The 100th anniversary of the end of the first world war will give Emmanuel Macron a platform from which to push back against nationalism. More than 60 world leaders will gather in Paris on Sunday and the president of France wants to make sure that they go home not just with a goody bag but with a clear message.
France is using the occasion to stage an international peace conference, which it plans to turn into an annual event. The Paris Peace Forum is being launched under the slightly tepid slogan “Peace is linked with global governance”.
Even this equivocal message is unlikely to sit well with Donald Trump, who is an avowed foe of global governance. The US president recently told the UN: “We will never surrender America’s sovereignty to an unelected, uncontrollable global bureaucracy.”