Since her participation in the
Alain Juppé government (1995–97), Lepage has sometimes been considered by the media as a right-wing environmentalist, a characterization she does not accept: "they tell me that I am a right-wing environmentalist, no. [...] I am not of the right [...] but I fight for what seems to me to be fundamental for us all in the coming years. [...] The social question was the great debate of the 20th century, I believe the environmental question will be the great debate of the 21st." Lepage associates herself above all with green and environmentalist politics, attempting to combine ideas of both left and right on environmental issues. From her participation in
Ecology Generation in 1990 up to the creation of her own think tank Terre Démocrate in 2009, she shows a desire to "transcend political differencecs" and overcome traditional left/right opposition, in order to "bring people together, beyond their political colors, on the environment". Close at once to
Daniel Cohn-Bendit and
François Bayrou, she works for the emergence of "a genuine pragmatic effort, based on fair and sustainable development, democratic and humanist". She notably wants a rapprochement between centrists and environmentalists.
Early politics (1981–1995) Lepage says that "I got into environmentalism very early, in the 1960s. As an environmentalist candidate in 1981, and elected in 1989". She became Deputy Mayor of
Cabourg in
Calvados in March 1989. In the early 1990s, she became a founding member of
Ecology Generation. She ran in the 1993 under this party label for the legislative elections in the fourth district of
Calvados. However, she only received 6.17% of the vote.
Minister of the Environment (1995–1997) In 1995 she responded affirmatively to a proposal by
Alain Juppé to head the Ministry of the Environment in a center-right government. She was then not a member of any political party. According to the left-wing newspaper
Libération, her nomination was harshly criticised by the right in
Normandy as she had just recently been beaten severely in elections there. Lepage was one of twelve women in the first Juppé government. On 7 November 1995, during a cabinet reshuffle leading to the second Juppé government, she was the only woman to remain a full Minister. While she says she did not suffer any particular difficulties as a woman in the government, she considers that she was subjected to insults in the National Assembly "which would have never have been hurled against a man". As Minister of the Environment, Lepage made a priority objective of showing that environmentalism can "contribute to the struggle against unemployment". She also made progress in the area of prevention with the adoption of a Clean Air Law, the creation of the Committee on Prevention and Precaution and, at the end state participation with the Professional Committee on
Asbestos. The controversial relaunch of the
Superphénix nuclear reactor, which experienced numerous technical difficulties, led to an open struggle between Lepage and the Minister of Industry
Franck Borotra. Because of legal irregularities, Lepage refused to sign the decree authorizing the relaunch of the reactor, implicitly threatening Alain Juppé with resignation. The trade unionist Christian Moesl said during a parliamentary hearing that "Corinne Lepage put Superphénix on the edge of the precipice and
Dominique Voynet pushed it over". A consensus politician, Lepage has been subject to criticism for her silence during the president of
Jacques Chirac on certain major environmental issues: the resumption of nuclear tests, the relaunch of the Superphénix nuclear reactor in September 1995, the reduction of the environmental budget, difficulties in implementation the Nature 2000 EU directive. Lepage used her experiences as a Minister to write a book in which she attacks industrial lobbies, hunters and technocrats in the upper levels of the civil service.
In search of a viable centre (1997–2007) On the subject of her political leanings, she said "I do not feel that I am woman of the right, but I do not deny in any way my participation in the governments of Alain Juppé." She ran in the May 1997 legislative elections, in Paris' seventh district. She lost in the second round to
Patrick Bloche with almost a 10% gap between the two candidates (54.50% to 45.50%). The dissolution of the government in 1997 put an end to her ministerial position. She then transformed CAP 21 into a political movement. As Administrator of
Transparency International France [tr. note: a non-governmental organisation which fights government corruption in 80 national sections], she is involved in the fight against political and financial corruption. In 2002, Lepage entered the
Presidential race and received 1.88% of the vote in the first ballot. In the regional elections of 2004, she was at the top of the list of the Paris
department on the slate of
André Santini (
Union for French Democracy, UDF). She did not participate in the second ballot run-off on the
Union for a Popular Movement (UMP) roster of
Jean-François Copé. In the
European elections of June 2004, her list for the constituency of
Ile de France would receive 3.6%. She was elected to the
European Parliament elected in the
2009 European election in
North-West constituency as the
MoDem's top candidate.
With François Bayrou (2007–2010) On March 10, 2007, she chose not run in the 2007 presidential elections, in order to support François Bayrou. She said that Bayrou "represents today genuine change in this country, which can allow
political ecology to have the place it needs." Cap21 was then one of the founding groups of the François Bayrou's new political party, the
MoDem. In May 2007, after Bayrou's defeat in the first round of the presidential elections, and the victory of
Nicolas Sarkozy over
Ségolène Royal, Lepage refused to participate in the because of "loyalty to her convictions". Running as a MoDem candidate in the March 2008 municipal elections of the
12th arrondissement of Paris, she got 9.95% of the vote. Lepage became Vice-President of the MoDem on 15 June 2008. In February 2009, Bayrou made her head of the Modem list for the Northwest district for the 2009 European elections. She was elected as an
MEP with 8.67% of the vote. Serious tensions emerged between the MoDem and Cap21 when the latter decided to ally itself with
Europe Ecologie in many regions for the March 2010 regional elections. After having criticized Bayrou's strategy and that of the MoDem, which she called "closed in on itself", she announced that she had left the MoDem on 17 March 2010. At the second round of the regional elections, she called on people to vote for the left, except in
Acquitaine where a MoDem candidate was viable. During its party congress of 29 May 2010, Cap21 presents itself as an "autonomous party" and its members vote overwhelmingly to leave the MoDem.
Member of the European Parliament (June 2009–May 2014) Lepage was elected to the European Parliament in the
2009 election. After the poor score of the MoDem in these elections (8.46%) she called for an alliance in the Parliament between the MoDem and Europe Ecologie. As an MEP of Cap21, she is part of the
ALDE group which includes the MoDem. In July 2009, she became the first vice president of the ENVI Committee (Environment, Public Health and Food Safety) and a substitute member of the ITRE Commission (Industry, Research and Energy) in the European Parliament. In December 2009, she was the only French MEP in the European Parliament's delegation to the
Copenhagen Summit. She expressed dismay at the results of the summit which she considered "a collective failure" to the benefit of "climatoskeptics" and lobbies linked to oil. Her experience on maritime issues led her to create the "Seas and Coastal Areas" intergroup in the European Parliament. She has presided this intergroup since January 2010. In June 2009, she protested in front of the Iranian Embassy against the regime alongside
UNEF,
SOS Racisme,
Jack Lang,
Nicole Guedj and
Marek Halter. With numerous other personalities, she signed a petition "Stop the Burqa and the Veil, Symbols of the Submission of Women and the Islamist Offensive". After launching the movement "Rassemblement Citoyen" (Citizen Rally), she presented lists under the banner of "Europe Citoyenne" (Citizen Europe) in the
2014 European elections; however, she was not re-elected to the European Parliament, with her list securing only 2.28% of the vote.
Recent activity On February 8, 2024, Corinne Lepage and
Yann Wehrling announced the launch of the "Positive Ecology & Territories" collective, for the 2024 European elections. Also in 2024, she opened a case in the
European Court of Justice against the European Union's "astonishing" 2023 decision to allow the weedkiller
glyphosate to continue to be sold in Europe for another 10 years. The
World Health Organization (WHO) had classified the weedkiller as "probably carcinogenic" in 2015, following a study by the
International Agency for Research on Cancers. ==Works==