When we are talking about populism in Europe, the first name that comes to everyone’s mind is Marine Le Pen. She is the leader of the nationalist, anti-EU, anti-immigration party The National Front, that came really close to power just a week ago. In the first round of the 2017 presidential election they won 21.3% of the votes and, while they were defeated 66.1% to 33.9% by Emmanuel Macron of En Marche! the party is to stay in the centre of French politics.
The National Front was co-founded by Jean-Marie Le Pen (Marine Le Pen’s father) in 1972. However, he was a controversial political figure: he has been convicted for hate speeches and his Holocaust denial remarks and when his daughter, Marine Le Pen, took over she tried to soften the party’s image - however she still follows her father’s footsteps. The party increased its popularity by promising jobs and a crackdown on immigration when the country went through major economical and political crisis.
Although, she did not become the President of France, the fact that more than 10 million people voted for her cannot be ignored.
"They became the first opposition party and already started reviewing their strategy for the next parliamentary elections in June. They plan to change their name, the idea behind that is to try to modernize the party and to stop being related to Le Pen’s inheritance. They want to highlight that the party is not racist and it’s legitimate to advocate for “Economic Nationalism," says Mathilde Guenegan, ICL journalist in France.
Although Macron managed to defeat Le Pen, he is facing tremendous challenges amidst a divided and fractured political landscape.
“We don’t know yet if he will be able to implement his program. It will depend on the result of the parliamentary elections. The country is very divided between those who see the European Union as theone responsible of the economic troubles France needs to resolve and those who believe in the EU but want to it be reformed. So, Macron has a lot of work ahead,” says Guenegan.
