The former Prime Minister Édouard Balladur has died on Monday, August 31, 2026, in Paris, at the age of 97, his family announced. A long-time deputy for Paris, he was one of the last surviving figures from the Pompidou generation, leaving behind a complete political trajectory from Bercy to Matignon, including an unsuccessful bid in the 1995 presidential election.
Born in Turkey in 1929 and educated at Sciences Po and ENA, the young man first makes his mark as chief of staff at ORTF, before joining Georges Pompidou's team in 1964. After Pompidou's victory in the presidential election, he follows him to the Élysée as deputy secretary-general.
He bears witness from the front row to France's industrial awakening: the birth of the TGV, the launch of the first Airbus, but also the 1973 oil crisis and its first waves of unemployment. After Pompidou's death, this avid skier moves into the private sector, in telecommunications.
Close to Jacques Chirac, Édouard Balladur becomes a Paris deputy in 1986, then Minister of the Economy. Influenced by Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, he launches a wave of privatizations and sells off, notably TF1 and Société Générale.
In 1993, he steps into Matignon during the cohabitation with François Mitterrand. There he brings in several figures who will shape the right, from Nicolas Sarkozy to François Fillon, and reintroduces Charles Pasqua and Simone Veil. His style does not go unnoticed: refined vocabulary, a distinctly British elegance, and his famous red socks.
At the height of his popularity, the prime minister enters the 1995 presidential election against his friend Jacques Chirac, who hadn’t seen it coming. He is eliminated in the first round with 18.5% of the vote, and ultimately urges voters to back the Paris mayor, who would win a few days later.
This fratricidal rivalry permanently damages the right. Édouard Balladur will never again be at the forefront: he fails to win the presidency of the Île-de-France region in 1998, then leaves his post as a Member of Parliament for Paris in 2007, after three terms.
Following Sarkozy’s election, he has been pushing to modernize institutions (including a cap of two consecutive five-year terms) and is a proponent of the Grand Paris project. In 2009, he declined an offer to join the Constitutional Council.
He remained a respected voice within his political camp, backing Nicolas Sarkozy and then François Fillon during the 2016 right-wing primary. In 2022, his support for Valérie Pécresse marked his last public statement.
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