 Sarkozy took a well heralded pummelling in the first round of the French regional elections and some of the lessons from France are likely to apply in the upcoming British polls.
A few things leap out from the raw figures. The first is that lots of people decided not to vote. According to one poll cited in Libération 53.5% of voters abstained. The NPA, which scored a modest 2%, suggests reasonably enough that it was young people, workers and the unemployed who stayed at home. The second is the strength of the far right. The Front National won 11.7% of the vote dispelling any fantasy that it’s a spent force. The racist and Islamophobic undercurrent which ran throughout the pre-election period must have benefited Le Pen. On the other side of the coin Europe Ecologie (EE) won 13.3% making it the third largest force after the UMP and the Socialists. The combined results of the anti-Sarkozy forces SP (30%), EE (13%), Front de gauche (6.2%) and the NPA and LO’s combined 3.3% tally up to a serious rejection of his project. However the third lesson, which we can take from the NPA’s relatively weak performance, is that offered a choice between an explicitly capitalist party and even a neo-liberalised social democratic party working class voters will, in the first instance return to social democracy rather than taking the more radical new option. As Greece shows having a social democratic government offers very little protection at all when the IMF and the European Union start demanding pension cuts, wage reductions and job losses. A lot of SP voters are heading for a hangover. The question then becomes one of offering a political expression for their inevitable disillusionment when the SP comes into office. |
French elections – first thoughts
Sarkozy took a well heralded pummelling in the first round of the French regional elections and some of the lessons from France are likely to apply in the upcoming British polls. A few things leap out from the raw figures. The first is that lots of people decided not to vote. According to one poll…
22 responses to “French elections – first thoughts”
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I have mixed feeling about saying this but maybe a tactical alliance the the Front de gauche. It cannot much worse or better than the TUSC business over there.
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Personally, I think the title of the NPA is a big mistake.If we did the same in Britain it would be an absolute disaster whereas in France it appears to be a relative disaster.
One, it doesnt appear to attract much support and two calling yourself an anti capitalist party doesnt exactly say what you actually stand for and most people I would say are a million miles from being “anti capitalist” nevermind “socialist”.
Unless political terms can be made relevant and real to peoples lives and they can see how they can play a part in fighting for a sustainable socialist future vision through a clearly well worked through and broadly aggreed upon political strategy and transition from capitalism to green socialism.
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NPA ended up with marginally more votes than L.O, but the differences is hardly statistically significant.
Which raises some questions about how useful the NPA’s new approach is, given LO is an unreconstructed cadre party.Parti/Front de Gauche was about double their combined vote. So doesn’t this tend to favour the faction from LCR that went into it?
Overall the Socialists/Greens/ Far left beat Sarkozy and achieved over 50% of the popular vote on a low turnout. NF vote is solid in Eastern France, but below 10% almost everywhere West of the Rhone valley.
Good case for renewal of a United front to towards the mass parties, while not supporting capitalist austerity measures implemented by the P.S.
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The NPA presented a slate alone with some ultra-small groups (mostly green) in 15 regions, they got between 1,6% in Alsace to 4,19% in Auvergne. The average vote for the NPA slate was 2,77%
The NPA presented a slate with the Party de Gauche in three regions (Basse-Normandie, Champagne Ardenne, Bourgogne) for an average vote of 4,75%
And there was a united slate of the Communist Party, the Party de Gauche and the NPA in three other regions (Languedoc, Limousin, Pays de Loire) for an average vote of 8,7%
Average vote for Lutte Ouvrière was 1,21%
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Whilst I agree with prianikoff that there is not a huge difference between the LO and NPA vote – which may well lead people to rethink the ‘new model’ I would advise a note of caution.
Firstly this was their first outing as an organisation and there may well be teething problem organisationally (although voters will have been well aware of what they were voting for)
Secondly this was an election dominated by islamophobia with Sarkozy defining the election as one that was about ‘national identity’. It didn’t work for him but his ploy helped the FN no end. The NPA’s selection of a hijab wearing candidate was massively controversial and they spent a large portion of the election being defined by that specific thing – despite the fact that many NPA members were unhappy with that candidate selection (wrongly).
Lastly I just wanted to say that elections are not everything. My impression is that LO achieve very little, but the NPA has been a vibrant and outward looking campaigning force – which make a far greater contribution to the movement, even if their vote this time was disappointing.
I’d also note that the Green vote is significant. The last regional elections they took 2% this time they won more than six times that number. That’s impressive.
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I think the NPA’s “first outing” was last year’s euro elections, where they got 5%.
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First people need to recall that these are regional elections. Not every party will have stood in every place, so this will overstate the votes of the mainstream. Therefore the collapse of the centre is even more striking.
Jim M, in some areas the NPA and the FdG were able to make alliances (as RC says). However, for the NPA it’s important to not be seen to back the reactionary policies of the SP. The strategic orientation of the CP and others in the FdG is to block with the SP. So it’s quite unlike TUSC, which is to the left of Labour and poses a programme which cannot be satisfied within British capitalism as it stands.
Fleabite, the NPA is not in Britain. A party like the NPA would be a step forward in Britain, but Britain does not have that objective situation. The FdG more more votes than the NPA on the basis of wanting to block with the SP rather than oppose it. Those are two strategic lines which are totally opposed to one another. Therefore the FdG is not a different route to the same outcome. It is a different route, one which resembles the whole line of the PCF for the last decades.
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Results of the Parti de Gauche and the Communist Party were just slightly better than the results of the Communist Party on the last elections. They got on average of slightly over 7% of the vote, going from less than 2% in Alsace to 11 % on the Communist Party strongholds og the North of France (Nord pas de Calais). but at the same time, the far-rigt was able to have a 17% vote in that region…
The french working class seems very demoralized at this moment. In working class areas, more than two third of the people didn’t go to vote. Those who voted preferred to do it for the mainstream left (on the basis than everything is better than the right) or for the far-right…
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“Those are two strategic lines which are totally opposed to one another”
But apparently not in Basse-Normandie, Champagne Ardenne, Bourgogne, Languedoc, Limousin, or Pays de Loire where these two opposed strategic lines came together in a common slate?LikeLike
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“NPA ended up with marginally more votes than L.O, but the differences is hardly statistically significant.”
I know what you mean but literally this statement doesn’t make sense. “Statistical significance” does not mean a difference has a certain level of bigness, but refers to the confidence one has in inferring from a sample to a population. E.g. if in a typical pre-election of say 1500 people poll the NPA scored 3% and the LO 2%, you might say this difference is not significant as the margin of error for the poll would be over 2%.
In this case we’re not dealing with a sample, but a whole population (of those bothering to vote) – we *know*, and don’t have to infer about, how many voted for each party. So you might say the difference is quite small, but any definition of big or small is quite arbitrary.
Just so you know : )
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jIM jEPPS
I’d also note that the Green vote is significant. The last regional elections they took 2% this time they won more than six times that number. That’s impressive.
spoken like a true politician.
More pertinently, Europe Ecologie, got, 12,46% – a reduction on last year’s European election result., 16,2%
That is less impressive
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Andy. It’s hardly spin is it? Last year was a different kind of election with a different electoral system, of course people vote differently from one kind of poll to the next.
If you don’t think going from 2% to 13% is impressive then fine, but it represents a massive increase in representation at this tier of government – which most people would think was worth noting.
The Greens here in the UK got 1.3 million votes at the Euros last year and wont get anything like that national vote in the coming general, even if we do really well, and no one with any sense will be comparing the two figures when they assess the result.
Just as in the coming locals people will judge Respect’s results in Tower Hamlets by comparing them with the last locals, not the intervening elections.
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The two strategic lines totally opposed to one another are expressed most concretely in the contradictions in the NPA.
In a number of places the NPA were persuaded to join with the PCF, PdG, their former comrades in the NPA breakaway Gauche Unitaire and thus the total left vote benefited. Where the NPA found reasons for not joining in they were marginalized.
My experience is that quite a lot of NPA votes flow between them and the Greens who, in France, are an adjunct to the Socialist Party.
In these regional elections the first round vote is jockeying for position, second round is picking an administration. In all cases the varying tactics of the serious left are about gaining the most leverage over the PS. And the PS are likely to be the dominant party in m ost regions if not all.
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I have to add that I am fairly cynical about the Partie de Gauche. It and seems to exist to prop up a dying PCF.
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There is some discontent within the NPA about choices that were made.
One strand of opinion feels that there was an over-reliance on Olivier’s media profile which led to an arrogance towards other organisations.
Another suggests that it would have been possible to have stood on a joint slate for election while making clear that they would not form part of a local administration if elected. This view has merit.
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Oh really Jim, look at the Europeans, and local elections- the PCF vote is now stabilising (he says hopefully), and just like the No referendum, the only left of the PS organisation capable of running the logistics of a national campaign is the PCF.
The same was true of the Regionals, as R.C. pointed out the Front scored only slightly more than the PCF standing alone- so rather than the PdG propping up the PCF rather the inverse is true.
Liam, The NPA have undoubtedly suffered by the fact that Danny CB has replaced Olivier as the media’s favourite ‘rebel’, and Olivier standing as the head of the list in Ile de France also marginalised the NPA’s media presence.
The PCF would not have agreed a slate with the NPA on the grounds of ‘principled abstention-ism’, niether would the PdG, or I think the Fede, which here the Languedoc is a ticket to the FN being in the administration. Vote for us and we are not going to do our jobs is hardly a sustainable position for anyone outside of student politics.
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“Vote for us and we are not going to do our jobs is hardly a sustainable position for anyone outside of student politics”
Vote for us and we’ll join a neo-liberal government is hardly a sustainable position for a “communist” or anyone else who claims to be for workers’ interests.
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Rustbelt radical just doesn’t get it.
The strategic divisions do not run between parties but within them. The PdG is a split from the PS, the Gauche Unitaire a split from the NPA and within the PCF there are sharp divisions over the way forward.For example, in Languedoc Roussillon the regional president (detached from the PS) faced an opposing PS list but included some dissident (right wing) PCF people while the PCF intransigent left and the middle ground (together the great majority in a regional PCF ballot) were in with the PdG, Gauche Unitaire and the NPA (despite the barely concealed reluctance of some of its local leaders). And the united left did well.
Life is so complicated and sectarian certainty so reassuring (in la la land)
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don’t always agree with Nick but I suspect he is right here.
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I will try to explain in english (I’m french)how i analyse the results.
-The average vote for the NPA where he was alone is 2.77 % and not 2%. LO was alone everywhere and there average vote was 1.2 and even a little less when the NPA were alone.
-The NPA was allied with PCF and PG in 3 regions, and with the PG only in 4 regions.
-It is clear that the NPA suffered from the fact that it was generally alone face to the Front de Gauche( PCF+PG+GU+les Alternatifs+…). But the FdG made a little more than 6% which is less than the PCF alone 6 years ago and the PCF will lose many elected representatives.
-It is clear too that the NPA lost many votes too in the violent national polemic after the decision of a local NPA group to present a candidate with a veil. Every medias, every party from the extreme right to the Front de Gauche and LO criticized violently the NPA and even few NPA members refused to vote for their own party.
-Don’t forget that Besancenot allied with LO made in 2004 2.5% (4.2% in the presidential election in 2002 and 4.1% in 2007) face to MGBuffet (pcf) (more than 7% in 2004…and 2% in the presidential elections in 2007).
Don’t forget that popularity don’t do everything. Besancenot remain very popular in the polls more than Pierre Laurent (PCF) who obtains 7% of the vote in the Paris region or more than Huchon 25.26%. Popularity is not sufficient to convince people to vote for you.
– For the same raison that some overstimate the NPA one year ago, there is a tendancy now to overstimate the difficulties of the NPA even if those difficulties are reals. We keeps most of our new members for exemple.LikeLike
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“Rustbelt radical just doesn’t get it.” I get entirely that “strategic divisions do not run between parties but within them” including dividing the forces that became the NPA. It’s just that we’re on different sides of that strategic divide. As for being called a sectarian, that is the standard issue Stalinist or opportunist insult when a group insists on standing outside of popular front politics, so even though offense was meant, none was taken. That doesn’t mean I don’t agree with having an electoral alliance at all, as long as we state from the beginning our views on joining or supporting governments. That only proves however that even with agreed to electoral alliances, the “strategic divisions” remain.
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It is difficult to use the term sectarian without seeming to insult but the fact is that within the NPA there is a sectarian tendency. Thankfully it is encountering a strong challenge from within its ranks, both from the new forces attracted to the organisation and from long standing LCR types. Life teaches hard lessons.
“on different sides of that strategic divide”
Perhaps an assumption too far. My point is that the strategic divide runs within the diverse organisations of the left and that the consequence of this is that labels are not a good guide to understanding.
My view is that the working class movement and the revolutionary left in France, a entity that finds its centre of gravity in the communist movement needs to find a way of overcoming opportunism, the principal expression of which is found in the PS, in conditions of both unity and struggle.
This means a differentiation within both the PCF and the PS. That this should also affect the NPA, a much smaller but still quite vital outfit is not a surprise.
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Liam redux 
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