At some point
last week, I was considering writing a preview of the 1st round of the
French Presidential Election. Most of the speculation I saw considered
Socialist candidate Francois Hollande the frontrunner for the first round of
voting, and also to defeat incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy in the second round 2
weeks later. Hollande would be the first Socialist president in 17 years, and
only the second one since World War 2. More interestingly, much of the leftist
blogosphere was abuzz with speculation that the Communist candidate Jean-Luc
Melanchon would finish in a strong 3rd place, relegating the
anti-immigrant National Front candidate Marine Le Pen to a weak 4th.
In my hypothetical column from last week I was going to excitedly report on the
strong support of Mr. Melanchon, note how a wide swath of the French populace
was rejecting the center through their support of Mr. Melanchon and Ms. Le Pen,
and argue that Melanchon’s apparent triumph over Ms. Le Pen illustrated that
the people of France had moved beyond petty identity politics and instead
embraced Mr. Melanchon’s form of Left Wing populism over Ms. Le Pen’s
neo-fascist right wing populism.
This point was
even more remarkable because of last months Toulouse shooting. To review French
Muslim Mohammed Merah killed 7 people in March supposedly in retaliation for
France’s involvement in the Afghanistan War. The shootings briefly gave Mr.
Sarkozy a small lead in the polls, and would seem to strengthen Ms. Le Pen’s
anti-immigrant argument. That the French people were seemingly able to rise
about the politics of fear in the wake of a tragedy seemed to indicate a
national bravery and a recognition of the real roots of the economic problems
facing France.
Well, It’s a
good thing I didn’t write that article, because the French people gave us the
exact opposite result in yesterday’s vote. It wasn’t Mr. Melanchon that
finished in a strong 3rd, but Ms. Le Pen who garnered 18% of the
vote, the highest total ever for the National Front. Mr. Melanchon finished a
weak 4th with 11%. Mr.
Hollande got about 29% and Mr. Sarkozy got about 27% and they will face off in
2 weeks. Despite the fact that the right-wing candidates got a higher
percentage of the vote, Mr. Hollande is still the front runner. Sarkozy only
wins about 50-60% of Ms. Le Pen’s vote according to polls, and Ms. Le Pen has
spoken harshly about Mr. Sarkozy. She considers him to be a part of the
classical liberal elite, and Mr. Sarkozy will have to figure out how to appeal
to Ms. Le Pen’s voters without alienating the center of his coalition. Further,
Ms. Le Pen has a vested interest in Mr. Sarkozy losing, she wants his coalition
to implode and hers to become the ascendant voice of the right wing. In
contrast, Mr. Melanchon told his supporters to unconditionally support Mr.
Hollande in the runoff.
The dichotomy
between Ms .Le Pen and Mr. Melanchon has been one of the defining features of
international politics for quite some time. Both tap into resentment among the
lower classes. The right wing blames it on ethnic minorities or some other
boogeyman while the Left Wing points out serious inequities in the free market.
In short, the right sells the politics of fear, while the left sells the
politics of class struggle.
The French
election takes place within a geopolitical context similar to America’s. The
economy is in shambles, and there is growing fear about the country’s future.
It illustrates the relatively small effect that an individual leader has that
the rightwing Sarkozy is bearing much of the same blame that the left wing
Obama is facing hear in America. In many ways individual policies matter far
less than the circumstances one faces once they are in office. Mr. Hollande
offers much of the same policies as Obama does, but in France they are seen as
needed reforms as opposed to the status quo(though I guess it’s worth pointing
out that 4 years ago Mr. Obama’s policies were seen the same way).
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