After watching Macron and Le Pen’s dominance unfold for seven years, the left’s determination to regain control of the policy agenda is likely to become a crucial dynamic that could reshape the future of French politics.
by Kazi Anwarul Masud
Should the French left be rising too? Alexander Clarkson, an expert in European affairs, thinks so. But the opinion of an expert may not necessarily put the world on edge. The world has changed. The world needs the infrastructural opportunities offered by China to developing countries that need infrastructure but do not have the money to finance it. China has also offered the Belt and Road Initiative, to which many developing countries have flocked like bees. Additionally, China wants a seat at the global table, however imperfect it may have been for the last fifty years, to assert its presence as a world leader, strengthened by its friendship with Russia. The Sino-Russian entente challenges the West-dominated world and is expected to remain so.
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| Jean-Luc Mélenchon's France Unbowed cemented itself as the dominant party on the left in the first round of the presidential election | Thomas Coex/AFP via Getty Images |
Introduction
Whether the French left can overcome such challenges remains an open question. But the NPF’s decisive role in this parliamentary election campaign reflects a remarkable recovery by a political tradition that had been pushed to the margins by Macron’s victories in 2017 and 2022. Ensemble’s cooperation with the NPF by withdrawing its candidates in 83 three-way races to strengthen the chances of defeating the RN in the second round has made it more difficult for Macron to equate the economic risks posed by parts of the left with the similar dangers the far right poses to the French economy, but more importantly, to the rule of law.
Macron Will Have to Change Tactics Post-Elections
After the elections are over, Macron’s ability to govern will require him to abandon the tactics against the left that had been crucial to his initial success. In a scenario where he needs to attract support from the NPF’s MPs to pass legislation in parliament, the left will have opportunities to influence policy and build momentum toward greater electoral success in 2027. In an election whose dominant theme has been the surge of support for the far right, a resilient left could end up having the last laugh after all.
Jubilation in Marine Le Pen’s Camp
As the results of the first round of France’s parliamentary elections rolled in on June 30, global media coverage was dominated by images of jubilation surrounding Marine Le Pen and her far-right party, National Rally (RN), which made huge gains. In contrast, there was despair among supporters of President Emmanuel Macron over the steep losses suffered by his centrist Ensemble coalition. Amid their fixation on the rivalry between Le Pen and Macron that has defined French politics for nearly a decade, commentators outside France paid far less attention to the New Popular Front (NPF) alliance of left-wing parties, which finished in second place in terms of total votes and whose fortunes are improving as rapidly as those of its bitter enemies on the far right.
Resurgence of the French Left
This resurgence of the French left has begun to gain momentum despite Macron’s efforts to portray centrist parties as the only viable alternative to the far right. Macron not only portrayed Ensemble’s blend of social liberalism and market-based reforms as essential to containing the RN and Le Pen, but he also sought to marginalize parties of the left that are inherently suspicious of market-oriented solutions to social problems. By presenting his coalition spanning the center-left to the center-right as the only “rational” option when faced with the extreme nationalism of the far right and the supposedly radical anti-capitalism of the left, Macron was echoing themes that helped him first win the presidency against Le Pen in 2017. More recently, however, this centrist strategy has come up short. Adding to these tensions, the other parties would demand an acceleration of measures in response to climate change that are unpopular with voters from the agricultural and manufacturing sectors, whose support other parties on the left hope to attract. But any governing coalition that included parties of the left would quickly find itself having to adjust many of these plans due to skepticism from Brussels, which has already issued France a warning over its budget deficit and debt load, but also from financial markets as well as centrist MPs whose votes would be needed to get legislation through parliament.
Macron’s Woes in Sustaining Unity of the Left
Sustaining the unity of the left could be further hampered if Macron attempts to pull moderate elements within the Socialist Party toward a more formal political relationship with his own centrist movement. However difficult managing the parties’ ideological differences will be, vicious personal rivalries between their senior leaders are an even greater potential threat to unity on the left. Though popular with his own supporters, Melenchon’s populist posturing and Cold War-era worldview elicit visceral hostility even from center-left voters, undermining efforts to widen the left’s base of support. His willingness to attack other senior figures on the left that he views as a threat to his own position has often helped stoke infighting in ways that played into the hands of the left’s political adversaries. Faced with Melenchon’s intransigence, other leadership contenders on the left, such as Raphael Glucksmann and Fatiha Keloua-Hachi, have had to maneuver cautiously to avoid splits that could endanger efforts to fight back against the far right. As long as Melenchon refuses to step back from the limelight, his intransigent class war rhetoric will be seized on by centrists and the far right as evidence of the supposed dangers the left poses to French society. If, however, a way can be found to convince Melenchon to accept a lower profile, the left could find itself in a strong position to attract a growing number of voters who are both fed up with Macron’s arrogance and profoundly hostile to Le Pen’s reactionary ambitions. Whether the French left can overcome such challenges remains an open question. But the NPF’s decisive role in this parliamentary election campaign reflects a remarkable recovery by a political tradition that had been pushed to the margins by Macron’s victories in 2017 and 2022. Ensemble’s cooperation with the NPF by withdrawing its candidates in 83 three-way races to strengthen the chances of defeating the RN in the second round has made it more difficult for Macron to equate the economic risks posed by parts of the left with the similar dangers the far right poses to the French economy, but more importantly, to the rule of law. After the elections are over, Macron’s ability to govern will require that he abandon the tactics against the left that had been crucial to his initial success. In a scenario where he needs to attract support from the NPF’s MPs to pass legislation in parliament, the left will have opportunities to influence policy and build momentum toward greater electoral success in 2027.
Dominant Theme
In an election whose dominant theme has been the surge of support for the far right, a resilient left could end up having the last laugh after all. Macron’s re-election against Le Pen in April 2022 was by a narrower margin, with Le Pen winning 41 percent of the vote, compared to 33 percent five years earlier. The parliamentary elections that followed two months later indicated that many voters closer to the center-left were beginning to lose patience with Macron’s agenda. Even as the RN benefited from Le Pen’s momentum to secure 89 seats in France’s parliament, the Nupes alliance of leftist parties comprising Jean-Luc Melenchon’s populist France Unbowed (LFI), the center-left Socialist Party, and the EELV (France’s Green party) won 131 seats. With Ensemble having lost its absolute majority, this pincer movement from the left and far right resulted in parliamentary gridlock that continued even after the Socialist Party suspended its participation in the always acrimonious Nupes coalition in October. When the RN surged to over 33 percent of the vote in the European Parliament elections on June 9—more than double his party’s score—Macron clearly felt the situation was untenable.
Macron’s Dissolving of the Parliament Was a Misfired Gamble
In a huge gamble, Macron dissolved parliament and called snap elections. The extent to which Macron underestimated RN’s willingness to learn from past mistakes and abandon Eurosceptic policies that might scare pro-European Union voters was already noticeable in 2022. Yet the speed with which the left reconstituted its alliance through the New Popular Front despite the substantial ideological differences between its members is an indication that Ensemble’s leadership also miscalculated the level of frustration toward Macron’s government among left-wing voters. After watching Macron and Le Pen’s dominance unfold for seven years, the left’s determination to regain control of the policy agenda is likely to become a crucial dynamic that could reshape the future of French politics.
Conclusion
How much the left expands its parliamentary presence after the second-round voting remains uncertain. Whether any momentum it gains from the snap elections carries over to propel one of its standard-bearers into the presidency in 2027 will depend on how well the rival parties that comprise the coalition can sustain a basic level of cooperation. The chronic infighting that has historically torn France’s leftist parties apart or led to vicious competition between them has frequently played into the hands of their centrist and far-right opponents. To avoid repeating that scenario, the fractious parties of the NPF will have to overcome deep ideological differences as well as nasty personal rivalries. When it comes to handling ideological fault lines between the distinct political traditions that make up the NPF, a shared rejection of the market-oriented reforms pursued by Macron since 2017 has helped sustain a degree of unity across the left. Whether it was mass protests in January 2023 against Macron’s controversial pension reforms or previous opposition to his labor market reforms, anger over drastic changes to France’s health, education, and welfare systems have fostered a willingness to work together among senior figures within the NPF.
With the RN openly pursuing a reactionary agenda toward immigrant communities that would undermine the rule of law, while softening its rhetoric on LGBTQ+ rights but not hostility to them, profound fear of the consequences of a Le Pen victory in 2027 has also instilled a stronger sense of discipline among left-wing movements that are likely to become the first targets of repression from a far-right government. Yet such unity in defense of the democratic foundations of the French Republic is likely to fray if parties within the NPF start to influence the actual policymaking of the French government. The more social-democratic instincts of the Socialist Party when it comes to allowing substantial space for a market economy alone.
Kazi Anwarul Masud is a retired Bangladeshi diplomat. During his tenure, he worked in several countries as the ambassador of Bangladesh including Thailand, Vietnam, South Korea and Germany
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