We thought it was dead, but it’s still moving. This Sunday, July 7, the second round of the legislative elections saw, to everyone’s surprise, the New Popular Front come out on top. The score of the alliance of left-wing parties, organized in a few days, exceeded that of the former presidential majority, Ensemble, and especially of the National Rally. If the advance of the far-right party is confirmed compared to the previous legislative elections, in 2022, the party obtained neither an absolute nor a relative majority. The clear call for a “republican front”, as well as the numerous withdrawals – in the majority of the 306 three-way races – will have got the better of the RN wave. The anti-fascist imagination, in France, still seems to work among a part of the French. Analysis with Gilles Vergnon, lecturer in contemporary history at Sciences Po Lyon and author of Anti-fascism in France from Mussolini to Le Pen (Rennes University Press) as well as Changing Life? The Time of Socialism in Europe from 1875 to the Present Day (Folio History).
L’Express: How do you analyze this survival of the Republican front?
Gilles Vergnon: The anti-fascist imagination still works in France, more than I thought myself. I did not see, for example, left-wing voters rushing to elect Elisabeth Borne when they were in the streets for months to boo her on her pension reform. I also had a hard time seeing Emmanuel Macron’s voters going to vote for Raphaël Arnault, spokesperson for the Young Anti-Fascist Guard, in Vaucluse. The principle is quite simple: in terms of votes, the National Rally has 10.1 million votes, ahead of the New Popular Front. But when you are in a logic of all against one, it obviously loses in the second round. This already happened in the 1950s, with the Communist Party. It lost every election because no one wanted to ally with it.
Why is this happening today with the RN? There are political reasons – obvious reasons linked to the program. But beyond that, there is an imaginary, stated in an even more powerful way than a few years ago, according to which Hitler and fascism are at our doorstep and that we must therefore vote for everything that is against him. It works. It is all the more extraordinary since Lionel Jospin himself said, twenty-three years ago now, that Jean-Marie Le Pen’s National Front was a dangerous party, but was not a fascist party. It was true. The RN is neither fascist in its program, nor in its modes of organization or in its methods. It is in line with the extreme national right. This was also true for Jean-Marie Le Pen’s FN.
But that doesn’t explain everything. The controversy over dual nationals probably cost them a lot of votes. The RN also proved, during this campaign, that it was not prepared. This is also proof that the RN is not a fascist party: a fascist party has great organizational skills. Here, we are dealing with a party incapable of organizing and seriously preparing a few hundred candidates.
What was the most negative element for the RN? The lack of preparation, or the imagination mobilized around the Republican front?
Both. The part of the electorate that traditionally votes LR must have certainly turned away from the RN in the face of the unpreparedness of its candidates, some of whom were sometimes lunar, others who made unacceptable statements. Then, there was this anti-fascist imagination that still works, but less than before. It depends where you go: it works well in the metropolises and in the West, in those regions of France that are doing “well”. The RN continues to be associated with the image “RN = FN = Pétain = Hitler”. It is a party that has largely cleaned up its facade but it is still not enough to convince.
You evoke the image of an RN sent back to the “dark hours” of History. Do you think that the French people who are blocking it see themselves as resistance fighters against barbarity?
Pretending to be Jean Moulin without risking torture or death is quite comfortable, but yes, it is one of the driving forces behind the vote. Beyond the joke, many French people wanted to oppose a resistance movement to the rise of the RN, reinforced by the declarations of certain party leaders and their very vague program. National mythologies, above all, are still very strong. Calling on the Popular Front is, in a way, pronouncing the magic word. Even if it lasted a very short time, this coalition is associated with paid holidays, the sunny days of early 1936… It is a very strong and very positive image. Even if the New Popular Front has little to do with the old one, brandishing these words has a direct impact on the electorate. We saw it with last night’s results. Our collective imaginations, especially on the left, have stopped at the 1930s and the Second World War. We are stuck in a very French time warp. This phenomenon exists much less in other countries, notably in Italy, which saw the political party led by Giorgia Meloni come to power.
France does indeed seem to be one of the only – if not the only – countries to benefit from a republican front. How can this be explained?
This is not quite the case: it also exists in Spain. Last year, to everyone’s surprise, Pedro Sanchez managed to win a dissolution that he had provoked, leading to the defeat of Vox, the far-right party. This is partly because in Spain the authoritarian dictatorship lasted until 1975. It is quite recent, and many people still alive lived through Francoism. The imaginary is very real, very lively. In Italy, on the other hand, there has never been a major trial of fascism. The fascist regime remained in place until 1943, or even 1945 in some regions of the country. Its major Nuremberg trial did not take place. The neo-fascist party was reconstituted very quickly and is, ultimately, part of the furniture in Italy. When the historic leader of the Italian Communist Party – when it still existed – Enrico Berlinguer died, the head of the MSI, the Italian neo-fascist party, said: “We didn’t agree on anything but he was a great Italian.” And he sent a wreath to his funeral. Can you really imagine Jean-Marie Le Pen putting flowers on Georges Marchais’ grave? It’s unthinkable in France. Our anti-fascist imagination is therefore more alive.
You mention the “time warp” in which France is evolving today. Do you think that a certain French guilt, particularly in relation to the Vichy regime, could still guide the vote today?
In 1987, historian Henri Rousso published Vichy syndrome, in which he describes the collective desire to forget collaboration in favor of national unity. He wondered if this syndrome would continue to function over time. Today, it has been proven that we still have it. For a simple reason, and to use Rousso’s words: the Second World War is the last catastrophe. Even more than anywhere else, all our imaginations are still stuck on this sequence.
In France, the Second World War is THE great catastrophe. It is the defeat of 1940, the Occupation, it is Vichy, but it is also the Resistance… This scene is constantly replayed because there are no other decisive historical moments that have really taken place since. Be careful, however: in certain rural regions or in the South of France, this imaginary is eroding. It hardly even works anymore. But it remains active in many areas, such as in the West of France, or even in the metropolises.
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