Jacques Chirac

Jacques René Chirac attended the École nationale d'administration and rose through civil service into politics, holding posts from agriculture minister to interior minister before serving as Prime Minister twice (1974-1976, 1986-1988) and Mayor of Paris from 1977 to 1995. He lost presidential bids in 1981 and 1988 as the Gaullist RPR candidate, initially championing tax cuts and privatisation, then reversed course and won the presidency in 1995 on a promise to heal France's "social rift," beating Socialist Lionel Jospin with 52.6% in the runoff. His twelve years in office featured state-directed economic policy he set against "Anglo-Saxon ultraliberalism," the end of military conscription in 1997, a referendum cutting the presidential term to five years, and his high-profile opposition to the American invasion of Iraq. He crushed far-right Jean-Marie Le Pen 82.2% to 17.8% in the 2002 election, remaining the last president re-elected until 2022, but in 2011 a Paris court handed him a two-year suspended sentence for diverting public funds during his time as mayor.