French presidential election, 2022

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Yeah he voted for the Communist League's candidate, Alain Krivine, in the 1969 presidential election

That would make him a former Trot rather than a former Commie. Which is much funnier because it is such a cliche.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

So the general sentiment in France right now is... for an entire political spectrum of different types of racists as candidates? A hard-Right racist of one sort, a hard-Right racist of another kind, a Conservative racist, a liberal racist, a left-wing racist...'

[Filuwaúrdjan]

UKIPs vote in general was not as working class (however defined) as a lot of people were very insistent that it had to be. They certainly had working class voters, but an awful lot of comfortably off middle class people as well - there's a habit, at present, of conflating 'higher professionals' (a group that they certainly did bomb with) with 'middle class' and that's just silly and dishonest.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Montebourg should stick to the honey business. He's good at that, unlike politics.

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There's a certain ghoulish phenomenon of a member of a minority group setting themselves against said minority group and telling bigots that everything they thought is true, and, well, here we are.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

A bit like the disciplinary code in Australian Rules Football.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

It makes perfect sense to consider nominating a candidate proposing a mixture of hardcore neoliberalism and fascism as there is such a massive shortage of both amongst the candidates already declared.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Mélenchon himself used this opportunity to start the year with some rambling against ‘the European Marian flag’ (he is obsessed with that; note that Léaument has claimed that the EU flag should be removed because it is a symbol of religious origin and, as such, an infringement on laïcité)

WTF

These people are not exactly entirely sane.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Those who think American politics boring because there are only 2 major parties would like French politics. There is a big menu of political parties and ideologies.

And yet people keep voting for the same sh*t

Well, it's a bit like the old cliché about American television isn't it? Countless channels, all of them terrible and with nothing worth watching on.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Hasn't a segment of the PS moved into Macron's party as well? Let's not forget that Macron got his start as Economics Minister in Francois Hollande's government so he has likely sucked up a lot of the more "third way"/centrist types from the PS

Yes - a significant number of members and quite a lot of voters. Of course there's a precedent for this: much of the SFIO base voted for Poher in '69.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

With the utterly predictable note that a bunch of them, notably Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian and Health Minister Olivier Véran are technically not members of LREM but of a separate party called Territoires de progrès that supports Macron's government. Much as Agir and Édouard Philippe's Horizons do on the right.

Because, well who knows, you ain't serious unless you've got your pointless microparty or something

*La Marseillaise plays in the background.*

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Unless she has a really good plan to turn things around very quickly, then I really don't see the point in Hidalgo staying in the race. Doing so otherwise will - unless we're seeing a serious case of polling failure - only further damage her image and that of the remnants of her party. She was always a curious choice of candidate given the general field: given that Macron is the incumbent and that there was always going to be a Green candidate, what exactly is the purpose of her candidacy? Other sorts of PS politician could maybe justify themselves under these circumstances, but not her sort. There's no room.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The cadres category (I never know how to translate the term in English be it to refer to the socio-professional group or the party cadres) is also including public sector executives (notably in education and health sector, some of them being very left-wing*), persons employed in information and culture sectors and engineers. Back in 2017, Mélenchon placed third with that category of voters with 19% against 33% for Macron, 20% for Fillon, 14% for Le Pen and 8% for Hamon. I strongly doubt Mélenchon has many voters among financial businessmen.

Yes, the important thing to note is that the traditional French socio-economic categorisations are somehow even worse than the MRS Social Grade (i.e. AB, C1, etc) horror show in Britain, except in a different direction. And at least that system is slowly falling out of favour, if nowhere near fast enough.

* This is personal anecdote, but the head (principal) of my high school was a well-known member of the Communist Party and the treasurer (intendant) of my middle school ran as candidate in local elections for one of the Trotskyist sects (can’t remember if it was LO or the PT).

This goes back a long way: the stereotype in interwar France was that nearly every teacher in the country was an SFIO member, and while that was a clear exaggeration it is a telling one.

Today, Zemmour was also officially endorsed by Marion Maréchal (whose ‘academy’, btw, employed Oleg Sokolov, a famous Russian historian currently in jail for having murdered and dismembered one of her students when in Russia).

Don't forget the best part: he did it while dressed as Napoleon and unsuccessfully tried to kill himself afterwards by throwing himself into a river.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Probably a stupid question, but how does Le Pen manage to come closest to defeating Macron in the runoff polls out of the major candidates? Quite a turnaround from last time

Have you seen the other candidates?

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Electorates are flexible: they could just stay at home.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Although there has been a general tightening up of runoff polling, it's more of a shift from 'huge landslide' to 'substantial lead' - Macron is typically up by around 10pts or so. Last time around there was actually a major polling error, but it was to his advantage.

The thing is, Macron has been an exceptionally polarising President and ordinarily that is not a good thing for an incumbent seeking election in France. That he nevertheless seems set to win comfortably - that a poll showing a five point lead counts as a 'shock poll' - is quite the statement on the calibre of his opponents.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

An important thing to understand about French politics these days is that the average Le Pen supporter is not an angry young man or an embittered pensioner, but an ordinary person in an ordinary job with children at school and with tricky household budgets to manage. They are sensitive to the cost of living and suspect (rightly) that they are getting badly served by public services, particularly when compared to other groups even if they generally misidentify who those other groups are.* They are, undeniably, quite racist by usual North Western European norms, but so are people who are far less likely to vote for Le Pen: that's just France. It is a sobering thought, but the sort of people who Le Pen centres her appeal around and wishes to drive to the polls in large numbers are the sort of people that Keir Starmer, Olaf Scholz and so on also spend most of their time trying to appeal to. But perhaps even worse is that no one else in French politics really tries seriously to appeal to this section of the electorate. So long as this remains true, it is very hard to find any hope in French politics.

_{*Which, by the way, is why left-wing appeals to preserve the social state and so on have fallen flat for years and continue to do so. Of course the French social state (I use this term rather than the more familiar welfare state for a reason) is rather unusually structured and funded: put bluntly, the principle beneficiaries are not those who one might expect of a more typical welfare state. That all of this is a major contribution to the structural factors underpinning far-right political support is rarely acknowledged but undeniably true.}

[Filuwaúrdjan]

1. Runoff polling is in general of questionable value until the first round is complete and this particular poll was conducted by a Brazilian firm with no track record in France. Polling for this election is extremely frequent (arguably too frequent!) and nearly all recent polls show Macron with a hypothetical second round lead of between six and four points. More have shown larger leads (ten points, eight points etc) than have shown a deficit.

2. This is a well-established Community with certain rules of behaviour, rules that exist to keep the quality of discussion at a high level. Behaviour of the sort common on the rest of the internet, and on American-focused boards on this forum, is generally frowned on. This is not a matter of political censorship, but of accepted standards. Unless you abide by these standards you will not be welcome here.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

An important thing to understand about French politics these days is that the average Le Pen supporter is not an angry young man or an embittered pensioner, but an ordinary person in an ordinary job with children at school and with tricky household budgets to manage. They are sensitive to the cost of living and suspect (rightly) that they are getting badly served by public services, particularly when compared to other groups even if they generally misidentify who those other groups are.* They are, undeniably, quite racist by usual North Western European norms, but so are people who are far less likely to vote for Le Pen: that's just France. It is a sobering thought, but the sort of people who Le Pen centres her appeal around and wishes to drive to the polls in large numbers are the sort of people that Keir Starmer, Olaf Scholz and so on also spend most of their time trying to appeal to. But perhaps even worse is that no one else in French politics really tries seriously to appeal to this section of the electorate. So long as this remains true, it is very hard to find any hope in French politics.

_{*Which, by the way, is why left-wing appeals to preserve the social state and so on have fallen flat for years and continue to do so. Of course the French social state (I use this term rather than the more familiar welfare state for a reason) is rather unusually structured and funded: put bluntly, the principle beneficiaries are not those who one might expect of a more typical welfare state. That all of this is a major contribution to the structural factors underpinning far-right political support is rarely acknowledged but undeniably true.}

You're raising fair points. The question is just whether LePen is actually able or willing to do something serious about that. And I'm very skeptical she has practical solutions to these problems, especially with her anti-EU stances that would harm France's economy. Just to throw a tantrum at the "power elite" by electing a far right-winger doesn't solve a damn problem. You can doubt Macron is the right leader to tackle these problems, but there are other candidates available in the first round. Voters could send someone else to th runoff. And just because Zemmour appears more extreme doesn't mean LePen isn't. Her presidency would be a total s-show.

I'm not suggesting that Le Pen is the answer to any of the problems that have led to her dominating (almost uncontested!) such a large and not obviously or naturally politically marginal section of the electorate, not at all. My post is simply an examination of the phenomenon and also an oblique demonstration of why other candidates and parties have been unable and/or unwilling to contest that electoral space, even though doing so seems natural and obvious to those of us from other countries in the North and West of Europe.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

This is true, but why expect Le Pen will decline after the first round? I would think a surprising strong showing (for those who don't religiously follow polling) and reconciliation with Zemmour and (some) Pécresse supporters will improve her standing.

I make no predictions either way. Runoff polling can develop in all sorts of different ways depending on what happens. The important thing is to note that right now it is hypothetical: after Sunday it will not be. We do not know yet, not for certain, if Le Pen will make the second round: she's only a fairly moderate polling error off losing out to Melenchon in some polls. I don't think this is particularly likely, I should add, but we should be careful of counting chickens for anyone.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

TBH those who criticize you pretend to be intellectuals but in the subthreads of other elections such as Spain or any election in Latin America, British and French avatars demonstrate their absolute ignorance and triviality. Besides here we have Zeneke, so "there are rules of behavior" is highly debatable xd.

So speaketh the great genius who crowingly proclaimed at great length that the Ukrainian people would not fight back if the Russian army invaded their country - a prospect that you regarded with masturbatory glee.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Polling summary time:

Macron - almost all firms have him on 26%, but a handful push a little higher. None below 26%, none above 28%.

Le Pen - more diversity here: a high of 25% and a low of 21% with most hovering in between the two, generally slightly tilting towards the lower end.

Melenchon - between 16% and 18% with most settling on 17%.

Zemmour - French firms pretty much all have him on a functional 9%, but foreign firms who have had a go show higher figures.

Pecresse - French firms have her on either 9% or 8%, but those foreign firms who have had a go show lower figures.

Jadot - between 4% and 5%.

Roussel - between 2% and 3% with the consensus being a functional 3%.

Lassalle - between 2% and 3%.

Hidalgo - 2%.

Dupont-Aignan - between a functional 2% and 3%.

Poutou - 1%.

Arthaud - microscopic.

What I'm mostly getting here is that there is a lot of herding going on and that even moderate polling errors could upset a lot of apple carts if they were to occur.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

FYIs if not already mentioned, the vote projection 8pm French time won't be an exit poll but a projection based on a sample of votes counted, as most polling stations outside the big cities close at 7pm local time.

This is one reason why purported exit poll 'leaks' are of strictly limited value, even if accurate (and often they aren't). The other reason, of course, is that people continue to vote until the polling stations close, and when margins are tight (and they often are in French elections, especially at the first round) this can make a critical difference.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

28 Macron
 24 Le Pen

And 20 for Mélenchon which is quite the surge. Almost double from where he was 2 months ago.

A candidate with his platform but without the baggage and toxic personality would have at least pipped Le Pen for second, which is worth reflecting on.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

It is patently clear from both his surge in the polls and the pattern of his support - quite different to last time in some seriously suggestive ways! - that Melenchon benefited from a huge wave of tactical voting and that the people who voted for other Left candidates were people who think the man is too much of an [expletive deleted] to cast their vote for. There is always a hard limit on tactical voting potential, and I tend to think that Melenchon hit his. In any case, he's a bad man and you shouldn't feel sorry for him, even if it would (obviously) be preferable if he had reached the second round instead of Le Pen.