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France's political earthquake
The first-round success of far-right leader, Jean-Marie le
Pen, in the French presidential elections shocked the world. Hardly discussed,
however, were the votes for the Trotskyist parties. Socialism Today interviews
Alex Rouillard, organiser for Gauche Revolutionnaire (CWI section in France), on
the election and the tasks for the left.
Why was the result of the first round, allowing Le Pen to enter the second
round, such a shock?
IT WAS A triple shock. The first was that the choice would
now be between the right and the far-right. The second one was that everyone had
thought that the problem of Le Pen had disappeared with the split between the
two Front National leaders with the setting up of MNR [Mouvement National
Republicain] by Megret. And the third point is that Le Pen is seen as the
spiritual son of one of the darkest periods of European history.
But there was not really a massive upsurge in Le Pen's vote?
THE FAR-RIGHT's votes were not much more than in 1995, if
you combine the total for Le Pen and Megret in 2002 and Le Pen plus de Villiers
in 1995. The difference is the complete collapse of Jospin and the plural left.
Overall, they lost several millions of votes. Jospin's support fell from 26% in
1995 to 16% in this last election.
How did Jospin and the Parti Socialiste (PS) campaign?
IN THE FIRST round they campaigned only on a so-called
'balance sheet' of the government. In fact, they were unable to find one thing
where they could say: 'Look we have made a real social policy'. Even with the
special youth jobs or the Aubry law on the 35-hour week, they know that they
have to be very careful. For example, the Aubry law is a major attack on the
working conditions in many workplaces, especially in the industrial sector, by
introducing huge flexibility in working hours, including weekend working.
How did Le Pen campaign? Where did Le Pen collect most of his votes from?
IN FACT, WE saw an invisible Front National, in terms of
placards and so on. The campaign it conducted was not very aggressive. In a
quite clever way, Le Pen claimed that signatories necessary for standing in the
presidential elections had gone missing. He used that to gain media attention.
It is quite clear that the signatories were not missing at all. Then he put
social demands on the top of his programme and that was enough to make him a
challenger to the two main candidates. Jospin and Chirac did not deal with the
real social issues, such as jobs and so on.
Le Pen collected most of his votes in rural areas and in
deprived working-class areas, the banlieues, etc, for two different reasons. In
the countryside it is because he was able to catch the votes of the small
farmers who have been ruined by the European agricultural policy. He put forward
concrete demands for them. In the run-down urban areas, it is mainly some
workers and unemployed. For these two categories there are also other disasters
following the capitalist crisis, such as insecurity - disturbances and violent
crimes - and things like that which sometimes poison people's daily lives. The
thinking was that voting for Le Pen would force the establishment to adopt
different policies on that issue.
Le Pen did not get an overwhelming support in the big
industrial suburbs of the cities. For example, in Paris Le Pen was not a big
candidate. It's interesting to see that in these industrial suburbs he did not
receive much more than the far-left candidates. The areas with large high-rise
housing schemes, for example, the 'Red Belt' of Paris or Rouen - mainly
working-class areas - saw equivalent scores for Le Pen and the far-left.
What kind of campaign did Lutte Ouvriere (LO) have for Arlette Laguiller?
THEY BEGAN WITH a very anti-capitalist and radical campaign
against redundancies and profits and the fat cats, etc. But, at the same time,
they did not have a flexible approach, they did not take up social demands that
were not already written in their programme, concentrating mainly on the
question of globalisation and things like that. So they had very good support
but they fell into the trap laid by the media who accused Lutte Ouvriere of
being sectarian. They spent too much time on this attack, saying that they are
not sectarian, etc. They should have had a much more effective position on
social issues. Worst of all, was the last week of the campaign when they did not
really have an open position for a new workers' party. Because they were trying
to reach Parti Communiste Francais (PCF) supporters, they were just speaking
about a 'new communist party' and saying to their potential voters that they
were not asking them to vote for communism but to vote for their simple
anti-capitalist demands. So in the last couple of weeks their campaign lacked
any real dynamism.
And the campaign of Ligue Communiste Revolutionnaire (LCR) for Olivier
Besancenot?
NEARLY THE REVERSE of what LO did! The main difference is
that their electorate is not the same at all. LCR are much younger, for example
students and young workers vote for them, but not so much the industrial
workplaces. There is a very big difference between the old industrial North of
France, where the vote went mainly to LO, and the South, with its concentration
of the more hi-tech branches of industry. The workers there voted mainly for the
LCR. So their campaign was based on only a few demands, from the legalisation of
cannabis to demanding a law forbidding redundancies. Then they made a change in
the last two weeks, speaking about a new force and a new workers' party that
would fight capitalism, etc. That explains why in the last period of the
election campaign they received stronger support than they were expected to get.
How did the PS leaders respond to Jospin's defeat?
BY BLAMING THE people for not voting for them and mainly
blaming them for voting for the far-left. As soon as they saw the results they
said that they would vote against Le Pen and campaign for that. For them, it was
a way of avoiding discussing the first round and immediately discussing the
preparations for the coming parliamentary elections, preparing a new 'united
left' list.
Mainly the PS leaders were calling for a vote for Chirac,
except Jospin, for example. He just said that we have to vote in order to defend
the republic, not even saying that we have to vote against Le Pen. The main PS
leaders said we have to vote for Chirac. At the same time, in many leaflets they
just said that we have to vote against Le Pen because they have not forgotten
that they have to defeat Chirac in the parliamentary elections.
What were Lutte Ouvriere and the LCR's tactics for the second round?
LUTTE OUVRIERE's position was very hard-line, just saying
that Chirac and Le Pen were both servants of the bourgeoisie. Well, not saying
that they were the same, but servants of the bourgeoisie nonetheless. LO called
for a blank vote or abstention, saying that no worker's vote should go to either
Le Pen or Chirac. This was not at all flexible. LO did not appeal
sympathetically to those who would agree on many issues but vote for Chirac
because they were scared and, at the same time, they were not calling for a
mobilisation.
The LCR on the other hand initially said that they had no
position and called for mobilisation. Two days after they changed that with a
call against Le Pen with a very formal call for a 'social round' - but without
putting concrete issues - after the second round of the election, but not really
giving a clear direction to the movement against Le Pen. It was clear that this
position would put them out of an agreement with LO. Neither of these two
organisations had a real orientation to propose on the basis of the 10% they
received in the first round of the election. Neither proposed a political
alternative, such as a real, new workers' party, not only in words but in
concrete proposals, such as calling for joint open meetings, etc. That is the
only way, really, to defeat Le Pen and all the other dangers that exist under
capitalism.
What was the position of Gauche Revolutionnaire?
WE SAID THAT we have to mobilise, that only struggles can
really defeat dangers like the Front National. That only working class and young
people can really defend the democratic rights of the whole population. But we
never called for a vote against Le Pen because the most important thing in the
mobilisation was to show the people that it was not the politicians who are able
to defend democratic rights but their own mobilisation. May Day clearly showed
that we could stop things like the Front National. And so we said that we would
be casting a blank vote but that we fully understood that a lot of people would
vote for Chirac. But we did not call for a vote against Le Pen which was, in
fact, a call for a vote for Chirac. A campaign around the vote would give the
impression that it was through the election that we can stop Le Pen. In fact, it
is through the struggle that we can stop him.
What response did Gauche Revolutionnaire get to its intervention?
WE RECEIVED A very positive response because we were really
active in the mobilisation. We were not putting our call for a blank vote up as
a barrier to discuss with people because our main propaganda was to mobilise, to
call the students and school students to go on strike, etc, and even to have an
appeal to extend the strike depending on the sector where we were working. It
was really easy to discuss with people and we had very friendly and good
discussions with people who wanted to talk about these issues. People joined us
during the movement. A lot of people worked with us. Our position [for a blank
vote] was not an obstacle at all. On the contrary, it was also a way of having a
deeper discussion on the question of why we had to mobilise, in which direction.
Also, we said that we should take into account the warning represented by the
fact that Le Pen went through to the second round, and that the move towards a
socialist alternative against capitalism was linked to defiance of the bourgeois
institutions and Chirac. That made it clearer for a lot of young people.
An estimated 1.5 million people participated in the May Day demonstrations
all over France. What was the mood?
IT WAS A very good one! People were open and friendly, with
the possibility of discussing with people. But most union leaderships and
political leaders put pressure on to make the vote for Chirac the main slogan.
It could have been a May day much more social, anti-fascist and anti-capitalist
but, because of the lack of forces who were against the slogan of an anti-Le Pen
vote, the demonstrations were not enough to give confidence to a lot of workers
and youth to link the question of fighting Le Pen with their own concrete daily
demands.
How do you view the outcome of the second round?
THE WHOLE PLURAL left and the media were all saying that Le
Pen will gain a big score. We never thought that, even if it was difficult to
resist that pressure. The first of May showed the complete isolation of Le Pen.
And so it was much more important to have a signal for the working class and
youth of an independent vote in that election. And that idea won 1.7 million
blank votes, which was a real clear call in that direction. Of course, these
blank votes were not the same as those in the first round because, in the second
round, the only ones casting a blank vote were those who wanted to say 'We don't
believe in Chirac or Le Pen' and who did not believe that Chirac was a barrier
against Le Pen. Maybe also there were a few first-round Le Pen electors,
especially workers, who voted blank in order to say they wanted to cast a
protest vote in the first round. It is interesting to see that the media did not
analyse of the blank vote. It would have been very interesting to see how many
trade unionists, workers, etc, voted blank.
Regardless of people's reasons for voting for Chirac - many to stop Le Pen -
Chirac has nevertheless been strengthened by the results, hasn't he?
WHAT IS REALLY important is to see that as soon as Chirac
was re-elected, he assembled a very hard-line government, completely reinforced
by his 82% vote. Of course, the result has strengthened Chirac a lot because he
is now a typical fifth republic president, the man on top of the nation, over
the other parties, the guarantor of democracy, etc. I'm sure that Chirac's score
is like LSD, because for him everything is OK. He was saved. The first round of
the election could have been a big warning for him, and a fight against Jospin
in the second round could have led to a defeat. Now nobody is talking about his
affairs, since just after the first round. The corruption scandals around Chirac
have completely disappeared from the papers.
What effects will the elections have on the Parti Socialiste?
THE PS GAINED a lot of new members just after the first
round. But it is not moving left. It has just gone back to a 1997 position - a
little bit more social, more open to young people's problems, etc. So it's clear
that the leadership does not want to win back power on the basis of a lot of
social demands. And so it is possible that a lot of those who have joined the PS
will be quite quickly disappointed.
The most important aspect of the presidential election, in
many ways, was the 10% vote for the Trotskyist organisations - in a country that
historically had a mass Stalinist Communist Party. What is the implication of
this?
THE TWO MAIN far-left organisations achieved 10% in the
election, but they have found no way to reach an agreement. The main task will
be to struggle against the attacks of the government. But to struggle against
the attacks is not sufficient to resolve the problem of the Front National. To
resolve the problems of misery, poverty and unemployment in France we will need
a real new workers' party. A new workers' party does not mean only a movement
with general anti-capitalist demands, etc, but a real party which is able to
organise the struggle, to make the struggle win, and to have a real socialist
objective. The proposal, for example, from the LCR does not deal in any way with
a socialist perspective. They keep the illusion of just having demands that are
enough to defy the system. On the other hand, LO sometimes speaks about
communism but does not link the task of going to socialism to the building of a
party. It makes no steps in that direction.
What is Gauche Rˇvolutionnaire's perspective now?
NOW THE LCR has made an appeal to all those who want to
fight capitalism to discuss together. Of course, we will participate in those
discussions. But their appeal did not mention 'socialism' or even 'party'. For
us, the next few years will confirm that the main task is to rebuild confidence
in the capacity of workers and young people to organise and lead struggles and
win support for a socialist programme. That is the way to defeat Le Pen and also
capitalism. It is on that perspective that more and more people are joining us.
We are ready to fight alongside all the genuine anti-capitalist and socialist
forces, but with a strategy to achieve socialism, not merely to maintain the
status quo or go back to some 'golden age' of the 1970s.
Election facts
THE FIRST ROUND saw a rejection of the establishment
parties. 29,498,009 people voted (71.6%) but the 28.4% abstention rate was the
highest ever (21.63% in the last presidential elections in 1995, nearly two
million votes more). Spoilt ballots numbered 995,550 (from 888,810).
Chirac had the lowest ever score for a sitting president
with 5,666,440 votes (19.88%) - 14% of the total electorate - while Jospin's
vote collapsed to 4,610,740, against 7,101,990 for the PS in 1995.
The combined Trotskyist vote was 2,973,600 (10.44%) -
1,616,546 (5.3%) in 1995. The LO vote was 1,630,244 (5.72%) - 1,615,546 (5.3%)
in 1995 - while the LCR polled 1,210,694 (4.25%). The Parti des Travailleurs
vote was 132,702 (0.47%). The LCR was second-largest party among youth with
13.9% (just below Chirac). LO won 10% of workers' votes.
The PCF vote evaporated, with 960,750 votes (3.37%, its
lowest ever percentage), from 2,634,187 (8.64%) in 1995. The Greens vote was
1,495,900 (5.25%), from 1,011,370 (3.32%) in 1995.
Le Pen's vote was 4,805,300 (16.86%) but Megret received
667,120 votes (2.34%). Therefore the total for the far-right was 5,472,420
(19.2%). In 1995 Le Pen received 4,573,200 (15%) but another far-right
candidate, De Villiers, got 1,443,186 votes (4.74%). So the total far-right vote
then was 6,014,324 (19.74%).
One survey said Le Pen's support amongst youth was 12% (down
from 18% in 1995), amongst pensioners 19% (from 9%), and small business people
30% (from 13%).
The second round saw a large rise in turnout to 32,577,810
(80.14%). Chirac received 25,316,647 (77.71% of all votes cast including blank
votes) while Le Pen got 5,502,314 (16.89%), only 55,400 more than in first
round. In some areas, for example Alsace, his vote fell.
Blank votes were 1,758,849 (5.40%). There were also high
levels of abstentions in some working-class towns, for example, a 29.26%
abstention in Lille.
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