The defeat of Marine Le Pen
The second round of France’s regional elections have left the extreme-right empty-handed. The agreement between Republicans and Socialists, and the high turnout at the polls, blocked the progress of the eurosceptic front. A strong message to EU countries’ leaders gathered in Brussels for the summit on terrorism, migration and economic crisis.
Marine Le Pen wins with flying colors (a week ago). Marine Le Pen has lost (today). After the second round of regional elections in France, commentators, politicians and media outlets alike have softened their tones or resumed their first positions, often contradicting themselves. So while in the light of the first round the results of National Front had become the symbol of a nationalistic victory, capable of carrying the Eurosceptic flame across the Old Continent, today FN is described as the loser, unable to break through the “Republican front” that handed 7 regions to the Gaullist center-right of Nicolas Sarkozy, 5 to the Socialists and allies of François Hollande, while Corsica remains proudly in the hands of the regionalist-separatists
The extreme, “no euro, no Europe”, xenophobic right, represented by the Le Pen dynasty, remained empty-handed. Point blank? Not at all.
At the second round FN kept its 6 million votes, plus a few thousand more. It accentuated the traditional French bi-polarity – Gaullists versus Socialists – and became integrated as the third stable force present throughout the country and in all social classes, drawing many of its votes from the young generations, distant from a form of politics considered incapable of providing answers to the legitimate expectations of under-30 voters. The political agreement between the moderate right and the Socialists (wanted more by the latter than by the Gaullists, headed by a watered-down Sarkozy), the high electoral turnout, and a majority electoral system guaranteed by two rounds of votes, have enabled the cornering of Front National. However, its leader Marine Le Pen argues: “nonetheless the regime is in a state of suffering.” This means that – in an attempt to interpret her words – the political realm, which for a long time was confined to the palaces of power, now appears to have lost its contact with the voters, which instead, through consensus to FN, send messages of dissatisfactions, deep-rooted fears, unfulfilled expectations, new hopes.
France can only restart from there. And both “Roi” Hollande and his assumed opponent at 2017 presidential elections Sarkozy, are well aware of it.
Similarly, Merkel, Renzi, Cameron, Rajoy (whose political future depends on Dec. 20 parliamentary elections in Spain), and other European leaders due to meet this week in Brussels for the European Council, should not underestimate the message coming from the French polls.
In fact, it is no coincidence that on the agenda of the December 17-18 summit figure the three major issues that have been fuelling the euro-perplexed wave, marked by racist sentiments, which is flowing throughout Europe. These are: terrorism and security, refugee-crisis and border-control, crisis and new economic governance.
The umpteenth wake-up call in France cannot go unnoticed. European politicians must do their share, providing shared, concrete answers to meet the ongoing challenges. In the same way, civil society, the public opinion, the media, educational agencies, are all called to give their contribution to values and projects so that Europe will avoid the repeatedly announced and feared drift calling for new “walls” and barriers, that had risked becoming concrete reality, heralded by Marine Le Pen.
