Gilles Ivaldi

An extremist autarky : The systemic separation of the French extreme right

Since its initial electoral successes in the mid-1980s, the Front National (FN) has played a key role in the French political system, channelling discontent from a number of heterogeneous sources and significantly affecting the moderate rights electoral returns at both local and national level. While the institutional framework has consistently prevented the FN from winning parliamentary representation at the national level, this systemic ostracism together with the moderate rights steadfast refusal to consider cooperation and Jean-Marie Le Pens reciprocal vilification has given the party the status of an isolated actor encapsulating social and political concerns in France. While the 2002 presidential success was exaggerated by the political opportunity structure of this election, the stability of the core FN electorate suggests the party can remain implanted in the long term despite lacking hope of executive or legislative participation.

Deriving a Forecast Model for European Election Turnout

Turnout is a key indicator in European Parliament elections in the absence of a direct executive outcome. Forecasting turnout is an important exercise in requiring the identification of a parsimonious model with good lead time from the array of structural, demographic, and attitudinal variables employed in rich explanatory models of turnout, and simultaneously minimizing prediction error. Building on a series of regression models using aggregate data, this article explores the applicability of such an approach to turnout in the EU-27 countries and considers the explanatory added value that deriving such a forecast model can also provide.

5 The French Front National: Organizational Change and Adaptation from Jean-Marie to Marine Le Pen

The French Front National (FN) constitutes one of the most successful populist radical right parties in Western Europe (Mudde 2007: 41). Since the mid-1980s, the FN has established itself as a significant force in French politics.

Rechtsextremismus in populistischer Gestalt: Front National und Vlaams Blok

Das Wiedererstarken der extremen Rechten in Westeuropa hat grose Aufmerksamkeit in der politikwissenschaftlichen Forschung auf sich gezogen. Inzwischen liegen zahlreiche Vergleichsstudien vor, die dem Phanomen mit zum Teil umfassenden Erklarungsmodellen auf den Grund gehen (vgl. z.B. Eatwell / Mudde 2004, Decker 2004, Schain / Zolberg / Hossay 2002, Gibson 2002, Hainsworth 2000, Betz / Immerfall 1998, Kitschelt 1995). In diesen Studien wurde zu Recht die Heterogenitat der rechtsextremen Parteiengruppe im Hinblick auf ihre historischen Wurzeln und Einbettung in die jeweiligen nationalen Parteiensysteme hervorgehoben. Jenseits davon gibt es allerdings auch markante Parallelen und Ubereinstimmungen. Vlaams Blok (im Folgenden: VB) in Flandern und der franzosische Front National (im Folgenden: FN) sind dafur ein gutes Beispiel. Beide Parteien gehoren derselben Klasse von ‚rassistischen‘, populistischen und Anti-System-Parteien am ausersten rechten Rand des politischen Spektrums an, welche sich signifikant von anderen Typen ‚neo-populistischer‘ Parteien (wie z.B. den Fortschrittsparteien in Skandinavien, der osterreichischen FPO, der ‚Liste Pim Fortuyn‘ in den Niederlanden oder der Lega Nord in Italien) oder eher traditionellen Akteuren wie dem neofaschistischen italienischen MSI (aus dem die heutige Alleanza Nazionale hervorgegangen ist) und der deutschen extremen Rechten unterscheiden (Mudde 2000, Taggart 1995). Der vorliegende Aufsatz ruckt die ideologischen Inhalte des rechtsextremen Populismus in den Mittelpunkt der Betrachtung.

Contesting the EU in times of crisis: The Front National and politics of Euroscepticism in France:

This article examines the performance and party system diffusion of Euroscepticism of the French Front National (FN) during recent European crises. The article argues that Europe’s successive crises since 2008 have been essentially ‘absorbed’ by the FN into its existing Eurosceptic framework which is guided by its radical right-wing ideology. While allowing the FN to successfully mobilize issues and grievances about the European Union (EU), Euroscepticism is, however, significantly impeding its strategy of governmental credibility. The article identifies the main political outcomes of these crises and finds differences in impact between the different EU crises on party competition over Europe. These findings provide insight into the relationship between the radical Right, Euroscepticism, and party competition. They also inform our current knowledge of Euroscepticism in French politics, and changes that EU crises have triggered, according to party system location and whether FN influence can be postulated.

Parties and Voters in the Policy Space: The Presidential First Round

In the first round, there was clear distinction among candidates on their policy positions, with salience of issues beyond the traditional left/right and social liberal–conservative dimensions, in particular on political reform and on Europe. The pitch of these policies, whilst in some respects overshadowed by valence issues of competence and integrity, clearly delineated different visions of French society. This chapter sets out the policy positions of the five main candidates and tests the relative importance of these in voters’ decision-making, using attitudes and preferences measured in a large-scale opinion survey. It finds that, whilst traditional political dimensions were more important in voter choice, the renewal and European dimensions played a significant role as well.

The 2012 French Presidential Elections

Emmanuel Macron’s victory in the 2017 presidential elections represents one of the most important disruptions to French political life since the establishment of the Fifth Republic. This book analyses the political opportunities enabling a neophyte to conquer the Elysee, and the conditions leading to the unprecedented presidential runoff between this centrist EU enthusiast and pro-globalization candidate and the nationalistic/populist alternative embodied by Marine Le Pen. The book begins by considering trends in party competition and presidentialism in modern France, notably presidential primaries and their impact on party competition. It then moves to considering the role traditional explanatory factors in elections, namely policies and voter profiles, played in the result. Finally, it examines the dynamics of President Macron’s success in the legislatives, and how he dominated the traditional party blocs. This book will appeal to students of French politics as well as those interested in electoral behaviour and European political systems.

The 2017 Legislative Elections: Manufacturing a Majority

Where the presidential election saw the overturning of traditional political competition, the subsequent legislative elections followed the confirmatory pattern of presidential majoritarianism very closely. While doubts had been expressed over Macron’s capacity to form a majority party government so soon after En marche!’s formation, tactical appointment of key ministerial positions enabled the president to attract a number of centre–right voters to complement the predominantly centre–left support he had received in the presidential race, thereby ensuring a centrist majority in the National Assembly. Despite being the subsidiary election to the presidentials, the legislative outcome was the necessary step in an eventual realignment of French political space, initiated but not completed by the presidential victory.

Campaign Events and Political Change

Unlike the 2012 election, there was strong reason to think the outcome in 2017 was affected by political events. In particular, the Penelopegate scandal which beset Francois Fillon was at least indirectly responsible for his failure to qualify for the second round, and consequently for the earthquake election of Emmanuel Macron. In addition, Francois Hollande’s decision not to stand and Marine Le Pen’s debate performance undoubtedly influenced the eventual vote shares in the first and second rounds, respectively, if not changing the eventual result. Beyond these three ‘shocks’, however, other mooted influences on the election are revealed to have had little or no effect on the outcome.

The 2017 Presidential Election: Continuity and Change

The uniqueness of the 2017 elections emerged from a system which appeared ‘blocked’ in a pattern of executive alternation between the governing parties of the left and right. The parallels between Hollande incumbency and that of Sarkozy in the previous electoral cycle suggested that competition in 2017 would follow a very similar pattern to 2012. Looking at the French party system over the longer term, however, reveals that a combination of certain traits witnessed before in separate elections, but never simultaneously—a strong centrist challenge, strong polarization and medium levels of party/candidate fragmentation—provided the essential conditions for the overturning of this blocked structure.