After recent volatile events in the UK and USA there is much attention focused on the upcoming presidential election in France. What might be the consequences of the election for French politics and the future course of Europe? 

Françoise Boucek is a Lecturer in European Politics in the School of Politics and International Relations at Queen Mary University of London and a Research Associate of the LSE Public Policy Group. She is the author of Factional Politics: How Dominant Parties Implode or Stabilize and co-editor of Dominant Political Parties and Democracy: Concepts, Measures, Cases and Comparisons.

Christian Lequesne has been Professor of European Politics at Sciences Po since 1988. He was the first LSE-Sciences Po Alliance Professor at the European Institute. He was Deputy Director of CERI from 2000 to 2003, and Director of CERI from 2009 to 2013 and Director of the Centre français de recherche en sciences sociales (CEFRES) in Prague from 2004 to 2006. Since 2015, he is 'visiting Professor of Honor' at the Department of Social Sciences of Charles University in Prague.

John Peet is Europe Editor for The Economist. He was previously Business Affairs Editor, responsible for the business, finance and economics and science and technology coverage of the paper. Prior to this, he had been Brussels correspondent, Executive Editor, Surveys Editor, Finance correspondent, Washington DC correspondent and Britain correspondent. He is the co-author of Unhappy Union: How the Euro Crisis – and Europe – Can Be Fixed.

Sara Hobolt (@SaraHobolt) is the Sutherland Chair in European Institutions at the European Institute. 

The LSE European Institute (@LSEEI) is a centre for research and graduate teaching on the processes of integration and fragmentation within Europe. In the most recent national Research Excellence Framework (REF 2014) the Institute was ranked first for research in its sector.

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