Valéry René Marie Georges Giscard d’Estaing was a French statesman born on 2 February 1926 in Koblenz, Germany, during the French occupation of the Rhineland, where his father served as a high-ranking financial official.
He died on 2 December 2020 in Authon, Loir-et-Cher, at the age of 94.
He belonged to a prominent bourgeois family with political and administrative ties; his father, Edmond Giscard d’Estaing (1894–1982), was an inspector of finances and economist who legally added “d’Estaing” to the family name in 1922, while his mother, May Bardoux, came from a lineage that included senators and a former minister of public education.
Giscard d’Estaing served as President of the French Republic from 1974 to 1981, the third president of the Fifth Republic, and was known for modernizing social policies and advancing European integration.
Siblings
Valéry was one of five children born to Edmond and May Giscard d’Estaing.
He had an older sister, Sylvie (born 8 December 1924 in Koblenz, died 18 May 2008), who married Emmanuel de Las Cases and later served as mayor of Prinsuéjols.
His younger brother, Olivier (born 30 December 1927 in Paris, died 13 September 2021 in Vierzon), pursued a career as a businessman and politician; he co-founded the INSEAD business school, served as mayor of Estaing from 1965 to 1977, and was a deputy.
The two younger sisters were Isabelle (born 1935, died 2021), who married into the Lasteyrie du Saillant family and held the courtesy title of countess, and Marie-Laure (born 1939), who married Jacques de Froissard de Broissia and likewise held a courtesy title of countess.
Career
Giscard d’Estaing interrupted his studies during the Second World War to join the French Resistance and later the First French Army under General de Lattre de Tassigny; he participated in the Liberation of Paris in 1944 and earned the Croix de Guerre.
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After the war he graduated from the École Polytechnique and the École Nationale d’Administration, then entered the Inspection des Finances.
He was elected to the National Assembly in 1956 representing a constituency in the Puy-de-Dôme.
In 1959 he became Secretary of State for Finance, rising to Minister of Finance under Charles de Gaulle (1962–1966) and later under Georges Pompidou (1969–1974).
Following Pompidou’s death he won the 1974 presidential election against François Mitterrand with a narrow majority.
As president he lowered the voting age to 18, legalized abortion, introduced divorce by mutual consent, expanded nuclear energy, and supported the development of the TGV high-speed rail network.
He also strengthened Franco-German relations with Chancellor Helmut Schmidt and advanced European monetary cooperation.
After leaving office in 1981 he returned to the National Assembly, served as president of the Auvergne Regional Council from 1986 to 2004, and was a member of the European Parliament from 1989 to 1993.
In later years he chaired the Convention on the Future of Europe that drafted a proposed European constitution.
Accolades
Giscard d’Estaing held the Grand Cross of the Legion of Honour and the National Order of Merit as former Grand Master of both orders, along with the Croix de Guerre 1939–1945.
He received the Charlemagne Prize in 2003 for his contributions to European unity and was a member of the Académie française from 2003, occupying the seat formerly held by Léopold Sédar Senghor.
He also sat on the Constitutional Council as a former president.
Internationally he was awarded numerous foreign decorations, including the Grand Collar of the Order of the Southern Cross of Brazil, and received the Nansen Refugee Award in 1979.
He was further recognized as a Bailiff Grand Cross of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta.
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