How to stay populist? The Front National and the changing French party system

Abstract

The main aim of this contribution is to assess the relevance of the notion of ‘exclusionary populism’ for the characterisation of the Front National (FN) in France. Since its emergence in the 1970s, several categories or notions have been applied to this political party. Once considered as the resurgence of a traditional extreme right, it has since been classified as a case of a new European right-wing extremism, or as one of the neo-populist parties that obtained electoral successes in the 1990s. The recent evolution of the party has also been described as a sort of ‘normalisation’. Is therefore ‘exclusionary populism’ still a category that can grasp the evolution of the party, as well as its present position in the French party system? To answer this question, this article examines political discourses and various electoral platforms of the Front National to gather some empirical evidence. The argument is twofold: The Front National, despite its ‘dédiabolisation’ strategy, is still a classic populist party characterised by exclusionary populism and a sort of ‘catch-all populism’; its evolution is, however, dependent on the recent evolution of the French party system.

Keywords:

• Populism
• Front National
• French party system
• radical right

Acknowledgements

I would first like to thank Manuela Caiani and Paolo Graziano for giving me the opportunity to participate in this special issue on ‘varieties of populism’. Paolo Graziano, in particular, was able to encourage and comment on the paper throughout the various stages of its realisation. I would also like to thank the two anonymous reviewers of the journal, who have made a significant contribution to improving this paper by encouraging better argumentation and clarification of a various elements.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor

Yves Surel is Professor of Political Science at the Panthéon-Assas University (Paris 2). He also teaches at Sciences Po Paris and is researcher at the Centre d’études et de recherches en sciences administrative et politique (CERSA, CNRS-Paris 2). He has published extensively in comparative politics and policy analysis. On populism, he has published various books and papers, notably with Yves Mény, Par le peuple, pour le peuple (Paris: Fayard, 2000) and he co-edited, with Yves Mény, Democracies and the Populist Challenge (London: Palgrave, 2002). [[email protected]]

Notes

1 I will mainly refer to this party as the Front National in the paper, even if it has recently changed its name, becoming the Rassemblement National since 1 June 2018.

2 ‘The Perils of Perception’, recurrent survey published by Ipsos: http://perils.ipsos.com/. These data are often contrasted with the actual composition of religious beliefs in the world analysed by the Pew Research Center (http://www.pewforum.org/2015/04/02/religious-projection-table/2010/percent/all/).

3 The word ‘énarque’ is used to designate the former students of the Ecole nationale d’administration, where the higher civil servants are selected and trained.

4 Dominique Albertini, ‘Florian Philippot, l’apparatchik détesté du “Front profound”’, Libération, 26 May 2017.

5 J.-L. Mélenchon, ‘Discours de la Bastille’, 18 March 2012.

6 Interview with L’Express: ‘Mélenchon: “Populiste, moi? J’assume!”’, 16 September 2010.

7 https://melenchon.fr/2017/01/30/valls-valse-encore-une-victoire-du-degagisme/

8 I refer here to surveys conducted by the same institute, IFOP, with similar protocols on both elections.

9 Marc de Boni, ‘Marine Le Pen: “Mélenchon, je n’en peux plus!”’, Le Figaro, 6 September.

10 ‘Emmanuel Macron accepte d’être qualifié de candidat populiste’, Le Monde, 19 March 2017.

11 Louis Hausalter, ‘Florian Philippot démissionne du FN après la sanction de Marine Le Pen’, Marianne, 21 September 2017.

12 ‘La stratégie étriquée de Laurent Wauquiez’, Le Monde, 27 October 2017.