Paris Jean-Luc Mélenchon lacks self-confidence and contempt for the policies of French President Emmanuel Macron. “We bring a new vision for the world and for society,” the new star of the French left called out to his supporters gathered at a concert hall in east Paris. “I am not telling you that we will create paradise overnight. But we will end hell.”
Many young people have come to hear the powerful speaker’s promises of salvation. The supporters who couldn’t find a place in the hall are standing in a small park in front of the building. You follow Mélenchon’s speech on a video screen. And they cheer when he says things like: “Our chances of winning are pretty high.”
Mélenchon speaks about this month’s general election, which he has recast as a quirky interpretation of the French constitution for the “third round” of the presidential election. In April, Mélenchon received 22 percent and missed out on the runoff against Emmanuel Macron, just behind right-wing nationalist Marine Le Pen. He has by no means resigned himself to defeat.
In recent weeks, Mélenchon has managed to unite the chronically fragmented left in France behind his party “La France Insoumise” (“Indomitable France”).
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The socialists are in the “New Ecological and Social Workers’ Union”, as are the Greens and the communists. Now he wants to take Macron’s majority in the National Assembly away – and thereby force the President to appoint him Prime Minister of a new government.
Far-reaching consequences for France’s role in Europe
The first round of voting will take place next Sunday, followed a week later by the crucial second round. In the fight for the 577 seats in the National Assembly, the Left Union is the strongest opponent of the head of state’s center alliance.
The election gets less attention in Germany than the presidential duel between Macron and Le Pen – but a success for the left-wing politician would have far-reaching consequences for France’s role in Europe and cooperation with the federal government. Mélenchon’s opponents fear that real hell would begin if the anti-capitalist EU critic took on political responsibility.
In April’s presidential election, the French president almost didn’t have to run against Marine Le Pen in the runoff.
(Photo: Reuters)
There are hardly any reliable surveys, also because the electoral system is even more complicated than in the presidential election. It is considered likely that Macron will be able to defend his majority in the National Assembly. The French living abroad, who have their own MPs, have already voted this weekend. In 11 constituencies around the world, Macron’s La République en Marche (The Republic on the Move) and allied parties led overall, followed by Mélenchon’s Left Alliance.
However, a success for the new alliance cannot be ruled out. Macron, who had withdrawn from day-to-day party politics in recent weeks, commented on the left-wing competition in an interview with several French regional newspapers on Friday. The President pointed out that Mélenchon does not run as a candidate in a constituency himself. “It’s hard to win an election if you don’t face it,” he said. In addition, the right to nominate the post of prime minister and the government still rests with him. “No political party can impose a name on a president.”
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After his lackluster election victory in April, Macron tried to gain new impetus by restructuring his government. Polls indicate that the French are not convinced by the new Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne and her cabinet. At the beginning of his second term in office, the President focused on strengthening purchasing power and fighting inflation. Mélenchon also wants to score with this topic.
The core demands of the new left-wing alliance include raising the minimum wage from 1,100 to 1,500 euros, introducing a minimum pension of 1,500 euros, lowering the retirement age from 62 to 60 and capping rents and prices for important everyday goods by the state.
The Parisian think tank Institut Montaigne calculated the costs of the program and came up with a sum of more than 300 billion euros per year. The French budget deficit would be more than 10 percent of economic output by 2027, and the public debt would rise to 134 percent during this period.
Mélenchon’s questionable image of Germany
The Maastricht criteria play no role in Mélenchon’s alliance anyway. According to the program, EU treaties and rules should not be respected “if they contradict the implementation of our program that has been legitimized by the people”. Mélenchon, who represents the national current on the French left, speaks of “European disobedience”. He sees France and other EU countries as victims of a “German diktat”, especially in economic and financial policy.
Again and again, Mélenchon’s statements reveal a questionable image of Germany. On the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Wall in November 2019, he described reunification as an “annexation” of the GDR by the Federal Republic. As a result, “outrageous social violence” was done to the East Germans, who actually did not want this type of merger.
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A call to Asma Rharmaoui-Claquin, who is running for the Left Alliance in the foreign constituency that includes Germany. In the French expats’ vote at the weekend, she qualified for the second round, behind the candidate from Macron’s center alliance. Rharmaoui-Claquin complains that the new Left Party is being treated unfairly by the German media, putting it on a par with Le Pen’s Rassemblement National. “We fight for the survival of social rights,” she says. Another important concern is the energy transition. Mélenchon wanted France, like Germany, to phase out nuclear power.
The 25-year-old French woman, who now works for the Federal Association of Offshore Wind Farm Operators in Berlin after completing her German-French high school diploma and studies in Germany, sees herself as part of the “Erasmus Generation”. She is not against the EU, but against the “neoliberal discourses in the EU, which are no longer up to date with the ecological and social challenges”. Mélenchon’s harsh criticism of Germany is directed against the “German elites, not against the German population”.
However, unease with the new leader of the French left can also be felt among German Social Democrats and Greens, whose sister parties in the neighboring country are now playing the role of junior partners of “Indomitable France”. In Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s SPD, it is said that the French socialists are expected to continue to pursue a clear pro-European course, even in alliance with Mélenchon.
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