By-elections in France

[Sibboleth]

Oise 2nd

UMP 51.6%, FN 48.4%

(First round: UMP 40.6%, FN 26.6%, PS 21.4%, FdG 6.6%, Pirate 2%, LO 1.6%, SE 1.2%)

[Sibboleth]

Anyways, I presume that this forums kipper contingent will be delighted at the news, if slightly miffed that the FN didn't do a tad better.

[East Anglian Lefty]

What was the turnout? That tends to defy the previous conventional wisdom about how well the FN need to do in the first round to win a run-off.

[Sibboleth]

35%

[Richard Allen]

Mar 24, 2013 20:08:20 GMT Sibboleth said:

Anyways, I presume that this forums kipper contingent will be delighted at the news, if slightly miffed that the FN didn't do a tad better.

Really?

Why would you think that?

[Deleted]

Socalists must have broken very heavily for FN.

[Deleted]

Mar 24, 2013 20:50:34 GMT Richard Allen said:

Mar 24, 2013 20:08:20 GMT Sibboleth said:

Anyways, I presume that this forums kipper contingent will be delighted at the news, if slightly miffed that the FN didn't do a tad better.

Really?

Why would you think that?

You are unusually sane for a Kipper

[arnieetc]

The real story here has to be how the Parti Socialiste vote split heavily towards the FN. Socialist voters backing a 'far right' party? Who woulda thought it?!

[Deleted]

It is fair to say that plenty of white working class people who vote for socialist parties in France and the UK have a huge concern of the impact of mass immigration, and vote for parties such as FN and the BNP as a result.
FN of course already have a small number of MPs in the National Assembly. Marine Le Pen came within a whisker of gaining the 11th constituency of Pas-de-Calais from a Socialist member in last years' general election.

This was her speech following the declaration:

Quarante-neuf pour cent!

[East Anglian Lefty]

A certain proportion of voters who backed parties of the left in round 1 must have preferred the FN candidate to the UMP one.

That said, it's likely that a lot of first round UMP voters migrated to the FN when they no longer had to worry about there being any chance of victory for a party of the left.

Certainly the evidence suggests that amongst voters there's no longer a cordon sanitaire between the UMP and FN, even if it's still just about alive amongst politicians.

[Sibboleth]

Mar 24, 2013 22:55:44 GMT East Anglian Lefty said:

Certainly the evidence suggests that amongst voters there's no longer a cordon sanitaire between the UMP and FN, even if it's still just about alive amongst politicians.

Yes, you only need to look at the runoff results in Left/FN constituencies - and to compare them to those in 2002 - to see that. The FN is now an acceptable choice for many 'respectable' Right voters, which is a new (and utterly depressingly) development. But then from Sarkozy onwards the UMP have often sounded like the FN (which itself is less obviously Neanderthalesque), so we don't get to be surprised...

[Richard Allen]

Mar 24, 2013 21:06:29 GMT joe said:

Mar 24, 2013 20:50:34 GMT Richard Allen said:

Really?

Why would you think that?

You are unusually sane for a Kipper

Naturally I appreciate the compliment even if it is not the most fulsome of praise. However, while I would agree that a small number of my party colleagues hold views that are borderline insane I have never found any noticeable support for FN among UKIP members. I am therefore puzzled by the suggestion made by Al.

[Deleted]

however as discussed before your top level are speaking to the FN and the reports were quite friendly on it. Now if Labour were speaking to the French Commie party imagine the moral outrage our opponents would have about that.

[Tony Otim]

Mar 24, 2013 23:50:02 GMT Richard Allen said:

Mar 24, 2013 21:06:29 GMT joe said:

You are unusually sane for a Kipper

Naturally I appreciate the compliment even if it is not the most fulsome of praise. However, while I would agree that a small number of my party colleagues hold views that are borderline insane I have never found any noticeable support for FN among UKIP members. I am therefore puzzled by the suggestion made by Al.

To be fair, one of your party colleagues here has made comments that some may have interpreted as support for FN. I'm not sure that would be an entirely accurate interpretation as I think his main point was actually about results reflecting the way people voted which wasn't happening with the FN in France.

[stepney]

Mar 25, 2013 10:12:00 GMT @ianrobo said:

Now if Labour were speaking to the French Commie party imagine the moral outrage our opponents would have about that.

You already are.



Boom boom!

[maxque]

So? As France president, I'm quite sure Conservatives are talking to him too.
Through, I'm quite sure talking of the Communist party, not about the french Labour equivalent.

[The Bishop]

I think steppers was making a joke - albeit not a terribly good one

[stepney]

Spoilsport!

[johnloony]

I notice that nobody in this thread so far has yet told us what the result of the by-election actually was. So I googled to find out, and after unsuccessfully searching through several news websites I looked on Wikipedia:

UMP . . . . . . . . 11073 . 13958
Front National . .7249 . 13190
Socialist . . . . . . .5828
Communist . . . . 1811
Pirate Party . . . . 538
Lutte Ouvriere . . 428
Independent . . . . 342

fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deuxi%C3%A8me_circonscription_de_l'Oise#.C3.89lection_partielle_de_2013

[Hash]

I actually posted something about the first round last week, but I got no answers vote-2012.proboards.com/thread/1161/french-politics?page=2 I had included a profile of the seat in question, which might be helpful for those who fancy getting the background on the seat.

The real story here has to be how the Parti Socialiste vote split heavily towards the FN. Socialist voters backing a 'far right' party? Who woulda thought it?!

The raw results would very much indicate that the PS vote split towards the FN, especially given that turnout actually increased by 2.5% since last week. However, I would be careful about extrapolating too much and assuming that the FN's big 22% increase can only come from the 30% or so who voted for the left/LO last week. We're dealing with low turnout (33-35%), and the lowest turnout numbers came from the more leftie towns and villages in the constituency. So there are basically two hypotheses for the FN's increase in support:
(a) that the FN took votes from the PS/FG (transfer hypothesis)
(b) that the traditional FN base mobilized better and compensated for first round PS/FG voters not showing up (substitution hypothesis)

I think both hypotheses are valid. The left-wing vote in the constituency, outside a ZUS in Beauvais, tends to be white working-class voters and such voters in this part of France, even those with more leftist sympathies, are quite willing to vote for the FN (which is more appealing than the UMP for many). Furthermore, the UMP incumbent here (Mancel) is basically FN lite (he signed a deal with the FN in the 1998 cantonal elections) and a mediocrity as an MP; therefore the left had no good reason to support him against the FN. 

OTOH, we should still be careful about assuming that there were tons of PS first round--FN runoff voters. It is also very possible that the FN vote mobilized even more and turned out in large numbers for the FN candidate, compensating for left-wing voters who stayed home or cast invalid votes. A few stats might provide some limited proof for the substitution hypothesis: turnout was highest in the places where the FN won, turnout was significantly lower in left-wing places (but it was not any lower, in general, than last week), and the number of 'blancs et nuls' (invalid) votes increased from 775 to 3046 (2.8% to 10.1%) and the number of valid votes (suffrages exprimés) declined from 27269 to 27148.

It is fair to say that plenty of white working class people who vote for socialist parties in France and the UK have a huge concern of the impact of mass immigration, and vote for parties such as FN and the BNP as a result. 

The FN has a huge working-class vote, and a lot of that undeniably comes from people who voted PS or PCF in the 60s, 70s and early 80s. And there are a good number of 'gaucho-lepéniste' voters who vote FN in the first round but for the mainstream left in runoffs against the right.

But there is little evidence, however, to support the claim that there a large number of 'swing voters' who hesitate between the FN and the PS/PCF in the first round (certainly no more than 2-5%). The old myth about direct and substantial FN-PCF transfers was debunked several times and dismissed by basically all serious academics who've studied the FN vote in detail. 

The FN's working-class vote and gaucho-lepénisme should be understood by interpreting the FN vote as two votes (like Nonna Mayer did in her excellent book back in 2002): the right-wing FN vote - which will vote for the right against the left in the runoff without much problems; and the 'niniste' FN vote. The 'niniste' vote is substantially more blue-collar/proletarian than the right-wing FN vote (also less affluent, less educated and less religious); these are protest voters whose parents more likely than not voted for the PS/PCF in the old days, but they themselves have little ties or affinities with the mainstream left even if they might prefer a leftie to a rightie in a left-right runoff situation. They dislike the mainstream parties, and their vote expresses frustration/anger/discontent. It is rather important to point out that immigration, on balance, is less important for niniste FN voters than right-wing FN voters: in the 2012 exit polls, a large number of Marine's voters also cited purchasing power, jobs, pensions or unemployment as major concerns.

You can see this if you look at the exit poll breakdowns by self-identified ideology: Marine got 36% of those who identified as 'neither left nor right' (Ipsos created a new centrist category in 2012, so few Bayrou voters chose the 'neither left nor right' category in 2012 unlike in 2007).

Mar 24, 2013 22:55:44 GMT East Anglian Lefty said:

Certainly the evidence suggests that amongst voters there's no longer a cordon sanitaire between the UMP and FN, even if it's still just about alive amongst politicians.

Yes, you only need to look at the runoff results in Left/FN constituencies - and to compare them to those in 2002 - to see that. The FN is now an acceptable choice for many 'respectable' Right voters, which is a new (and utterly depressingly) development. But then from Sarkozy onwards the UMP have often sounded like the FN (which itself is less obviously Neanderthalesque), so we don't get to be surprised...

For fun, I threw together some stats on left-FN and right-FN runoffs in June 2012:
In left/FN runoffs, there is a 0.78 correlation between increase in FN votes between R1 and R2 and the strength of the right in the first round. Furthermore, turnout did not drop by any more than 2.5% or so in those constituencies.
In right/FN runoffs, there is a 0.21 correlation between increase in FN votes between R1 and R2 and the strength of the left in the first round. And a 0.64 correlation between the first round left-wing vote and the decrease in turnout (usually fell by 6.5-10%).

On average, the FN vote increased by +16.6% in right/FN runoffs and by +16% in left/FN runoffs. In the 2011 and 2004 cantonal elections, the FN vote had increased by about 10-11% in both left/FN and right/FN runoffs.
Worthwhile info on FN runoff performances in 2011 (cantonal): www.ifop.com/media/pressdocument/299-1-document_file.pdf