A few days ago, a survey carried out by Elabe caused a lot of talk. It showed that if the presidential election of 2022 were replayed today, it would lead to a victory for Marine Le Pen against Emmanuel Macron with a score of 55% of the vote. It is important not to overinterpret what is only a poll. On the one hand, because the particular anger inspired by the President of the Republic is linked to a very agonistic social context (and he will not be a candidate in the next election anyway). On the other hand, because to affirm that one would prefer to abstain rather than to block the RN is a form of abstraction which only makes sense when confronted with the real fear of its accession to power.
It remains that, for the first time, a poll gives the winning RN. The question that arises is therefore that of the tightness of the moral rampart which has until now confined this party to a space of relative ineligibility. In reality, this tightness is not at all self-evident. Thus, voting for Emmanuel Macron and, before him, for Jacques Chirac may have represented a cost for some individuals. In 2002, we even imagined going to vote with gloves to represent the disgust that the act inspired. If many did so despite everything, it was because the cost of inaction (abstaining when one of the candidates was on the far right) seemed too high to them. However, our brain generally has much more consideration for the costs of action than for those of inaction.
To understand this, consider two individuals who want to bet on a horse race. The first, Jean, chooses horse A, but he was tempted to bet on horse B. Paul, meanwhile, bet on horse B, but, at the last minute, he changes his choice and prefers A It is ultimately B who wins, and the two players, who bet A, therefore do not win the large sum that was at hand. Which of the two do you think will have the most regrets? This question, two famous psychologists, Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman, have made the subject of an experiment: 92% of individuals consider that Paul will be the most unhappy. In both cases, both Paul and Jean make a decision that causes them to lose, but Jean must assume the consequences of his non-action (after hesitation, he decides not to change his bet), while Paul is faced with the consequences of his action. We are more likely to regret the consequences of action than those of inaction. This is true in many areas: we do not want to be guilty of an action whose consequences would be morally reprehensible, and we are less careful when these consequences follow from inaction.
Countdown
A particular motivation is therefore needed so that the costs of inaction (abstaining from voting) can offset the costs of action (voting for Macron). In this particular case, it holds if the RN inspires awe that makes abstaining flicker guiltily. It still holds if the alternative seems a lesser evil. But all the conditions are met today for this to no longer be the case. The notabilisation strategy of the RN is more profitable than the carnival posture of rebellious France. It makes it easy to forget that the far-right party hides in its ranks anti-abortion or vaccine-skeptic individuals, for example. The fact that, in the particular circumstances of the contestation of the law on pensions and of a certain form of administration of power, the Elysée appears to some as the door to Hell, notably attenuates, by a halo effect, the symbolic difference between Marine Le Pen and the rest of the politicians.
Today, the vote against the far right, which had been placed by the concert of unanimity under the regime of an ethics of conviction (we do not vote for the RN and we never abstain from it whatever the conditions), is gradually shifting to that of an ethic of responsibility (What are the consequences of having voted for Macron?). In these circumstances, one wonders whether the costs of inaction, which sometimes weigh little in our minds, can sustainably offset the costs of action. Despite the cacophony present in the theater of politics today, we sometimes have the feeling of hearing the ticking of a countdown.
*Gérald Bronner is a sociologist and professor at the Sorbonne University