable personal reputation and his accomplished television manner made him a strong media performer. Despite hailing from CNIP Giscard had been a loyal disciple of de Gaulle, supporting his strengthening of the executive branch at the expense of parliament. However like Pinay Giscard was a convinced pro-European and a strong supporter of the Atlantic alliance. Giscard sought a political re-alignment of the parties of the centre and right, creating a new, more permanent centre-right coalition of the CNIP, MRP and the Gaullists, with the possibility of attracting the centrist Radical Party to this new ‘Presidential Majority’.
In the economic sphere Giscard wanted a modernised France to join West Germany, Japan and the United States in the ‘first industrial league’. He sought to achieve this by combining long term strategic planning with a competitive, de-regulatory and freer market approach to economic management. He sought to end government support to unviable companies, and force a more market driven approach into French business thought. Giscard particularly sought to emulate the ‘German model’ and develop a social market economy based around a strong currency, a balanced budget and wage controls.
Valery Giscard d'Estaing
appointed Prime Minister March 1963
Giscard argued for a ‘change in continuity’ in domestic affairs, and initially advocated a number of liberal social reforms. He sought ‘the greatest possible reconciliation between equality and liberty’ and argued there was a need to reform and update French state institutions to take into account the social and economic developments that had occurred since 1945. He proposed to lift many of the more authoritarian controls exercised by the government in broadcasting, the arts and civil affairs. Through 1963-66 Giscard enacted a ‘quiet revolution’ in social affairs; lifting film censorship, reducing government control over the state broadcaster RTF, and in 1965 followed Britain by introducing a private television channel, lowering the voting age to 18, permitting divorce by mutual consent and abolishing the death penalty for all crimes expect aggravated murder and treason. Some of Giscard’s more radical proposals, such as legislation to ensure equal pay for women and a liberalisation of the abortion law had to be abandoned due to opposition from within his own centre-right coalition, and from President Pinay himself.
Foreign Affairs
Pinay saw the role of the President as In his approach to foreign policy the new President differed significantly from his predecessor, being a convinced pro-European, pro-American and more internationalist. Pinay was to establish a particularly strong rapport with German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer and his successor Ludwig Erhard, and helped deepen Franco-German ties after a century of conflict. In early 1963 Pinay announced that France would not veto Britain’s entry into the European Economic Community, and after a year of negotiations the United Kingdom, Ireland and Denmark acceded to the EEC on January 1st 1964. EEC entry was seen as a major foreign policy achievement of the British Conservative government of Alec Douglas-Home, and contributed to his party’s narrow election victory in the election later that year. The President was to court controversy by aligning France more with the United States, and offering diplomatic support to the American War in Vietnam. This move brought strong criticism at home, not only from the left opposition but also from anti-American Gaullist nationalists such as Jacques Chaban-Delmas. Pinay’s personal popularity was to take a strong hit as a consequence.
