The New Popular Front Against the Fascist Threat in France
Logo du Nouveau Front Populaire (2024)
When, just after the announcement of the results of the European elections, French President Macron surprised everyone by deciding to dissolve the Parliament and to call general elections for June 30, it was obvious that he aspired to repeat, once again, the successful blackmail thanks to which he had won his two presidential elections: to find himself alone against Marine Le Pen and her far-right party, thus forcing left-wing voters to vote for him in the absence of a left-wing alternative of their own. Moreover, everything pointed to the success of his blackmail manoeuvre: the fragmented left and its mutually loathsome parties could not reconcile and ally themselves in the three weeks between them and the first round of the elections, and even less in the six days (!) they would have had to submit their candidacies.
Unfortunately for Mr Macron, things turned out very differently. Under the heavy pressure exerted on the leaders of these left-wing parties not only by their party base but also by a very large part of the population who suddenly realised that the fascist far right was literally one step away from power, these parties met, discussed and agreed in just 3-4 days not only to join forces in what they called the New Popular Front (Nouveau Front Populaire) but also to adopt a quite bold “breakaway program” with the neoliberal policies of the last 40 years!
As far as Mr Macron is concerned, the conclusion is therefore clear and can be summed up in the saying… « the biter bitten”. And this is because his ‘high-ranking’ economic and other local and foreign friends are now accusing him of ‘irresponsibility’ which is pushing France ‘into chaos’ and ‘to the brink of collapse’. And because the French population is now abandoning him once and for all, leaving the electoral battlefield and beyond to be dominated by the extreme right and the united left, without any of the well-known “moderate” “centre-right” and “centre-left” safeguards that allow capital to rule by muddying the waters of the class confrontation…
The fact is that the despair and panic that prevailed immediately after the announcement of the results of the European elections on the evening of June 9th, was followed the next day by hope. And two days later, by optimism. This was because, hour by hour, the prospect of the left-wing parties coming together not only to block the path to power of the far-right National Rally (Rassemblement Nationale-RN), but also to take over the government of the country by winning the elections, was growing stronger by the hour! Of course, the time available to the New Popular Front to make its message and programme known is minimal, not even two weeks. However, everyone, friends and foes alike, admits what the first polls are beginning to confirm: the New People’s Front of the united French left is developing a dynamic that already puts it within touching distance of Marine Le Pen’s party. In other words, anything is possible, even a victory for the New Popular Front, even though the far right is still the favourite in the forthcoming French elections.
Indeed, it is indicative of this dynamic that is developing these days in the bowels of French society that, as everything seems to indicate, it even manages to overcome the shocks caused to the New Popular Front (NPF) by the ‘aberrations’ of some of its leaders. Such as those caused by the well-known authoritarianism and egotism of Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the historical leader of its largest component, the « France Insoumise-LFI » (France Unbowed) party, who has chosen this crucial moment to purge his party of historical members who dared to publicly… disagree with him. And what is even worse is that Mélenchon has done so in double violation of the agreement of the NPF’s partners, which expressly stipulates that all outgoing MPs and councillors are his candidates, while anyone with a court conviction cannot be his candidate. By imposing the candidacy of his favourite outgoing MP Quatennens, who was convicted of domestic violence, and by depriving his outgoing MPs “challengers” of the possibility of being re-elected, Mélenchon has given the enemies of the New People’s Front and the media the opportunity to denounce his “undemocratic authoritarianism” at the very moment when he is denouncing others as undermining democracy. However, the angry pressure from the grassroots was such that the “favoured” outgoing MP was finally forced to withdraw his candidacy, and the “cleared” outgoing MPs are finally standing for election with the support of all the other components of the New Popular Front and a large part of the voters and members of the « Insoumis « …
The conclusion is that France is experiencing the most critical days in its post-war history as it is now clear that in the second round of its forthcoming elections, in the vast majority of contests, only two factions will face each other: on the one hand, the fascist far-right of Le Pen’s National Rally, which has its origins in Petain’s quisling regime and the OAS murderers of “French Algeria”. And on the other hand, the New Popular Front, which, as its name suggests, is inspired by the precedent of the Popular Front created in 1934, under pressure from the bases of the Socialist and Communist parties against the – even then intense – threat of the fascist gangs. And which won the elections in 1936, to implement not only its programme, which was rather timid, but also the much more radical demands of the millions of workers who took part in the largest strikes and factory occupations in French history until May 1968, which led to the realisation, for the first time in world history, of “paid holidays”, the 40-hour week, unemployment benefit, nationalisations of important industrial sectors, etc. which were not included in the programme of the Popular Front!
So, as in 1936, everything is possible today in the outcome of the all-out class conflict which begins, but does not end, with the June 30 elections. The New Popular Front, which brings together in its ranks all the nuances of the French left, from the LFI to the Socialist Party (PS), and from the Communists (PCF) and the Ecologistes (Les Ecologistes) to the extreme leftists of the New Anti-Capitalist Party (NPA), is now fighting a battle that goes beyond the borders of France. With its clear programmatic positions on the side of the Palestinians and Ukrainians fighting for their existence against their oppressors and murderers, the NPF is de facto the hope and alternative for the workers and oppressed of the whole of Europe, both Western and Eastern, over which the spectre of racism, fascism and war hovers ever more menacingly. No doubt that his struggle is our struggle too
In France, a Bold New Take on ‘Liberté,
Egalité, Fraternité’
The upcoming French general election has fans of grand fortune more than a little uneasy
By Sm Pizzigati
France has rendered unto the world, over the past quarter-century, a distinct public service. Thanks to the trailblazing research of three French scholars — Thomas Piketty, Emmanuel Saez, and Gabriel Zucman — we know much more about the world’s maldistributed wealth than ever before.
Could France now be on the brink of making another significant contribution to a more equal global future? That question has suddenly become surprisingly timely. French voters, after an unexpected turn of political events, will shortly have a real opportunity to begin shearing our global super rich down to something approximating democratic size.
France’s surprising turn of events started earlier this month when millions of voters went to the polls to elect the 720 members of the next European Parliament. For Europe’s centrist political leaders, most notably French president Emmanuel Macron, the results would turn out to be a disaster. Candidates with Macron’s French centrist coalition garnered less than half the 31 percent of the vote that the French far-right coalition, the anti-immigrant Rassemblement National, took in.
Macron’s reaction? He quickly dissolved the French National Assembly and scheduled a “snap election” to replace it, with the first voting round coming June 30 and the second July 7. Then, right on the heels of Macron’s move, another stunning surprise. In the June 9 European Parliament balloting, France’s four top left parties had competed separately. For the new French National Assembly elections, the four parties announced, they would be fielding a single, unified slate of candidates.
That single slate — the Nouveau Front Populaire, the New Popular Front — has what many observers see as a real shot at beating the election’s initial favorite, the French far-right coalition led by Marine Le Pen. And if the Nouveau Front Populaire does gain legislative control, France could soon be experiencing a distinct egalitarian shift. The Nouveau Front Populaire, as Jacobin analyst Harrison Stetler notes, has “laid out a radical program to rebuild France’s dilapidated democracy.”
The New Popular Front has framed this “radical program” as a three-part “legislative contract” with French voters. The first part lays out the “emergency” steps the new government will take in its first 15 days in office. The second covers the New Popular Front’s action plan for its first 100 days and the third the longer-range “transformations” the Front plans on pursuing.
The struggle for a more equitable distribution of French income and wealth figures prominently throughout all these three stages. The Front’s “legislative contract,” points out Jacobin’s Stetler, “would mark a clean break” from the Macron years and their “transfer of economic power to the wealthiest.”
In the emergency first stage, the Front is promising to advance a quick hike to the French minimum wage coupled with new taxes on “the superprofits of agro-industrialists and mass retailers.” The first 100 days will concentrate on enacting five legislative packages that include moves “to abolish the privileges of billionaires.”
Among those moves: increasing the progressivity of the French income tax by adding new tax brackets that will subject ultra-high incomes to higher overall tax rates, establishing a meaningful tax on vast accumulations of wealth, and setting a limit on how much the already rich can inherit.
The New Popular Front legislative contract also aims to turn French corporations into something more than wealth-accumulation machines for the execs who run them.
Those corporate accumulation machines have of late been running in overdrive. One current French CEO, the LVMH luxury giant’s Bernard Arnault, is now sitting upon the world’s third-largest personal fortune. The Bloomberg Billionaires Index puts his latest net worth at just under $200 billion.
Fortunes like Arnault’s would shrink significantly if a New Popular Front administration gets to take power. The Front’s legislative contract promises to “make employees real actors in economic life by reserving for them at least a third” of the seats on corporate boards and expanding the worker “right of intervention” in how companies operate.
The legislative contract the Front is proposing would, in still another egalitarian move, “create a right of pre-emption to allow employees to take over their business in the form of a cooperative.”
The New Popular Front’s vision extends outward to Europe as well. The Front’s legislative contract calls for taxing Europe’s richest — and corporate “superprofits” — at the continental level to increase the budget resources available to the European Union.
None of this agenda, of course, will ever see the light of legislative day unless the New Popular Front maintains enough unity among its four prime partners — France Insoumise, the Parti Socialiste, Les Écologistes, and the Parti Communiste — to top the far-right.
“It’s going to be either the far right,” as Greens party leader Marine Tondelier puts it, “or us.”
France’s most recent public opinion polling has the New Popular Front gaining on the ultra-right Rassemblement National, the National Rally party that Marine LePen leads, with the Front now up to almost 30 percent of the vote and the National Rally hovering just a few points above that.
Meanwhile, in many districts across France, candidates with president Macron’s center-right party now appear likely to not even win enough votes in the June 30 first round — at least 12.5 percent of the total cast — to make it into the July 7 second.
And if the New Popular Front should win, then France just might be able to resume its role as a global egalitarian beacon. Back in the 20th century, the top 1 percent’s share of French wealth fell from 56.7 percent of the nation’s total in 1905 down to a mere 15.8 percent in 1984. By 2022, that 15.8 percent share had rebounded up by over half, to 24 percent.
What does France’s future now hold? We’ll know much more in just a few weeks.
Sam Pizzigati an associate fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies, has written widely on income and wealth concentration, with op-eds and articles in publications ranging from the New York Times to Le Monde Diplomatique. He co-edits Inequality.org Among his books: The Rich Don’t Always Win: The Forgotten Triumph over Plutocracy that Created the American Middle Class, 1900-1970 (Seven Stories Press). His latest book: The Case for a Maximum Wage (Polity). A veteran labor movement journalist, Pizzigati spent 20 years directing publishing at America’s largest union, the 3.2 million-member National Education Association.
Fascist nightmare in France: What should anticapitalists do?
It is a historic moment in France. After the far-right National Rally (RN), led by Marine Le Pen, gained 31.4% of the votes in the European elections, and President Macron’s party got only half that, Macron dissolved parliament and called a snap election.
Early projections, uncertain but scary, predicted a parliament with no overall majority, in which RN would have more seats than any other single party and which would see well-dressed fascist Jordan Bardella appointed as Prime Minister.
I do not consider this the most likely outcome, but the danger is very real. Already the media are full of interviews with various union leaders, business leaders and voluntary sector representatives asking them: “How will your organisation adapt once RN is in government?” The idea of a far-right government as a realistic and acceptable option has been normalised.
If RN were to take office, it would be a catastrophe. Even without a parliamentary majority, it would have the power to appoint or dismiss hundreds of top civil servants in every field, control over the police, education and cultural sectors and so on. Its capacity to persecute Muslims, trade unionists, LGBT people and others would be terrifying, and green initiatives and safeguards would be thrown on the rubbish heap.
There are three main reasons that the far-right vote is so high. First, Le Pen has succeeded in persuading the majority of the population that RN has broken with its past and is just a party like any others. We who think the organisation is a threat to democracy are now in a minority (41% according to a recent poll). Secondly, Macron has been helping the far right by adopting parts of its program, in particular a whole series of laws victimising Muslims, as part of a “divide and rule” strategy. Thirdly, Macron’s vicious attacks on pensions, benefits and public services have increased the misery that fascism feeds on. Finally, the left has not organised a serious, permanent, long-term, mass national campaign of harassment and education to stop Le Pen from building her party structures. (The left has generally considered that building a radical alternative is sufficient, and that there is little need to take aim specifically at RN activities.)
Unity can beat the fascists
There is everything to play for in the weeks to come. At the June 9 European elections, nine million people voted for the far right. Eight million voted for some shade of left-wing politics. Seven million voted for Macron or for the traditional right-wing parties. Twenty-four million people stayed at home. Three-quarters of these abstainers sometimes turn out to vote at election time, so could be persuaded to do so this time.
RN is still a party with a fascist core, and still uses a logo based on the flame symbol of 20th century Italian fascist Benito Mussolini’s supporters.
RN pretends to defend ordinary people even as it regularly votes in parliament against their interests. It voted against raising the minimum wage in 2022, against rent freezes last year, against increasing resources for victims of domestic violence in 2016 and more. It promises to slash inheritance taxes for the rich and to reserve social housing for people of French nationality. It aims at increasing prison sentences and making it even harder to prosecute killer cops
Unity is required to defeat the fascists — in parliament, in the streets and elsewhere.
Two different types of unity have been proposed. Many have suggested the unity of all democratic parties — left and right — against the fascists. Former Socialist party (SP) President, François Hollande insisted this week that this is the best option. It has been tried at various elections in France over the past 25 years. Millions voted for Macron in presidential elections in 2017 and 2022 purely “to keep the fascists out”. A huge row broke out at the time on the left between those who wanted to vote Macron against Le Pen and those who would vote for neither.
This idea of unity with neoliberals against the far right has been a disaster. Macron’s neoliberal crusade was strengthened by the votes lent to him by left-wingers, and, predictably enough, Macron’s strategy was to defeat Le Pen by stealing parts of her program — an idea that backfired and led to millions more voting for RN.
The New Popular Front
We need unity of the left. It is extremely good news then that the four main left parties: La France Insoumise (France in Revolt, FI), the SP, the Communist Party and the Greens — have agreed on an electoral pact this week, so that there will be only one left candidate per constituency. Several smaller groups, such as the New Anticapitalist Party (NPA), have joined the pact.
These elections take place in two rounds, beginning on June 30. If there are several left candidates in a town, the chances of a second round opposing only right and far right are much increased. So this agreement will automatically reduce the number of far-right MPs elected by several dozen. But it also has two other crucial strong points.
Firstly, people will be able to vote for a break with neoliberalism. An alliance that simply says “No to fascism!” is not enough (especially when millions are not convinced RN are fascists). This is why the new electoral alliance has also produced a program for government.
The alliance has chosen to call itself the New Popular Front (Nouveau Front Populaire, NFP), in reference to a radical French government in the 1930s, which is remembered for important social reforms such as paid holidays — although its actual history is far less glorious than its reputation.
The alliance may be misunderstood by some Marxist readers, because it is only made up of left-wing organisations, whereas Marxists often use the term “popular front” to refer to broader alliances, which include parties that are not left-wing.
Its program, published on June 14, begins by declaring the need for a complete break with Macronism.
It promises that a left-alliance government, if elected, will raise the minimum wage by 15% and all public employees’ wages by 10%. It will cancel the recent two-year rise in the standard retirement age and aim at returning retirement to 60 over time. It will cancel the recent cuts in unemployment benefits and re-establish the wealth tax abolished by Macron.
Other plans include building a million homes, defending tenants’ rights, investing heavily in opposing violence against women, and abrogating the recently adopted racist immigration laws.
A dynamic campaign could encourage millions more to vote for the NFP. And the campaign is set to be dynamic. The danger of the far right, left unity and the radical program are three enormous encouragements.
Several thousand activists joined the FI’s networks in the 48 hours after the snap elections were announced. As the four organisations negotiated, hundreds of young people rallied outside the building, chanting for the need for unity.
The mobilisation against the far right is not limited to political parties. Demonstrations against the far right were called by the main trade unions in 200 towns over June 15‒16. Human rights groups, feminist organisations, cooperatives and campaign groups such as ATTAC and Greenpeace are calling for people to vote and mobilise against fascism.
Serious mistakes
Three far-left publications in France have declared this week their opposition to the NFP. One argument they use is that elections don’t matter and electoral campaigns “undermine” the “real” antifascist movement. This is a serious mistake.
Certainly, organising outside parliament to oppose Le Pen and Bardella is essential. But how could we attract large numbers of people to fight fascism while showing them that we did not care whether Bardella gets to be Prime Minister or not?
The other argument used against the NFP is that now that FI is proposing a joint program with the Greens and the Socialist Party, many important, more radical elements of FI’s program, could be downplayed or omitted.
For example, stopping nuclear power is not mentioned in the program, nor is leaving NATO.
However, one cannot propose an alliance on the basis that other parties abandon their political ideas. In addition, there is nothing in the compromise program that prevents each party from continuing to campaign for its own priorities.
Importantly, should the left win the election, there will still be a need for mass movements and strikes to make sure the new government implements real change, faced with the organised hostility of investors, bankers, billionaires and their ilk.
While there is plenty of enthusiasm in the united left campaign, it will nevertheless be an uphill struggle, and much patient explanation will be required.
Defeatism is common; you even hear people who have generally left sympathies suggesting that it would not be a bad thing for RN to be in government for a few years “to show people how dreadful they are”. Many are tempted by Macron’s lie that “extremism” of left and right are similar.
Anticapitalists must build the election campaign and the antifascist mobilisation, as well as putting forward our own arguments. A radical left government would be under enormous attack by international and French capital. We need to be discussing what happens to left governments under pressure and what can be done about it. These debates in and around the FI have been rare, partly because the most prominent Marxist organisations have not generally debated seriously with left reformists.
There will be many ups and downs. No doubt between the two rounds of elections there will be another blazing row about whether it is acceptable or not to vote for Macron’s candidate against a fascist candidate. This is just one moment in a long political crisis.
The existence of a left-wing alternative and the rise of the FI are the result of the mass working-class struggles of the past 30 years, in which it has been shown that political class consciousness is widespread in France.
If we get a left government, there will be much work to do to make sure promises are carried out. If the elections go badly for us, it will just be the beginning of the struggle.
[John Mullen is an anticapitalist activist in the Paris region and a supporter of France Insoumise. His website is randombolshevik.org.]
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