Raffarin: We have to make a break

Colleagues describe Raffarin as intelligent and modest, a consensus-builder who has rubbed few colleagues the wrong way

PARIS, France -- The man French President Jacques Chirac named as his prime minister is a media-savvy businessman-turned-politician known for his people skills.

Jean-Pierre Raffarin, 53, has risen quietly through France's political ranks over nearly 30 years, making few enemies and showing he has a way with words.

A former small business minister, Raffarin wants France to open its markets to greater free trade -- a view that could put him at odds with the country's anti-globalisation movement.

Raffarin was plucked from obscurity to lead France's interim government after Chirac won re-election as president over far-right leader Jean-Marie Le Pen.

CNN NewsPass VIDEO Jacques Chirac claimed the largest margin of victory ever in the French presidential election as he defeated far-right candidate Jean-Marie Le Pen in a landslide. CNN's Jim Bittermann reports (May 5) Play video CNN's Robin Oakley has more on the the vote for a new French president (May 5) Play video   EXTRA INFORMATION In-depth: France Decides 2002    RESOURCES Profile: Jean-Pierre Raffarin     MORE STORIES • Chirac salutes French voters  • Chirac landslide against Le Pen

After Chirac's new right-of-centre coalition stormed to victory in parliamentary elections, Raffarin was confirmed as prime minister.

After Le Pen shocked France by winning a spot in the presidential runoff against Chirac, Raffarin was quoted as saying: "The French are deeply angry and we have to be active but modest.

"We have to make a break with the old way of governing, which was often arrogant and always distant."

Chirac's initial choice of Raffarin, a provincial moderate, was seen as a signal that he had heard voters' protest against that arrogance -- and their demand for more power at local and regional levels.

Raffarin's grass-roots image and low profile apparently gave him the edge over Parisian Nicolas Sarkozy, a former budget minister and leading light of Chirac's RPR party.

Raffarin was appointed almost immediately after Socialist Lionel Jospin resigned as prime minister. Jospin came third behind Le Pen in the initial presidential vote.

10-point plan

A senator and head of the Poitou-Charentes regional council in western France, Raffarin, who is married with one daughter, first entered politics in 1976 as a minister's spokesman after years of working as a marketing director for several companies.

He took up local politics in 1988 as the assistant mayor of Chasseneuil-du-Poitou after a stint as a public relations company executive.

His only previous national post was minister for small business and commerce from 1995-97, which he lost when Alain Juppe's conservative government collapsed.

Also in 1997, Raffarin became vice president of the Liberal Democracy party, which he joined after a split in the conservative UDF party, where he served as general secretary.

Raffarin and three other conservatives also launched a study group called Dialogue and Initiative, which hosted a series of public discussions in which Raffarin emerged as an open-minded, crowd-pleasing speaker.

Colleagues describe him as intelligent and modest, a consensus-builder who has rubbed few colleagues the wrong way.

Raffarin has proposed a 10-point reform plan in which he calls for a stronger presidency, more decentralised government and more referendums. He also has proposed closing smaller ministries such as tourism and housing.

Earlier this year, he published a book on "new governance" for "stakeholder" citizens, terms dear to the centre-left Third Way of British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

"The question now is not what politics can do but how, beyond state action, we can respond to initiatives by creative citizens," he wrote. "The state does not have the monopoly of the public interest. Civil society has sometimes provided answers the state was unable to give."

As a former member of the European Parliament, from 1989-95, Raffarin admits the EU and globalisation have reduced France's powers and says France should not be so defensive about living in a more open world.

But like Chirac, Raffarin draws a clear line against the anti-immigrant policies of Le Pen.

"France is a racial hybrid and will remain so. Let's make this our strength," he wrote.