Lessons Learned From France’s New Popular Front, with Clément Petitjean

This is an automatically generated transcript and may contain errors.

[00:00:00] Cayden Mak: Welcome to Block and Build, a podcast from Convergence Magazine. I’m your host and the publisher of Convergence, Cayden Mak. On this show, we are building a roadmap for the people and organizations who are trying to unite anti fascist forces in order to build the influence of a progressive trend while blocking the rise of authoritarianism in the United States.

[00:00:17] Before we get started, I want to acknowledge our newest Movement Builder and Movement Champion subscribers. Maikiko James, Alan Brodsky, Max Elbaum, Thad Goss. Marla, Camilla, Elena Veli, William Minter, and Jacob s Swen Langel also, and Ellen Leary. If you wanna join these folks to make our work possible, you can become a [email protected] slash donate.

[00:00:38] This week’s headlines put Climate Chaos front and center. Last week, an unseasonable heatwave finally came calling to my home in the west coast, leaving 130 million people under heat warnings and reach, and getting us to 3,500 reported wildfires before the peak of wildfire season. California Governor Gavin Newsom has focused on climate change as a cause for the extreme weather, saying this week that, quote, Climate change is real.

[00:01:03] If you don’t believe in science, then you have to believe your own eyes. The lived experience of all of us, that all of us have out here in the western United States, and for that matter, around the globe. Speaking of around the globe, at the same time, many Texas communities were slammed by a record breaking early season hurricane, Hurricane Beryl, which made landfall in the United States after devastating Jamaica, Grenada, St.

[00:01:25] Vincent, and the Grenadines, Mexico, and Venezuela earlier this week. 22 million, 2. 2 million Houston area residents were initially without power following the storm, and over a million still remain without power in the blistering summer heat five days later. At least two others have died in the U. S. ‘s northeast from flooding caused by the storm remnants traveling through that part of the country.

[00:01:46] Also yesterday, Arkansas Secretary of State John Thurston rejected a petition of over 100, 000 signatures to put abortion access up to 18 weeks on the November ballot in the state. Abortion is currently illegal in Arkansas unless the mother’s life is determined to be threatened. Following the lead of other autocratic conservative state leaders around the country, he cited a minor clerical error, the failure to submit documents confirming the use of paid canvassers, as his reason for refusing the will of petition signees.

[00:02:16] Across the pond, the UK election saw the Tories crash and burn after a decade of messy conservative leadership. led to upheaval in British governance. But don’t be too impressed by the Labour leadership. You may remember a couple of weeks ago, talking with Vivian Topping about how Keir Starmer is very willing to align with the anti trans hate machine, for example.

[00:02:34] And in France, you probably have heard that snap elections have the Nouveau Front Populaire emerge with the most seats in Parliament, as voters soundly rejected the far right, and to a certain degree, Emmanuel Macron’s neoliberal centrism. the main topic of our discussion today. To talk about those developments in France, I’m joined by Clément Petitjean, lecturer in English at Panthéon Sorbonne, University of Paris.

[00:02:56] Clément also wrote for us in advance of last week’s snap elections in France about the emergence of the Nouveau Front Populaire, and I’m excited to have him join me to debrief that election and talk a little bit about what lessons we can glean from it as observers from across the pond. Clément, welcome to Block and Build.

[00:03:12] Thank you for making the time to chat. 

[00:03:14] Clément Petitjean: Thank you for having me. 

[00:03:16] Cayden Mak: And also thank you so much for, giving like providing that article laying out the sort of like state of play before the snap elections. I think that, for our listeners who are maybe a little unfamiliar with the French political system and recent political history.

[00:03:32] I think maybe we can start with a little of that context setting. I imagine most of our listeners are aware that France has a multi party parliamentary system. So there are, like, many political parties working to build alliances, jockey for power, and win elections. Could you lay out a little bit of context about some of the players in this drama, probably starting with the names that listeners are most likely to know?

[00:03:53] So, former Prime Minister Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen, the leader of the far right. 

[00:03:59] Clément Petitjean: Yeah so I’m just going to start by so saying it. So the french political system is not exactly parliamentary. It’s a weird Semi presidential system and in order to understand the Chaos that has you know been happening.

[00:04:18] I was looking for a less polite word. But you know the chaos that eminem macron initiated on June 9, I think it’s important to have in mind just the broader institutional parameters. So the constitution under which we currently live in France the constitution for the fifth Republic was drafted in 1958. It’s the 14th constitution since the French revolution of 1789. So it’s important also to. Have that in mind for u. s listeners for whom the constitution is this kind of, sacred document that hasn’t changed ever you know for more than two centuries the french vocal history is slightly more Convoluted and chaotic.

[00:05:01] So the way it works is that The parliamentary aspect of the Fifth Republic is that you have two houses the National Assembly and the Senate that have legislative power. And it’s parliamentary in the sense that the government is responsible to the parliament The government in french politics refers to the executive body so it means the prime minister who’s appointed by the president and then All the ministers and secretaries of state who are appointed by the prime minister So it’s a slightly more specific meaning than when you Than you know the u.

[00:05:40] s meaning for the word government so the fact that the government is responsible to the parliament means that if there is a majority in parliament it can overthrow The sitting government and then the president has to appoint A new one, for that to happen. You need to have an absolute majority of I will call them deputies because it will be easier so you need to have 289 deputies who?

[00:06:08] Vote yes to a motion of no, of no confidence So that is the parliamentary aspect of the system, but there’s also a presidential aspect of the system now the french president under the fifth republic has, considerable executive powers and he’s also elected directly by citizens, which is not the case in more traditionally parliamentary systems.

[00:06:31] So it means that he is responsible to the people and to the people only. He cannot be impeached by Parliament. If, there, there’s no mechanism through which the National Assembly could decide to remove Macron. Macron did dissolve the National Assembly on June 9, in the wake of the EU elections, as I mentioned in my convergence piece.

[00:06:55] Really, an hour within the EU results. So, it’s, I think, crucial to keep in mind that, On june 9 at 8 p. m. folks in france you know got the results from the eu elections. I’m not going to get into the details, but the bottom line is that the far right national rally Won around more than 30 of the vote and won twice.

[00:07:19] As many eu, members of parliament as Other forces so it means that it was a clear win for the far right 60 minutes You Within that victory, Macron announced that he dissolved the National Assembly. But the other way around is not possible. The National Assembly cannot impeach, cannot dissolve Macron.

[00:07:39] The only thing that could happen would be Macron stepping down on his own. And so what has happened over time is, and I’ll get to that question of who Macron and Le Pen are, is that gradually, the legislative, the National Assembly, aligned itself more and more with the presidential office holder.

[00:07:59] It means that we have spoken about for the past 20 years of a presidential majority within the National Assembly, which is very telling, right? It just means that it’s a sort of rubber stamp political group. Which is elected after the presidential election, so it’s a good way for, a president to assert control over the legislative the legislative branch.

[00:08:24] What happened in the first important change to keep in mind is 2017, and this is where the main players of today’s shit show, and I’m going to say it, 

[00:08:33] Cayden Mak: You are 

[00:08:33] Clément Petitjean: definitely 

[00:08:34] Cayden Mak: welcome to call it a shit show on this program. 

[00:08:37] Clément Petitjean: So the main players are Emmanuel Macron, who used to be François Hollande’s minister of the economy.

[00:08:44] So François Hollande was the center left president between 2012 and 2017. Macron was a former banker and he ran in 2017 on a platform of breaking the With old left right divides and, pitching himself as an outsider to professionalized politics. As someone who is close to to the people and who understood the sort of dynamic will of the 

[00:09:12] Cayden Mak: population.

[00:09:12] Clément Petitjean: Which 

[00:09:12] Cayden Mak: is a funny pitch for a guy like him. 

[00:09:15] Clément Petitjean: Yeah, it’s a very funny pitch. Very intriguing that voters bought into that narrative. But so he became president, he became the youngest president of the Fifth Republic. And he won around eight million votes, in the first round, of the 2017 presidential elections Then the second player is marine le pen.

[00:09:36] So marine le pen is the daughter of a long time far right leader Jean marie le pen who’s one of the original founders of the National Front in 1972, which was founded, among others, by Nazi era collaborators. And Jean Marie Le Pen was this very infamous figure who was the National Front’s president from 1972 until 2011, when his daughter, Marine Le Pen, became president.

[00:10:04] So she took over from her father. She first ran. In 2012, she came third, and then 2017 was her, second candidacy. And she, throughout the 2010s, engaged in what we call a de demonization strategy. So, to try and make the National Front respectable. To move away from the infamy that the National Front was to, push under the rug accusations of being racist, of being anti Semitic.

[00:10:36] of, being a very deplorable party. And a moment, a symbolic moment in that perspective was in 2018 when the National Front was rebranded National Rally, the Rassemblement National. And in 2017, Marine Le Pen finished second. She won 21 percent of the vote, around 7. 6 million voters.

[00:10:58] And the third important player here is Jean Luc Mélenchon. Who is, one of the most. Prominent figures on the French left, he had already run in 2012 under the banner of the Front de Gauche, the Left Front, which was a broad based left wing coalition to the left of the Socialist Party, and then in 2017, he ran for president.

[00:11:21] Under the banner of a movement he had just created, La France Insoumise, which in English is often translated by France Unbowed. And he also had, so not the same rhetoric as Macron, but he said that he was trying to bring together something like, Like left wing, populism, but trying to distance himself from the history of the left and the left right divide to a certain extent, as well They often got fourth in the 2017 election But he also got around 7 million votes and what happens in that first round is you had macron with approximately 8 million votes Mali Nupen with 7.

[00:11:59] 5 million votes the right wing candidate, François Fillon who got around seven million votes as well, and then Mélenchon. So you had four main players in the second, in the runoff Macron was elected he won two thirds of the vote, around 20 million votes, and Marine Le Pen won around 10 million votes. And what happened in the National Assembly after that is that the, Won an overwhelming majority. They won around three 50 seats. The left had a very, so, small presence in the National Assembly and the national front only had eight candidates. Now it’s important to keep those numbers in mind when, we fast track to 2022 and 2020.

[00:12:47] In 2022, there was a rematch, macro versus luen, which was very much. A narrative that the media loved to , to pitch. Basically the first day after the election, a lot of journalists were like, okay, so what about Lon Ben in 20 22. But this time it got the results were much closer, macro lost votes.

[00:13:08] So he won only 59% of the vote. So he lost 2 million voters basically, and Le Pen won 3 million. So she still lost, but it showed that there was this sort of rising dynamic there. Yeah, balance 

[00:13:23] Cayden Mak: changing, yeah. 

[00:13:24] Clément Petitjean: And then Mélenchon still had approximately 7. 7 million votes. So at that moment, you have not the four blocs from 2017, but three blocs.

[00:13:36] The left. Macron’s center which turned very rapidly into an extreme center so very, anti democratic very Smug in its exercise of power. There’s this I don’t know if I would suggest readers check this article from politico which came out this week where The journalist is in Macron’s Air Force One and he asks him who do, who you confide in?

[00:14:02] And then Macron, waits for a long moment and he says, myself. So that is very good indication of how Macron and all the people around him have exercised power. Refusal to compromise, refusal to negotiate, refusal to accept. Any other opinion but their own. So you have that second block and then the third block is it’s the far right only this time in 2022.

[00:14:28] There was no absolute majority in the national assembly the macronists lost seats the national front now rebranded national rally increased the number of seats from eight in 2017 to 89 in 2022 Which is which was at the time unprecedented the national dramatic. 

[00:14:50] Cayden Mak: Yeah 

[00:14:50] Clément Petitjean: dramatic 

[00:14:51] Cayden Mak: increase 

[00:14:51] Clément Petitjean: in only five years, right? The left Under underwent a an interesting, change There was a left wing coalition that was built called the best the new ecological and social people’s union which brought together whatever was left of the communist party the socialist party the green Union who rebranded themselves the ecologists later on and then francaise fumies, but very soon it turned out that this coalition did not function there was a lot of internal rivalry.

[00:15:20] There was a lot of bitter infighting Some of which I talk about, talk about in the piece and then gradually there were moments when that very fragile coalition pretty came apart at the seams first was In the summer of 2023 When the ecologists announced that they would go it alone in the eu elections next, in the in june 2024 you know showing that they did not they were not interesting in running Coalition slates and then the second moment when that coalition really came apart was post october 7th, right?

[00:15:58] In the way of the the terror attacks by hamas and Israel’s genocidal response, most prominent François Soumy’s voices took pro Palestinian stances and refused to characterize October 7th as as terrorism, which led other Nupes members to disagree with them. And a narrative of François Soumy’s being, being anti Semitic, which originated in that moment, and which Sort of gained a life of its own over the months so much so that now you have a significant number of pundits and elected officials who believe and say That Constance Fumise is the prime anti Semitic party in France, which is absolute nonsense, right?

[00:16:46] You can definitely argue that and agree with the fact that there were some, remarks that were deeply problematic by Mélenchon when it came to what happened. Like in israel, but to say that and forget that the National front slash national rally has been committed over the years for anti semitic, remarks comments jean marie le pen for instance in the 1980s Said that the gas chambers were a detail of history and you know when marie le pen, became president and when the she said that she

[00:17:25] She stood by the entirety of the National Front’s history and background, so she never renounced that, she made she paid lip service to, ideas that, yes, the National Front had changed, but the bottom line never changed. The National Rally is still fundamentally racist, still calling for immigrants to be expelled and sent back to their countries for cracking down on a very sort of tough law and order policy and rebuilding, rejuvenating France around white people, white Christian, the sort of belief that there’s such a thing as, white, European, Christian civilization that is under threat. 

[00:18:08] Cayden Mak: Well, it also sounds like that media narrative does play into the sort of, like, Macron line that’s, like, both The far left and the far right are like radical and like you can’t trust them. 

[00:18:21] Clément Petitjean: Oh, absolutely and that line has been that line has come into full force during this sort of very brief, legislative campaign and during the after the first round of the in the elections when when the stakes were that there were a lot of, we call them triangulars, so configurations, and so there are 577 districts legislative districts in France.

[00:18:50] And the way this system works is, it’s a two round majoritarian system. So, if You receive an absolute majority in the first round, you get elected and you represent that district and you’re a deputy at the National Assembly. If not, if no one receives an absolute majority, there’s a runoff. To make it to the runoff, A candidate must garner at least 12.

[00:19:12] 5 percent of the total number of registered voters. And because you have that configuration post 2022 with three blocks of relatively equal size, the number of triangulars, so configurations where you had three candidates in a runoff rather than two, which was historic. Norm under under the Fifth Republic, you had 310 constituencies out of the 500 that were still up for seats after the first round, where 310 constituencies where you had triangular races.

[00:19:52] And what happened, so this was on the night of June 30th, the first round of this very weird and chaotic legislative election. Within a matter of days, so right before candidates had to file for officially running in the runoff, that number dropped from 310 to less than a hundred. More than 200 candidates dropped out a vast majority of them from the new popular front and then a sizable Well a minority from us.

[00:20:29] So what happened is this process of the what we call the republican front is the idea that The national front slash national rally is not a normal party. It was it’s a party that was founded by nazis and that it is fundamentally opposed to Republican values, to core fundamental rights.

[00:20:50] So whenever there is a possibility to vote for someone who runs against a far right candidate, the Republican front principle holds that. You have to vote for that candidate, even if this candidate is, fairly right wing objectionable in many ways candidate. That principle held was first put into place at a large scale in 2002, 

[00:21:16] The 2002 presidential election, when against all expectations, Jean Marie Le Pen went to a runoff against incumbent president Jacques Chirac.

[00:21:28] Chirac was elected with more than 80 percent of the vote, and from then on there, there was this principle that you have to block the far right at the polls in any way you can, and the best way you can do it in that, when there is a runoff like that is. You vote for whoever is is opposing them and for decades that that principle held and then was gradually chipped away at and it was very much the case in 20 2022 you know the fact that nine would then got so much More so many more votes than in 2017 is an example that for a lot of voters the national front slash rally is no longer this illegitimate political player that should never be endorsed in one way or another.

[00:22:19] Cayden Mak: Well, I also wonder about, like, the, that principle also, like, in some ways, perhaps taking momentum away from the left. Like, is, was that a dynamic that emerged over the past 20 years? 

[00:22:33] Clément Petitjean: Oh so in this particular election absolutely because you had those triangular Configurations there were calls left and right for to decide who should desist who should drop out so You know some would say Whoever came third has to drop out and then a lot of macronist macronists. Candidates would actually say i’m not going to drop out You If the other, if the candidate who’s not National Front candidate is someone from France Insoumise, so, a lot of prominent former ministers would draw a line between say a socialist candidate and they would say, I can, I can drop out on their behalf.

[00:23:15] And saying, I will not desist if the other candidate is, if the third candidate is an unscrummy candidate. So what happened is, you would have those people using that line that you described of neither the left, neither the NFP nor or the nor the far right, with a rhetoric of the extremes in the plural, right?

[00:23:35] The belief that, the sort of famous horseshoe theory that the extreme left and the extreme right are, basically the same. And this is something that is fundamentally that sort of contradicts the notion of the Repub the Republican front, but because the McInnes over the past couple of years.

[00:23:55] Have used this expression of the republican arc to single handedly decide who belongs to the republic and who doesn’t and they have reduced the scope of this arc to exclude On the grounds that you know, normally would it be an anti semitic? Party which you know is nonsense and it’s not the case, but also would say because there are Islamo leftists and, woke LGBT sort of America influenced people who want to destroy the values of the Republic.

[00:24:29] Those people are not, do not share anything in common with us being real reasonable Republicans. And that, that did in this in those like recent elections, pretty did So, as I said, 127 NFP candidates dropped out whereas only 81 McElhinney’s candidates dropped out. And also the Republican front was very unbalanced when you look at voter behaviors.

[00:25:00] Left wing voters voted more for the right than the opposite. Around 73 percent of nfp voters So people who voted for an nfp candidate in the first round did vote for a macronist or right wing candidates, in the runoff against a national rally candidate Only approximately macronist voters voted for an nfp candidate when their candidate dropped down so it means that Even if you had calls from elected officials who would say, this is how I suggest you should vote the McQuinnists did not respect the Republican front principle because of that.

[00:25:48] I think because of that belief that the NFP is the extreme left, which it’s not it’s it plays, it really plays into electoral politics. So, it was even confirmed by. One of the the highest administrative institution, the Conseil d’Etat, which stated earlier in March that. France Insoumise was a left wing party, but the National Front, the National Rally was a far right party.

[00:26:16] So even a sort of very administrative institution like the Conseil d’Etat recognized that there is a distinction between the far left and and the left, which was not the case for a lot of Macronist 

[00:26:30] Cayden Mak: voters. Okay, so that’s that’s some interesting context that I think I can see some of the like Very strong differences between how all of this went down in France versus like really what we’re looking at here in the U.

[00:26:48] S. What we’re staring down the barrel of here in the U. S. And I’m curious to hear from you what you think about the difference between what we consider left in the U. S. Whether that’s like like more left leaning mainstream Democrats, whether that’s like the squad, in Congress.

[00:27:04] And what, how far left, like, France’s new popular front leans? Like, what are the, what do you see as the differences there? Like, what are people like willing to do? And like, what are the differences in the platforms and behaviors that you see? 

[00:27:19] Clément Petitjean: So that’s a very hard it’s a very hard question.

[00:27:22] My answer would be that I don’t think that the left right divide maps over the Democrat Republican divide. I think it cuts into the Democratic party. But because this party is such a loose, coalition of. Folks who often don’t have a lot in common because there is no such a thing as It’s not a party of its members, right?

[00:27:52] You don’t have you know when you’re elected to be a delegate there is no sense of it’s just built. It’s just an elect a machine Built to win elections a machine that is mostly governed by and that has been increasingly governed by a small group of very wealthy donors but then it’s Loose enough that You can have fairly Left leaning candidates who can still you know, play Into that arena, which is not so much the case with in France, in part because there never has been a bipartisan system the way it exists in the U.

[00:28:35] S. And you could argue that for most of the Fifth Republic, there was this left right we call it alternance. So, for one term you have a right wing candidate and then you know that the next time is going to be a left wing candidate. And you had those sort of two mainstream parties the center left the socialist party and then The rights that would be the sort of dominant players who knew that they had that their claims to hold Executive and legis legislative power were real, right?

[00:29:10] whereas for instance thought that they could displace the socials party as the main party on the left in 2012 and they didn’t well on goes didn’t manage to to do that So what happens is in the u. s. That bipartisan? Mold hasn’t burst into pieces You In 2016, I thought because of the the Sanders campaign that, the Democratic party would implode or collapse in one way or another.

[00:29:38] Also thought that the Republican party because of, Trump’s campaign, because of the years of Tea Party base building I also thought that the Republican party would, come apart at the seams and it didn’t, it’s still around. And I think one of the, one of the things that is one of the really important roadblocks in American politics is that there is no credible, not credible, but there is no foreseeable way to go beyond bipartisanship, and that has to do with the fact that it’s such a federal state, the electoral system is so, fragmented.

[00:30:19] Cayden Mak: And very, like, oriented towards, like, a winner’s take all kind of, like, system where it’s, like, you can’t have, Even like a partial split of say like electoral college delegates like it’s just not Things are designed to maintain that status quo 

[00:30:35] Clément Petitjean: Yeah, and it’s it would be immensely complicated to muster enough Social power to reach a to change the rules.

[00:30:44] The rules of the game in france, it’s very difficult as well to change the rules of the game, but because one person who does You Old executive power has, acted for the last couple of weeks months and years, he has created this chaotic situation, right? He this is something I mentioned in the Convergence piece, but the day after, so June 10 was the 80th birthday of a very tragic massacre during World War II in France, in central West France, in Oradour sur Glane and Macron attended.

[00:31:23] The anniversary ceremony here, and he is reported to have told a business, a businessman I threw my I pulled a pin on the grenade and I threw it at their legs talking about his dissolution. Decision and he said let’s see how they cope with it. So that image of the dissolution as a grenade he threw at the french population it just tells you how that sort of mindset of wanting to well thinking that it’s either him or chaos, but also him pushing the country on the verge of chaos so that The national rally would be his sole Ally that he would also benefit from the left being fractured and what happened is, contrary to all predictions all expectations Left wing forces managed to bend together, right?

[00:32:21] They managed to come together under this banner of the new popular front They managed to agree to a common platform. They managed to run single candidates in all 577 districts. And on Sunday, they managed to get, the largest number of seats in the National Assembly. They did not get an absolute majority, they only got around 186, I think it’s 190 if you include a couple of other deputies, so, granted they didn’t win, an absolute majority, but they won a majority.

[00:32:57] They’re the largest group in the in the assembly and So I think it’s difficult to compare the u. s in france for those because the rules of the game are so different Sure, sure however, I think that there are things that I mean some of the things I think could The lessons that, leftists look at U.

[00:33:25] S. leftists look at would be first, and I think this is the main the main symbolic victory during this campaign is there was hope. There was enthusiasm. There was, Initiative, you have, you had like hundreds of people designing, beautiful posters that had a sort of very interesting graphic design.

[00:33:50] You had thousands of people who had never engaged in politics in any sort of way who started, phone banking. Who started knocking on doors who there was something called victory rides that was organized in france So, he had groups of 10 20 30 people who would go from their district where they knew a national a new popular front candidate, Either had won or was likely to win so they would go to swing districts and we actually used that language swing, district, which is very new it’s directly imported from the us, but it’s a very new political Label that has been used in this campaign and folks would just reach out to the local candidates campaign and knock on doors What you know, there is This fabulous moment of the sort of giant canvassing operations run by volunteers that would go to I don’t remember what the official numbers are, but it’s like in the tens of districts Thousands of people participate in that people, you know spoke to their friends their colleagues their loved ones There was this sense that a sense of urgency based on the real Fear that the national front might have a, an absolute majority.

[00:35:11] This is something that was fueled by, opinion polls. And this is something, that I experienced, my friends experienced. That’s. You know that I think was a real trigger for a lot of people especially, people of color especially immigrants or the children of immigrants because their parents might not have the right to vote but they might have people in impoverished neighborhoods lgbtq folks, civil servants who journalists because the national rally said that they would privatize You public, media channels once they were elected so there was this real sense of of urgency and threat that was combined and I think this is very unique to this moment to this sense of hope You know the hope not only that we can block the far right, but also that we can win raises in the minimum wage that we can overturn a very infamous very horrible pension reform.

[00:36:16] Bill that it was turned into law last year. Invest massively into publicated education, into public transportation, into public healthcare. So there, there was this, even if the platform of the national of the NFP was not. It’s clearly not a far left program. It’s clearly not a far left platform.

[00:36:39] There were no calls for nationalizing energy companies, for instance. To say to a company like Total, which is, one of the, one of the larger climate criminals on this planet who is directly responsible for global warming, who is directly responsible for, Hundreds of thousands of people’s lives being in day endangered that kind of stuff that was not on the agenda and you know called for increasing taxes for having The ultra rich pay more taxes for having billionaires pay more taxes does sound like a sort of genuine left wing policy demand, but not, it was not, it was less radical than the platform that also let me tell him ran on in 1981.

[00:37:27] And yet you have, hordes. Of talking head and media pundits and macronist and right wing and far right like the officials who say that this is the far left and this is No one said this is bolshevism. But when you listen to them, you thought that lennon was on the ballot Was you know as a slated candidate so I think that this sense of hope really is something that was unique Yeah to the campaign and I think one of the main lessons is not just how to generate that hope because I don’t think this is not something that we have control over, right?

[00:38:06] However, how to sustain it, I think, is something that organizers and activists can think of in terms of how do we build structures and opportunities, collectives, WhatsApp groups, local tenant unions local environmentalist groups, local anti racist associations, whatever, how do we build institutions that can keep those tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of people engaged and actively engaged, right?

[00:38:40] To tell them that we have avoided the fascists being voted into office, but there is something that Marine Le Pen said on July 7th, which I think everyone should keep in mind is she said, the tide is rising. It hasn’t, it has not risen high enough this time, but our time will come.

[00:39:00] And there’s this sense when you listen to far leaders, but also voters that They will win, you know because you have because you’ve had this eight deputies in 2017 89 In 2022 right now. They are at 140 something So the numbers keep rising and rising and unless We manage not just to block but also to build and I think here that you know The name of this podcast is so relevant to the situation.

[00:39:31] So unless we find ways to, to build the next round of elections, 2027, which will be the next presidential election it’s almost already written on the wall what is going to happen. And the other difficulty here is that. And I’ll go back to another important lesson, I think, is that McClung cannot dissolve the National Assembly again.

[00:39:54] He we are stuck with this National Assembly until next June, 2025. So it means that. There’s no possibility unless, he calls a state of emergency and grants himself Sort of special powers if he stays within his line and does not doesn’t move to wartime Governing style and we’re stuck with with this.

[00:40:20] So so I think this is pretty important, right? How to sustain that hope and I think here, you know that there’s this great quote from Abolitionists, organizer and writer mariam kaba when she says hope is a discipline and I think that here the idea like Looking towards institution building and this idea of discipline.

[00:40:40] I think is really important and I think the other the second lesson would be that the nfp is Has been so far a political formulation of that hope, that sort of broader hope that was not political institutional, right? That, that existed beyond political organizations, that exist, that has started through an electoral campaign, but I think has grown beyond that, beyond the purely electoral, the sort of purely institutional electoral arena.

[00:41:13] And I think that this is a crucial question. How do you work on improving the existing political institutional supply when there is this broader social and political demand that wants to meet it in one way or another? And I think in the U. S. so far, the supply side has been Fairly, poor and inconsistent to say the least.

[00:41:41] And the other thing and that would be, I think the third thing, the third main lesson, I think that folks in the U S can look at with maybe not inspiration, but interest and curiosity is. How there have been efforts attempts to democratize organizing skills and to create something like an organized politicized civil society what happened was a lot of labor unions a lot of Civic organizations who often stick to a non partisan stance who say, we’re not going to endorse anyone.

[00:42:18] We’re not going to support Any one candidate, did say they’d come out in support for the nfp and they’re I think When the dust settles it will be because it hasn’t settled yet Because you have this maniac who keeps banging on the floor to make sure that you know The dust is still in the air and everyone is still, so confused.

[00:42:37] But when slash if the dust settles It will be interesting to see who are those who refused to Take a stance and support the nfb. I’m thinking of a number of Environmental groups for instance who said we want to keep working with everyone. So we are not going to endorse anyone versus a labor union like the cgt, which is one of the largest one of the most militant labor federations Who explicitly came out in favor of the nfp saying, it’s not in our it’s not a tradition that we endorse candidates Because there is this sort of strict Non partisan principle in french labor unionism But she said that the stakes were so high the urgency was so present and the danger the threat was so real that it was necessary to step into the political fights and support the candidates and I think here that this politicization of civil society organizations happened hand in hand with attempts to democratize access to organizing skills and tools to try and break down, the boundary between seasoned, activists and organizers and people who you know would knock on doors for a first time or even people who voted for a first time and I think that And this is something that i’m very I’ve been very interested in the U.

[00:44:12] S. that professional boundary between professional organizers and non professional activists, leaders. And of course that boundary is fairly fluid. And I think that when you look at union organizing, for instance when you look at the UAW strike, when you look at the Starbucks organizing drive, there have been fantastic initiatives to say that there can be work organizers, that being an organizer does not equate being paid and working full time and that you can actually.

[00:44:48] Spread and teach the skills To people who will then themselves, spread and teach those skills so that you don’t have that Symbolic boundary that you know keeps those who know inside and those who don’t outside and I think that this is Not something you can you can decide you cannot just decide overnight.

[00:45:10] We’re going to deprofessionalize organizing and we’re going to democratize the access to organizing skills. But I think it was very interesting that those processes happened, those union spaces. I think That we in France have a lot to learn from those experiences, but conversely seeing all those volunteer run canvassing operation has been so, so thrilling, right?

[00:45:38] To see that you would have folks who would just step in. And be like, yeah, you know i’ve never door knocked before i’ve never canvassed i’ve never handed out leaflet It’s fine. I’ll just learn and then on the other side you had folks who would you know on social media put up training platforms and then organize training calls Say, okay, you’ve never done that.

[00:45:59] It’s not a problem going to you know Give you a couple of ropes and then you’ll see it’s not Rocket science, right? It doesn’t mean that you can do anything you want and then mess it up Right. It’s something you can learn And it’s and the learning costs are not extremely extremely difficult 

[00:46:19] Cayden Mak: Yeah.

[00:46:19] Yeah. No, that’s interesting. I feel like a lot of there’s some folks that we are in cahoots with at Convergence who are, trying who’ve built some infrastructure for some very similar things. Like our friends at Seed the Vote were very much like, how do we actually like equip large numbers of people to go out and like actually knock on doors, like regardless of their experience, whatever.

[00:46:43] How do we really support them to feel confident to do that? But I, yeah I feel like it’s like an emergent, It needs to be the sort of like emergent thing that like yeah, it’s there’s no switch to flip But there’s like definitely a model to follow here. 

[00:46:58] Clément Petitjean: Yeah, but then I think also one of the one of the conditions of possibility for that was that folks If you look at those canvassing, those, they were called victory rides Convois de la Victoire in Paris, and they may happen in other cities as well, but very often it relied on the possibility of people to ride public transportation.

[00:47:22] Cayden Mak: ride 

[00:47:22] Clément Petitjean: a train and to be reimbursed. There were donations to that fairly loose organization that said, we’ll cover travel expenses. We’ll cover housing expenses if you can’t or we’ll put you up with folks on the ground. So if you’re going to Southwestern France, there are comrades out there who will be happy to, share their spare room or just like put you up for a couple of days.

[00:47:48] There was this notion of so it’s impossible to translate it into English, but militant holidays. So just the idea that you’re going to the, to, you’re gonna, Brittany, you’re gonna Southern France. For a couple of days you’re staying with folks and at the same time you’re, doing political work you were knocking on doors phone banking you know distributing leaflets, that kind of thing and I think that creating those networks That are not necessarily tied to one specific organization Yeah has been incredible and I think here also the role of let’s say social media writ large so instagram I think a lot of stuff happened a lot of stuff seemed to happen on instagram a lot of stuff happened on whatsapp So whatsapp groups, telegram you know those messaging apps that Make it very easy to communicate coordinate plan stuff without needing a lot of resources a lot of It was a very it was staff light to say a lot of this happened I don’t want to romanticize volunteer commitments right because it also means that the folks who can do that are folks who can you know choose to dedicate some of their time to that and when you’re working two or three jobs you know when you have kids to to take care of when you know your cash strap at the end of the month You’re it’s going to be harder to decide that.

[00:49:21] Yeah, you can just you know skip a shift and Jump on a train and door knock in the place. You’ve never been. But there was still this The that yeah that enthusiasm and gusto and you know taking initiatives thinking, okay, you know what, I’m just going to create this. This whatsapp group with brands and we’re going to decide that we do something and i’m curious.

[00:49:46] I’m, very curious to see what what is left of all of this all of this energy and I think because The time frame was so crazily tight The campaign lasted for 20 days 21 days and because the stakes are so high A lot of folks to go the not extra mile, but extra couple of miles, even if it meant, having nice with very little sleep and then, feeling very exhausted.

[00:50:19] At the moment But that I think is something that is I think that enthusiasm That moment of that sort of energy and things popping up left and right happened during the george floyd uprising, right but,

[00:50:43] but I don’t think that there was a similar sense of hope and joy, right? Yeah I also But I’d be curious 

[00:50:53] Cayden Mak: to get your take on that. Totally. I think that to a certain extent 2020 was also a wild time. But I do think also that there continued in that time, it felt like in a lot of places that I was seeing like a pretty strong disconnect between the experiences that people were having in the street.

[00:51:16] And then like what was being talked about in the sort of like institutional halls of power that really, I think, meant that a lot of that energy did not there, there was an upswell of like interest, I think, in how institutions of power are going to relate to, like movements for racial justice in the United States.

[00:51:35] But I do think that there was maybe some disconnect between those conversations that ultimately didn’t quite translate over into like, here’s a policy program. I think one of the things that I think that. was interesting that you described about one of these lessons is that like the new popular front was able to put together a Platform that was at least coherent, right?

[00:51:57] Like if not the most like clearly like leftist thing something that was like coherent that was popular that made sense to people and that like responds to It sounds like a lot of the similar things that, that just like regular people are struggling with in both France and the United States and that like, I think that like a missing piece is finding ways to translate those sorts of like genuine expressions of pain, of frustration, of Like the desire for something different into Something that’s like hey, here’s a way that we can do this.

[00:52:33] Here’s like the real building blocks and I think that’s in a lot of ways what feels to me like the most challenging part of the build work in the u. s is that like Finding the right vehicle for those things feels a lot harder here. 

[00:52:50] Clément Petitjean: Yeah. And I think, so I participated to a couple of those victory rides and I had done door knocking in the U S during my PhD where I worked on organizers in Chicago.

[00:53:03] And it was fun to see that those experiences, which I could never really apply in France because door knocking. It’s not really a thing in the sort of, repertoire of things that you can do when you engage in a in a political campaign or at least not the way it’s institutionalized in the U S but the, the couple of door knocking experiences I had in this campaign, it felt.

[00:53:29] When you talk to people and you said, well, the new popular front is, pushing for the pension reform being overturned. So it means that instead of you having to work for having, not being able to retire before 64 so prior to that reform, the minimum the legal age retire was 62, and now it’s been bumped to to 64.

[00:53:53] So being able to tell people. We hope that we’ll overturn this unjust piece of legislation or is saying we want to push for an increase in the minimum wage. There were things that, very concrete proposals or when you could tell people. If the new popular front has a majority and comes into power they will try to make sure that starting september when you kids go to school, you don’t have to pay for for lunch, you don’t have to pay for all the school Things that your your kids need.

[00:54:33] That sort of very concrete proposals, You Resonated with a couple of voters now, of course, they didn’t resonate with all of them But the fact that there was a real there is a real attempt to address social justice to address environmental justice Of course, there’s a lot of efforts that have to be done in terms of anti racism but There was this element of there are tangible things that we can put out there.

[00:55:08] And also What I heard is that a lot of the people who you know worked on those campaigns did not tried to work on their their role their attitude and wouldn’t go to say, okay. I am an activist You I’m right, and here is why you should vote for us, this sort of very top down approach, but rather try to say, try to have a more organizing approach, right, to ask questions, to be like, okay, so how do you feel about this moment and then, how would you what would be the most important change?

[00:55:43] Demand that, that would mean something for you to try and connect with people is also something that I think we should capitalize on is the acknowledgement that, and again, there is interesting comparisons are made with the U S with, this idea that the U S is so polarized that you have.

[00:56:05] Fully blue states fully, red states. No one speaks to one another which I don’t think is fully true when you look at That actual interactions on the ground or at least not at least a little bit more complicated But here you when you saw the electoral map and you saw a lot of rural areas small towns crazy numbers of national rally Voters There’s the sense of, we have to find ways to talk with these people.

[00:56:38] We have to find ways, not necessarily to turn them over, because, there’s a lot of far right voters who are, very committed to the ethno nationalist racist project of the of Nina Penn and her and her colleagues, but at least, there’s To make it so that another Option exists out there, right?

[00:57:02] And it’s not just this sort of homogeneous circle of friends where the only thing you talk about the only Space of ideas that you evolve in is You know just

[00:57:23] far right ideas. And in that regard, it’s not just about trying to connect and reach out and broaden the scope to go beyond the sort of, just preaching to the choir, that kind of stuff, but it’s also recognizing that the media has played an important role, not so much in terms of manipulating people, but in, in the sense that.

[00:57:46] In the narratives that are put out there and there’s been this Very significant and rapid shift to the right in French mainstream media with this one particular individual, Vincent Boulodé, who’s our own Rupert Murdoch, right, who wanted to build a Fox News style empire who was dreaming of this sort of Broad based alliance of the rights that would be, socially conservative or very conservative and ultra liberal economically and he’s managed in, very in record time to push For the mainstream, the president of the mainstream right wing party LHQT to make an alliance with the national rally, which again, is unprecedented at that exact level to, to go beyond the Republican boundaries that, separate the Republican, the the national front from the rest of the political parties LHQT stepped over those boundaries and orchestrated one way or another at least pushed by this Media mogul and he has extended his grip over a number of radio stations tv channels newspapers, so there’s also this Urgent challenge to build more independent media outlets and to grow their audience and to make sure that to work on how journalists report on, political news, how they frame their topics or talk about how come they don’t fact check or, cut off someone who says that François Soumise is anti Semitic and don’t add, first, it’s not true.

[00:59:30] And second, when you look at the record of who was convicted for anti Semitic remarks, you have to look at the National Front or, the reminding people that yes, it is absolutely true that the National Front was founded by people who looked to Nazi Germany as something that was a good model of society who were, was founded by people who participated on the French side of the French war in Algeria, who, wanted Algeria to stay a French colony, who were And this is some, this is a narrative that has become difficult to produce in certain TV stations and radio channels, just to remind the facts that the historical facts that the National Front was founded by neo Nazis and fascists and collaborators.

[01:00:20] There are, people will say, how dare you say that? Are you calling 10 million, 10 million people racist? Is that, no, just, stating facts of historical facts that everyone should. 

[01:00:32] Cayden Mak: Yeah, no, that’s also very interesting that like, it’s the like, arrival of us style, like right wing media is an important part of this picture that I think maybe a lot of reporting on this in the US misses.

[01:00:48] So I appreciate that also. Because there is so much work. It makes, it actually makes me think about my guest a couple weeks ago, Vivian Topping, was talking about how, like, the one thing that she keeps seeing as, like, an antidote to a lot of the hysteria around Transgender people and like the quote unquote threat that transgender people pose is actually just deep canvassing, right, like talking to people and like, like, getting beyond the sort of like headlines and the hype and that like, I think that to me is like emblematic of just how a media environment can really like deeply poison the well against things that like ultimately people are like, Yeah, this is actually self evident that like, people who are struggling in society should be protected by society, that actually a lot of people agree with that, but like, they get turned around in the sort of like, like scaremongering and the rhetoric around things like that 

[01:01:47] Clément Petitjean: Yeah, and I think you’re absolutely I think you’re pointing into a very stimulating direction of how do you intervene politically at that level of Direct interactions, without thinking that this is where you’ll solve 

[01:02:05] Cayden Mak: things, right?

[01:02:06] Right, or even that we have to convince everybody in one interaction, is that like, opening the door and letting people step through it is actually a much more sustainable model too, right? That like, we can’t force people to walk through a door, but we have to show them the doors there. 

[01:02:22] Clément Petitjean: Yeah. And that, that raises questions of how do you go against, how do you break through social, racial, residential, geographic segregation, and how do weave, different people different perspectives, but i’m not saying it in a sort of mushy way of you know Everyone should you know we should you know, put our differences aside and recognize that we’re all humans after all that kind of stuff but to look at that in terms of it’s hard to push against social forces that create closure, right that creates Homogeneous And I think that here in France we have a lot to learn from organizers, right?

[01:03:09] This is something that, that was very instructive. And I think that, that is one of the main political lessons that I take away from my own research on community organizing is that organizers do occupy this space. Intermediary position where they can navigate between different worlds, right?

[01:03:27] Whether it is because they have a sort of downward downwardly mobile trajectory And you know they work in south side neighborhoods in chicago when clearly it was not what they were socially meant to do Or conversely people who are upwardly mobile who grew up on the south side of chicago Who were you know, the first in their families to go to college who had that, very Utterly mobile trajectory who decide for, various reasons to Not take that, high paying job at whatever service industry or banking institution but rather to build connections in a meaningful Political way to say that there is this reweaving Repairing work that needs to be done while at the same time being able to speak with, wealthy donors and elected officials and to code switch constantly.

[01:04:24] I think that this is, if, I think that, like, investing that code switching ability, those code switching skills, I think should be an important aspect of this block and build strategy. And to be honest, this is something that I’m really looking forward to try and develop in France in the next couple of weeks.

[01:04:48] Weeks, months, and years. 

[01:04:50] Cayden Mak: Yeah. Yeah. No I definitely see that, it’s like the learning that needs to happen is about, like, how we, I like that word reweaving, that, like, a lot of it is like, reweaving the, like, some of the social fabric that has unraveled under neoliberalism, right?

[01:05:05] The, like, it’s, the, That fundamentally I think is the task before us. We’re actually going to beat back the fascist threat 

[01:05:13] Clément Petitjean: there’s this wonderful quote this definition of solidarity in wait, I need to i’m looking for it in daisy pitkins on the line which you know, I find it to be one of the best books i’ve read on organizing in years to be honest.

[01:05:31] It’s just You Such a beautiful thoughtful and very deep piece of writing and there’s a moment when and I think that actually, I’m going to read rereading. I take it from her in a way where she says the solidarity Is a form of closeness maybe even intimacy and network of deep connection that rewires the splintered collective Yeah, I love that and I think it’s not only is it beautiful but it’s also so true and it opens so many strategic very strategic and practical options and I think that among one of the tasks that we have in france and that in that you guys have in the u.

[01:06:17] s is to try and find to try and chart paths that, are, that you can envision, and that you can also see how you will go through all the steps, even while knowing that, the steps will change along the way, and there will be, so much that happens, but.

[01:06:37] Anchoring that into things that are doable 

[01:06:42] Cayden Mak: Right 

[01:06:43] Clément Petitjean: things that you can do and you can also feel Satisfaction of doing right. That is not just it’s not just like rhetoric and Concepts, but it’s also actual actually felt experiences in that, the that closeness that intimacy that pickin writes about You I think is the sort of moral and political compass that, that that should be developed and and nurtured in a much more intentional way.

[01:07:14] Cayden Mak: Yeah, that’s great. Clément, thank you so much for joining me today. I really appreciate your insights on the French political system, on that election, and really, I think your your experience being able to bridge What organizing looks like in the United States, what kind of made the new popular front victory possible in France.

[01:07:32] So I think hopefully very informative to our listeners. If people want to keep up with you and your work, is there any place where, you publish regularly or where can people find you online if they want to, if they want to read more? 

[01:07:43] Clément Petitjean: So I have a Twitter account that I started using a couple of years ago Every now and then I write I write stuff for I would say in these times jacobin convergence Hopefully i’ll get to write for other independent media outlets, out there And there’s you know that book that came out with hey market last year occupation organizer that talks about more specifically about community organizing and the role of community organizers And hopefully there will be, follow ups to that work in one way or another.

[01:08:21] Cayden Mak: Fantastic. We’ll make sure to link to your story for us in the show notes and to your Twitter so that people can find you and your work. 

[01:08:29] Clément Petitjean: Thank you very much. It was a great conversation. It helped me. Get my ideas a little clearer in that, crazy mess that we are in. So, very grateful for that 

[01:08:40] Cayden Mak: space.

[01:08:41] Fantastic. Thanks so much. This show is published by Convergence magazine, the magazine for radical insights. I’m Caden Mock and our producer is Josh Elstro. If you have something to say or a question for me, please drop me a line. You can send me an email that we’ll consider running on an upcoming episode at mailbag at convergencemag.com. I hope this helps.