Far-right and hard-left supporters turned out en masse for Sunday's French presidential elections, which saw traditional mainstream parties underperform catastrophically. As voters gravitate more towards political extremes, France’s political landscape is witnessing a reorganisation some experts have dubbed a "three-way split".
Projections have confirmed that President Emmanuel Macron will face far-right leader Marine Le Pen in the second round of France’s presidential elections on April 24. Garnering over 27 percent of the vote in the first round, Macron was slightly ahead of Le Pen, who earned 23 percent in total. Far-left firebrand Jean-Luc Mélenchon came in third with 22 percent of votes, an uptick from the 20 percent he drew five years ago.
The parties that once dominated France’s political landscape on the left and on the right, however, have fallen by the wayside. Together, the traditionally right-wing Les Républicains and left-wing Socialists got less than 10 percent of the vote, a devastating blow to both. Their humiliating elimination puts the two parties at a decisive moment in which they can either work to rebuild a feasible political project or see themselves relegated to the history books.
But the sweeping victories of Macron, Le Pen and even Mélenchon – centrist, far-right and far-left candidates – tell another story. With a whopping 73 percent of the total votes in their favour, France’s political landscape is facing a restructuring – or even a “complete reorganisation of the parties around these three poles”, according to Claire Tourmen, lecturer at UC Berkeley’s French Department. She described the phenomenon as a “tripolarisation”.
A fatal downfall
The Socialist Party, now spearheaded by Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo, has steadily fallen in the ranks as France’s political landscape has shifted to the right over the years. No longer basking in the limelight of former Socialist president François Mitterand’s historic upheaval of the political scene in 1981 – in which he put an end to 25 years of uninterrupted conservative rule – the party that helped François Hollande win the 2012 election barely reached 2 percent of votes this time around.
The disastrous result is a significant downgrade even from 2017, when Socialist candidate Benoît Hamon only got 6.36 percent of votes. Already deemed catastrophic at the time, the party had five years to turn their campaign around and rebuild their agenda, but clearly have failed to do so.
Over the years, left-wing voters have instead been enticed by incumbent Macron’s centrism or dazzled by Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s far-left revolutionary rhetoric, dividing the French left as a result. The rift grew even larger this year when neither Mélenchon, the Greens nor the Communist candidates agreed to form an alliance with Hidalgo.
And with the Socialist Party unable to reach the 5 percent of votes necessary to see their campaign expenditures reimbursed by the state, their financial future is at stake. The cash-strapped party was previously forced to sell its historic headquarters in 2017.
“The left has never been able to recover the working classes …,” Remi Lefebvre, political scientist at the University of Lille, told the Grand Continent political journal. “Instead of reinventing itself, the party stuck with the bureaucratic middle classes and civil servants. It’s not necessarily bad, but it’s not enough,” he said.
France’s traditional right-wing party Les Républicains, which has been in opposition for 10 years now, also failed to woo back voters who turned to Macron or far-right leader Marine Le Pen. Despite its strong roots – which can be traced back to World War II resistance hero Charles de Gaulle, who built the foundations of the French presidency – the party came in fifth in the first round.
Les Républicains candidate Valérie Pécresse garnered less than 5 percent of the vote, a staggering drop compared to the 20 percent her predecessor François Fillon won five years ago. In her concession speech, she called the result “a personal and collective disappointment”, defending her struggle by saying she “had to fight a battle on two fronts, between the president’s party and the extremes that joined forces to divide and beat the republican right”.
On Monday, Pécresse launched an appeal asking French people for “urgent help” to “cover the remaining costs” of her campaign and pointed to the “critical situation” Les Républicains are finding themselves in. Having failed to reach the required 5 percent of the vote, the party will not be reimbursed for the estimated €7 million it spent on the campaign.
“This morning, I am launching a national appeal for donations to all those who gave me their votes, but also to all those who chose to vote tactfully yesterday, and finally to all the French people who believe in political pluralism and freedom of expression,” she said, specifying that donations could be made via her website.
‘Three-way split’
“[Macron, Le Pen and Mélenchon], who were already present in the previous elections… are doing better than they did in 2017,” Jérémie Peltier, head of studies at French think tank Fondation Jean Jaurès, told FRANCE 24.
“These three candidates represent the three-way split that has come to define French political life,” he explained, pointing to the new “tripolarisation” as a major lesson learned from the first round of this year’s presidential elections.
But this new trend does not offer any certainty for the future of France’s political landscape. If Macron wins in the second round, he will have reached his term limit by 2027 and will not be able to run for re-election. With no clear successors in his party and a lack of on-the-ground presence in city halls or regional councils, his voters may be feeling relieved but “not very confident, according to Tourmen.
Though Mélenchon rallied widespread support this year, he has said this presidential campaign – his third – would be his last. In a speech following projected results on Sunday, he urged his young supporters to “do better” and refused to admit failure.
Le Pen has also said this would be her last presidential campaign.
Moreover, Les Républicains and the Socialists are unlikely to make a comeback. Les Républicains will have to rethink their strategy and design a conservative message in tune with voters' expectations. While they still have control of the Senate and municipal councils across France, the party has failed to find a new luminary since Nicolas Sarkozy was defeated in 2012. They even run the risk of needing to join the far-right forces gaining ground in France if they want to survive.
The Socialists, on their end, only have 25 seats in parliament today. Hanging on to the upcoming legislative elections in June as a last resort, first party secretary Olivier Faure called on the “left wing and environmental forces, on social forces, on citizens ready to commit to build together a pact for social and environmental justice”, in a speech on Sunday. If they lose more seats in June, however, state funding for their party will fall even more.
For Peltier, the vote offers little promise of redemption. “I’m not sure that the legislative elections will be the moment for [Les Républicains and the Socialists] to recover their losses,” he said.
“[The two parties] have elected representatives, mayors, regional presidents and departmental presidents across France. But the truth is that, time and again, the legislative elections more or less mirror the results of the presidential elections,” he explained.
