Born in Rouen and raised in Neuilly-sur-Seine, Hollande began his political career as a special advisor to newly elected President François Mitterrand before serving as a staffer for Max Gallo the government's spokesman.

He also sent troops to Mali and the Central African Republic with the approval of the UN Security Council in order to stabilise those countries, two operations however largely seen as failures.

[3][4][5] Under Hollande’s presidency, Paris hosted the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference, and his efforts to bring the 2024 Summer Olympics to the city were successful.

However, with domestic troubles – in particular due to Islamic terrorism – over the course of his tenure, and unemployment rising to 10%,[6] he faced spikes and downturns in approval rates, ultimately making him the most unpopular head of state under the Fifth Republic.

[9] His mother, Nicole Frédérique Marguerite Tribert (1927–2009),[10] was a social worker, and his father, Georges Gustave Hollande (1922–2020),[11] was a retired ear, nose, and throat doctor,[12][13][14] who "ran for local election on a far right ticket in 1959".

[citation needed] Five years after volunteering as a student to work for François Mitterrand's ultimately unsuccessful campaign in the 1974 presidential election, Hollande joined the Socialist Party.

Hollande lost his bid for re-election to the Assembly in the so-called "blue wave" of the 1993 election, described as such due to the number of seats gained by the Right at the expense of the Socialist Party.

Hollande announced in early 2011 that he would be a candidate in the upcoming primary election to select the Socialist and Radical Left Party presidential nominee.

[25] All his main opponents in the primary – Aubry, Ségolène Royal, Arnaud Montebourg, and Manuel Valls – pledged their support to him for the general election.

[32] Incumbent President Nicolas Sarkozy announced on 15 February that he would run for a second and final term, strongly criticising the Socialist proposals and claiming that Hollande would bring about "economic disaster within two days of taking office".

[37][38] He also appointed Benoît Puga to be the military's chief of staff, Pierre-René Lemas as his general secretary and Pierre Besnard as his Head of Cabinet.

[39] Hollande's full Council of Ministers became the first ever in France to show gender parity, with 17 men and 17 women, and each member was required to sign a new "code of ethics" that placed significant restrictions on their conduct and compensation, above that of existing law.

[40] Hollande's economic policies are wide-ranging, including supporting the creation of a European credit rating agency, the separation of lending and investment in banks, reducing the share of electricity generated by nuclear power in France from 75 to 50% in favour of renewable energy sources, merging income tax and the General Social Contribution (CSG), creating an additional 45% for additional income of 150,000 euros, capping tax loopholes at a maximum of €10,000 per year, and questioning the relief solidarity tax on wealth (ISF, Impôt de Solidarité sur la Fortune) measure that should bring €29 billion in additional revenue.

Hollande also signalled his intent to implement a 75% income tax rate on revenue earned above 1,000,000 euros per year, to generate the provision of development funds for deprived suburbs, and to return to a deficit of zero per cent of GDP by 2017.

[43][44] Hollande had also announced several reforms to education, pledging to recruit 60,000 new teachers, to create a study allowance and means-tested training, and to set up a mutually beneficial contract that would allow a generation of experienced employees and craftsmen to be the guardians and teachers of younger newly hired employees, thereby creating a total of 150,000 subsidized jobs.

Hollande has also announced his personal support for same-sex marriage and adoption for LGBT couples, and outlined plans to pursue the issue in early 2013.

[45] In July 2012, Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault announced that "In the first half of 2013, the right to marriage and adoption will be open to all couples, without discrimination", confirming this election promise by Hollande.

One of the main measures of the bill allowed companies to temporarily cut workers' salaries or hours during times of economic difficulty.

French private sector workers saw the size and duration of their pension contributions increase only modestly under the reform while their retirement benefits were largely untouched.

[53] On 11 January 2013, Hollande authorised the execution of Operation Serval, which aimed to curtail the activities of Islamist extremists in the north of Mali.

[56][57][58][59] On 27 February 2014, Hollande was a special guest of honor in Abuja, received by Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan in celebration of Nigeria's amalgamation in 1914, a 100-year anniversary.

[60] In July 2014, Hollande expressed support for Israel's right to defend itself during the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, and told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, "France strongly condemns these aggressions [by Hamas].

[65] [check quotation syntax] In 2014, French bank BNP Paribas agreed to pay an $8.9 billion fine, the largest ever for violating U.S. sanctions against Iran at that time.

[66] In October 2016, Hollande said: "When the (European) Commission goes after Google or digital giants which do not pay the taxes they should in Europe, America takes offence.

"[67] An IFOP poll released in April 2014 showed that Hollande's approval rating had dropped five points since the previous month of March to 18%, dipping below his earlier low of 20% in February during the same year.

[69] Following the Charlie Hebdo shooting in January 2015, however, approval for Hollande increased dramatically, reaching 40% according to an IFOP poll two weeks after the attack,[70] though an Ipsos-Le Point survey in early February showed his rating declining back to 30%.

[72] One year before the end of his mandate, in April 2016, his approval rating was placed at 14%, and surveys predicted that if he were to run for a second term, he would be defeated in the first round of the 2017 presidential elections.

[76] While refusing to sit on the Constitutional Council, of which he is an ex-officio member, François Hollande continues to comment publicly on French and international political life through several books and university lectures.

[87] On 25 January 2014, Hollande officially announced his separation from Valérie Trierweiler[88] after the tabloid magazine Closer revealed his affair with actress Julie Gayet.

[94] Hollande is commonly nicknamed Flanby, a popular dessert similar to flan, as it embodies a political wobbliness and pudginess often attributed to him by his critics.