28 March 2011

Sarkozy's party the loser in local elections

Local elections were held across France yesterday. These elections are called the cantonales — the canton is an electoral district in a département, of which there are about 100 in France. The winners of the cantonales become "departmental councilors" — the closest American equivalent would probably be county commissioners.

Our département, for example, the Loir-et-Cher, is made up of 30 cantons, one of which is centered on Saint-Aignan. The Blois area — Blois is by far the largest town in the département and is its administrative "capital" — is divided into five cantons.

Analysts are saying that the big loser in these local elections was the UMP party headed by current French president Nicolas Sarkozy (age 56). And the big winner, politically, was the party that up to now has been called the French "hard right" — the Front National, headed up by a 42-year-old woman named Marine Le Pen, the daughter of FN founder Jean-Marie Le Pen (age 82). The UMP got 20% of the total vote nationally, and the FN got about 12%.

The Front National didn't win many seats on departmental councils this time, but it greatly increased its share of the vote. That's a bad sign for Sarkozy and his center-right party.

The winner in terms of percentage of votes won was the Parti Socialiste, with 36%. The abstention rate was very high, with fewer than half the eligible voters actually going to the polls. Even so, on the right, Le Pen's Front National seems to be on the rise and Sarkozy's UMP seems to be on the decline. My impression is that Sarkozy has adopted policies and rhetoric aimed at pulling more right-wing voters into his party, but his efforts have backfired by giving the extreme-right FN new respectability.

All this is important in France because it shows the current balance of political power just about a year before the next presidential elections are to be held. Sarkozy will in all likelihood be a candidate for re-election. The socialists haven't yet chosen a candidate. Marine Le Pen will run.

If Sarkozy and Le Pen divide the right-wing vote, it will be easier for the socialist candidate to win a majority in the presidential polling. The election takes place in two rounds, and the final result depends on who the two top vote-getters are in the first round.

In 2002, for example, the two top vote-getters in the first round of voting were the two right-wing candidates, the center-right incumbent president Jacques Chirac and the extreme-right challenger Jean-Marie Le Pen. The socialist Lionel Jospin, then Chirac's prime minister, was eliminated. In the second round of elections, Chirac defeated Le Pen with more than 80% of the vote.

At this point, polls show Sarkozy being eliminated in the first round of next year's presidential elections. In a second round opposing a Parti Socialiste candidate and FN's Marine Le Pen, the socialist would win handily. Still, the presidential election is 13 months away...

By the way, don't let the word "socialist" confuse you when it comes to the Parti Socialiste Français. It is the center-left party, and the largest party on the left side of the political spectrum in France. It corresponds to the social democratic parties of other European countries.

The last socialist president was François Mitterand (1981-1995). Socalist Lionel Jospin was prime minister from 1995 until 2002. And the Parti Socialiste's presidential candidate, Ségolène Royal, got 48% of the vote against Nicolas Sarkozy in the second round of the 2007 presidential election.

34 comments:

  1. Thanks for explaining in easy language French politics which I have always found very confusing. Will be interesting to see if Sarkozy is re-elected next year.

    ReplyDelete
  2. PS. only half the cantons vote at any one time - for example, we didn't this time round, but le Grand Pressigny did.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Ken,
    We had elections in New South Wales in Australia this weekend and the incumbents, the Labor Party were trounced - all does not go well for the Federal Labor Party and Julia at the next Federal election.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Hi Susan, the conseillers généraux elected this time will serve only for three years. Then in 2014 the whole system changes.

    Leon, there are big changes all around the world right now. The U.S. got a new majority in the House of Representatives in January. The UK changed parties recently too. Is France next?

    ReplyDelete
  5. Susan, LOL. Yes, I agree with you.

    Comme je l'ai souvent dit, les Français ont le cœur à gauche et le porte-feuille à droite!

    The French people have their heart on the left and their pocketbook on the right.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Susan

    Have you been perusing the blogs of DSK and Anne Sinclair :-)

    ReplyDelete
  7. In my canton yesterday, I had the choice between the FN and a Socialist. The UMP was eliminated in the first round.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Mr. D. S-Kahn had better make up his mind then.

    ReplyDelete
  9. If those were my choices, I'd vote for Segolene. Sarko hasn't been that great, IMO, though his wife seems perfectly nice.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Good report but for one thing: the FN will NEVER be respectable!

    ReplyDelete
  11. Nuggi, I agree with you. But the FN seems to be gaining in votes all the time.

    Diog', I'm not sure I agree about Carla. But then I don't know her personally.

    CHM, that "wallet on the right" and "heart on the left" saying has been around for many decades. I'm not even sure it is true any more. More and more French people seem to have their heart on the right.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Sorry, you now have your own Sarah Palin to deal with!

    ReplyDelete
  13. Ken

    DSK has till this summer to 'declare' himself - June or July . Otherwise he will have to resign from IMF asap

    ReplyDelete
  14. TB, je sais mais les socialistes doivent choisir un candidate dans ces delais-là. DSK veut-il ou ne veut-il pas être candidat ? To run or not to run, that is the question (for DSK).

    ReplyDelete
  15. Bill in CA...
    Does it always have to go back to Sarah Palin? Really?

    ReplyDelete
  16. DESIREE AND ALL, I apologise for injecting partisan politics. This blog is not the place for it.

    ReplyDelete
  17. Ok last comment
    From what I could gather from the news, rumours and "interviews", looks like he is going to run but will wait till the last minute for the primaries.
    After all, AS has already made it known that she wouldn't like her husband to go for another 5-yr term @ IMF and they have purchased/renovated an apt in a former hôtel particulier on Place des Vosges .

    BTW: A good topic for conversation in May :-)

    ReplyDelete
  18. Was anyone surprised? Sarkozy started losing favor as soon as he was elected and made it clear that he envied Bush.

    ReplyDelete
  19. Nice summary, thanks. So funny to see Sarko referred to as center right, as of course he is, but in the US some think he's a leftie.
    Wonder what the political landscape would look like by now if Segolene had won?

    ReplyDelete
  20. @Emm
    I do not think it would be wrong to place Sarkozy left of Obama. I'm not too much in US Politics, and I do not know where that would place him on the left-right scale for you. I live in Germany, and comparing the two, I'd say Merkel who is center-right, is certainly more on the right side than Sarkozy ever was (I mean, not in words, but in acts).

    Sarkozy's been elected president because he spoke like Le Pen. However, he acted like any of his predecessor, and I guess that is why the FN is regaining momentum, as nobody will ever trust Sarkozy again when he's talking like Le Pen.

    The funny thing is that Marine Le Pen is also getting a lot of votes from former communists. She shares the same views as the socialists on many points, with a "big government" being put forward as the solution to every economical/social issue. I guess she's clever enough to speak what these people want to hear, when you think her father was a Ronald Reagan fan... What places her on the far-right side are mainly her views on immigration. Anyway, French politics is a crazy business. Just look at Mitterand, a guy who participated in the Vichy regime to some extend, and ended up president with communists ministers, that is just weird, isn't it?

    ReplyDelete
  21. Sarkozy has been lowering taxes on the rich and excoriating immigrants, especially Roms, for years. That's what makes him right wing. He is not a progressive, by a long shot.

    French politics is no crazier than the politics in other countries, you just have to take some time to figure it out.

    Oh, and the communists-becoming-hard-rightists phenomenon has been a reality in France for decades. It's as if the political spectrum was a circle, and the circle is closed when the supposed far-left (communism) and the far-right meet. Both are authoritarian, if not totalitarian.

    Back in the 1970s and early 1980s, the French communists and socalists, the two largest parties on the left, cooperated to propose a Programme commun. The socialists under Mitterrand thereby triggered the continuing decline of the French Communist Party.

    ReplyDelete
  22. Whoa! After ny partisan politics apology yesterday, the comments were full of it. I won't go negative and say one bad word about former short-term Governor Palin I'll only say that I'd support anyone from Mr. ED, the talking horse, to Alvin the Chipmunk if they ran against her. Anyway, she's about to be eclipsed by a certifiable Whacko Congresswoman from Minnesota who makes Palin look like Eleanor Roosevelt by compzrison.

    ReplyDelete
  23. Bill, right on! Bachman, isn't that her name? Palin seems to be on the decline now.

    ReplyDelete
  24. Ken,

    I agree Sarkozy has been using the Roms, but only because he needed to have a right-wing alibi. And he has been doing this as well with all his “debates” lately, e.g.”Débat sur l’identité nationale” or now on Islam. Fact is, nothing for what he’s been elected for has really happened. Ask the people who voted for him, expecting a Kärcher, what they think of Sarkozy only using in on French roads to "spray" speeding tickets. That is the way he’s doing politics, talking like a right-winger, but acting like his predecessors. He spoke like Le Pen, but in reality, nothing has changed much as far as immigration is concerned (obviously the only factor to define a right-winger).

    Sarkozy's cabinet has been creating more taxes than Jospin's back then. And concerning the “bouclier fiscal” that would limit taxes to 50% of the riches income, you do not seem up to date on it, because he gave it up. He will modify the ISF (impôt de solidarité sur la fortune). However, a vast majority of the people who will benefit from it are middle class who own their place of residence, which price has sky rocketed because of the estate situation. And do not forget that France still has got one of the heaviest tax system in the world. Even Sarkozy’s friends like Johnny still prefer to pay most of their tax in Switzerland. I guess Sarkozy did much less in that domain and others that would characterize him as right-wing, than you believe.

    It’s up to you to believe Miterrand has been initiating the decline of communists. Fact is, Sarkozy brought the FN to its knees, whereas Mitterand brought the FN in the “assemblée nationale”, by introducing some “proportionnelle” in the vote. I mean, this guy had friends like René Bousquet, with whom he worked in the Nazi cooperating government during WWII. I do find it crazy, that given his background, this guy could become president (and I do not talk about weird stuff like "L'attentat de l'observatoire" and the like).

    Well, what I think doesn’t matter that much (I stopped voting anyway), and it won’t change my views on what I normally read here: keep up the good work, your blog is great!

    ReplyDelete
  25. Pourquoi avoir effacé mon intervention précédente? Votre réponse est le comble de la mauvaise foi, et je pensais avoir apporté la contradiction de manière courtoise et argumentée. Si c'est mon anglais niveau collège qui a pu vous froisser, veuillez m'en excuser, ce n'est pas ma langue maternelle. Même si je suis expatrié de France depuis douze année, je ne vois pas en quoi vous seriez plus à même de décrire la situation politique de mon pays, bien au contraire. Vu de l'extérieur, et surtout d'Allemagne, les affaires en France semblent invraisemblables. Mais bon, vous êtes le maitre des lieux, alors je ne vais pas insister, hein...

    ReplyDelete
  26. Jan, je n'ai rien effacé du tout. Je suis incapable d'expliquer ce qui s'est passé. Mais je reçois un mail pour chaque commentaire, alors je vais essayer de remettre votre message. Et oui, j'ai trouvé votre réponse intéressante et bien écrite.

    ReplyDelete
  27. Here is Jan's comment, which inexplicably disappeared from the blog:

    Ken,

    I agree Sarkozy has been using the Roms, but only because he needed to have a right-wing alibi. And he has been doing this as well with all his “debates” lately, e.g.”Débat sur l’identité nationale” or now on Islam. Fact is, nothing for what he’s been elected for has really happened. Ask the people who voted for him, expecting a Kärcher, what they think of Sarkozy only using in on French roads to "spray" speeding tickets. That is the way he’s doing politics, talking like a right-winger, but acting like his predecessors. He spoke like Le Pen, but in reality, nothing has changed much as far as immigration is concerned (obviously the only factor to define a right-winger).

    Sarkozy's cabinet has been creating more taxes than Jospin's back then. And concerning the “bouclier fiscal” that would limit taxes to 50% of the riches income, you do not seem up to date on it, because he gave it up. He will modify the ISF (impôt de solidarité sur la fortune). However, a vast majority of the people who will benefit from it are middle class who own their place of residence, which price has sky rocketed because of the estate situation. And do not forget that France still has got one of the heaviest tax system in the world. Even Sarkozy’s friends like Johnny still prefer to pay most of their tax in Switzerland. I guess Sarkozy did much less in that domain and others that would characterize him as right-wing, than you believe.

    It’s up to you to believe Miterrand has been initiating the decline of communists. Fact is, Sarkozy brought the FN to its knees, whereas Mitterand brought the FN in the “assemblée nationale”, by introducing some “proportionnelle” in the vote. I mean, this guy had friends like René Bousquet, with whom he worked in the Nazi cooperating government during WWII. I do find it crazy, that given his background, this guy could become president (and I do not talk about weird stuff like "L'attentat de l'observatoire" and the like).

    Well, what I think doesn’t matter that much (I stopped voting anyway), and it won’t change my views on what I normally read here: keep up the good work, your blog is great!

    ReplyDelete
  28. Hi Ken,

    The message somehow disappeared as I checked back for an answer, that is why I thought you'd have moderated a different view on French politics. All my apologies for even thinking this was the case. It would not have kept me from enjoying your posts, recipies and pictures anyway ;)

    ReplyDelete
  29. Thanks for the half apology Bill, but I just don't understand why it always goes back to Sarah Palin? Its gets old.
    Besides, I could think of one person in the White House that doesn't have a clue what they are doing either.
    @Ken Broadhurst-your circle analogy of the political parties is interesting. Makes some sense to French politics to those of us who are here in the US. Thanks.

    ReplyDelete
  30. Hello Jan, I just found the comment of yours that disappeared a few days ago. It was in the blog's spam folder. I don't know why blogger decided it was spam. There were three other comments in the spam folder (from Craig and from Peter H.) that shouldn't have been in there. I moved them back into the comments on the topics they belonged with.

    Désirée, thanks for your comments. I think you have discouraged my friend Bill in CA from commenting now. Please refrain from negative comments on other blogger's contributions. I'll appreciate it.

    ReplyDelete
  31. Thanks for the update ;)

    ReplyDelete
  32. Ken,
    I don't think Bill is discouraged from commenting, he joked about our comments back and forth on wcs's blog the next day. I wasn't trying to be negative towards anyone, but maybe it came off that way. Sorry for that. But I also feel that it wasn't at Bill personally, it was his comments on the women he was referring to that I found negative and that I disagreed with.

    ReplyDelete
  33. Good, Désirée, thanks for telling me. I appreciate your comments.

    ReplyDelete

What's on your mind? Qu'avez-vous à me dire ?