Despite the Eurosceptic rhetoric of the radical left-wing La France insoumise (LFI) party and its leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon, a new survey shows that LFI supporters largely favour the EU.
The survey, published by French think tank Fondation Jean-Jaurès, seeks to anticipate how the left-wing NUPES party coalition, created on the eve of the June legislative elections, will fare.
Disagreements abound between the parties that make up the coalition – especially over EU policy. Debates over whether to “disobey” European regulations dominated the legislative campaign and caused divisions between the greens (EELV) and the socialists (PS), two NUPES members.
However, Mélenchon had set the pace of coalition negotiations and imposed his terms, benefiting from strong results in the presidential elections, with 21,95% in the first round and only 400,000 votes short of making it to the second round.
Mélenchon has been a fierce critic of the EU, most recently over the EU’s response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. He notably defended Moscow’s line that NATO was threatening Russia.
French left is still divided on Europe
The French left, now the strongest opposition facing Emmanuel Macron’s presidential majority in this year’s legislative elections set for Sunday (19 June), remains divided regarding issues related to the European Union.
LFI supporters’s pro-EU stance “surprising”
The survey, however, highlights that Mélenchon’s critical stance against the EU is not shared by his supporters.
“Only 58% of LFI supporters deem EU membership to be a good thing (compared to 81% for those supporting the PS and EELV). However, that’s not to say LFI supporters reject the EU completely: only 10% consider that membership in the EU is a bad thing, which is only slightly more than supporters of the PS (3%) and EELV (7%),” the survey found.
“These results are surprising,” Antoine Bristielle, the survey’s author, said in an interview with EURACTIV. “We had the feeling during the campaign that LFI was strongly anti-European while EELV and PS were in favour of more Europe. The data says something else: Euroscepticism among LFI supporters is marginal”.
“Differences may emerge, for example, between a more federal Europe and a Europe of the nations. But in principle, EU membership is seen as something positive,” he added.
To Bristielle, LFI’s positions on the EU have evolved. Mélenchon was particularly critical of the EU during the eurozone crisis. Still, over time his position has shifted from calling for France to leave the EU to speaking of “disobeying” rules on a case-by-case basis.
The ‘radicality’ paradox of the French Greens
The left-wing alliance NUPES, which finished neck-and-neck with President Emmanuel Macron’s Ensemble! in the first parliamentary election round, has reinforced the view that French Greens are too radical to govern. The reality, however, is much more nuanced.
The unknowns of the 2024 European elections
When it comes to the long-run stability of the NUPES coalition, preparations ahead of the 2024 European elections will also prove crucial and complex.
“From an electoral point of view, it is in the interest of the socialists and the greens to run on their own: the proportional system favours smaller parties – and so the campaign would give the greens or the socialists a powerful platform at the national level”, Bristielle told EURACTIV.
“But if left-wing parties have the 2027 presidential elections on their radar, divisions for the European elections make no sense. This would confuse voters and create a feeling of disingenuous unity.”
The most profound disagreement among NUPES party members is not about the EU but rather the coalition’s opposition strategy to Macron’s government.
Greens and socialists are overwhelmingly in favour of collaborating with Macron’s majority party – if only on a case-by-case basis. This figure drops to 45% for LFI.
LFI’s opposition is part of a broader strategy to appear as the only “true” opposition party, as illustrated by LFI MP Éric Coquerel, who told EURACTIV he would position himself as “a real counter-power to the government’s neo-liberal policy”.
Other disagreements exist on nuclear energy. While 77% of PS supporters either “completely agree” or “rather agree” to support nuclear energy production in France, the figure falls to 47% for LFI and 39% for the Greens.
How the French social democrats could stage a comeback
After years of wrestling with poor electoral results and dwindling political importance, France’s social democrats have a chance to get back to the centre stage ahead of the 2027 presidential election.
[Edited by Benjamin Fox]
Source: euractiv.com
