French presidential elections: a view from the left

An article from the Trotskyist "In Defence of Marxism" website on the recent presidential elections in France.

Some highlights:

>>>The bourgeois press are now raising a hue and cry about the threat of a ‘fascist’ president in the second country of Europe. Such hysteria can be dismissed out of hand. Marine le Pen is certainly a reactionary brute, but she is no fascist. In actual fact, she is a demagogue who has modelled her campaign on that of Donald Trump in the United States. She has gained ground particularly in working-class departments in the north, and former industrial heartlands of la France profonde (“deep France”) that were decimated by deindustrialisation. With the present cost of living crisis putting even more pressure on poor workers and middle-class layers, Le Pen’s pledges to cut taxes on fuel and other necessities, and incentivise businesses to raise wages, have struck a chord.

>>>Far from a shift to the right or towards fascism, Le Pen’s growing popularity at Macron’s expense represents a growing resentment by working-class and middle-class layers towards the status quo. It expresses class anger towards a hated and out-of-touch elite, albeit in a distorted way. A 69-year-old former miner from Stiring-Wendel, a small town in eastern France, was quoted in the Wall Street Journal as saying that, until recently, he never really imagined Le Pen could become president. “She was too scary… she represented the far right, and she wanted to leave Europe. Now, I can see her as president. She is more serious, more focused on our struggle.” Even a section of former PCF voters are transferring their support to Le Pen. This is also a direct expression of the right-wing drift off the party itself.

>>>The PCF bears particular shame in these elections by choosing to stand a candidate (Fabien Roussel) against Mélenchon, rather than stepping aside as in 2017. The PCF received 2.3 percent in the first round, which while derisory, might nevertheless have been enough to tip the balance in Mélenchon’s favour, blocking Le Pen and turning the second round into a clear-cut contest between the right and left. This would have electrified the situation, and doubtlessly drawn in a big section of non-voters behind FI, as they would have been presented with a genuine alternative. The same is true of tiny parties like the NPA and Lutte Ouvrière (LO), who despite getting less than one percent each could have changed the character of these elections entirely by pulling out of the race.

>>>In the end, these parties have accomplished nothing other than to guarantee a right-wing president, lose their campaign expenses, and secure their continued irrelevance. Roussel has even joined the PS and LR in endorsing Macron in the second round. These characters had the gall to justify running in the election on ‘pragmatic’ grounds, arguing that Mélenchon couldn’t win anyway. And now, after helping ensure Mélenchon did not win, we witness the sorry spectacle of a so-called Communist ‘pragmatically’ endorsing a banker!

Read all of it here:

French elections: resounding rejection of the establishment

Jean-Luc Mélenchon