The heightened, stable percentage of “disaffected” and “discouraged” French citizens is useful in understanding how support for populist candidates such as Marine Le Pen and Jean-Luc Melenchon has been able to take root and grow.
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Breaking down these two metrics individually, 70% of French in 2016 said they do not have confidence in their national government (or disaffected), while 64% of the population rated their future lives on the same footing or worse in relation to their current lives (or discouraged). Altogether, 43% of French were both disaffected with the government and discouraged about their personal future, the fourth-highest percentage among all EU countries.
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