France’s National Front Claims Record-Breaking Victory

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France’s National Front Claims Record-Breaking Victory

Across Europe, political parties are moving from the fringes to be the new mainstream.

Marine Le Pen’s National Front (FN) is more popular than ever. Once viewed as an illegitimate, radical fringe party, FN has become France’s most popular party, claiming a historic victory in the first round of regional elections last Sunday. The elections are not yet complete, but in the first round of voting, FN won 28 percent of the vote, winning the majority in six of France’s 13 regions. The second round of votes is still pending, set to take place on Sunday, but one thing is clear: France is looking for change.

“[T]he damage has been done,” according to Politico’s Pierre Briançon. Whether or not FN takes home further wins in the second round this Sunday, the fringe party’s rising popularity has been firmly established. It is yet to be seen how well this protest-movement-turned-political-party can govern large territories, but nevertheless, the historic win at the polls prods observers to keep a close eye on Marine Le Pen and FN in the lead-up to the 2017 presidential elections.

FN has been on the rise since Le Pen took over the party from her father in 2011. The year before, in the same regional elections, the FN won only 11 percent of the vote. Since then, Le Pen has worked to “detoxify” her party, removing herself from her father’s extremist rhetoric. While softening the party’s image, FN is still staunchly nationalistic, and Le Pen remains outspoken in her calls for the restoration of France’s “territorial, monetary, legislative and economic” sovereignty—and her denunciation of Islam. It’s a message that could take her far in a country brutally forced to confront its problems with radical Muslims in its midst, while mired in economic problems—often blamed on the euro.

The National Front’s success in France sets a precedent for many other fringe extremist parties in Europe to go mainstream. Stratfor writes:

Le Pen is simply the most visible face of a wider European trend: the weakening of traditional parties and the rise of anti-establishment forces that criticize both the European Union and the elite that support it.

In Germany, the europsceptic party AfD (Alternative for Germany) held only 4.7 percent of the popular vote in 2013, its first ever election campaign. Just one year later in the 2014 elections, it won up to 12.2 percent in some regions.

The German fringe party’s success is attributed primarily to the refugee crisis. German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union and its sister party, the Christian Socialist Union, have fallen in polls from 43 to 35 percent, due to Merkel’s handling of the crisis.

In recent months, the anti-immigrant Sweden Democrats have polled at around 27 percent—making it Sweden’s most popular party. It too has come from nowhere—in 2010 it won only 5.7 percent.

Spain’s anti-austerity Podemos party won 15 seats in the Andalusia region.

In Greece, anti-austerity Syriza party has transformed from a fringe party to now the governing party of the struggling country.

Similar advances of fringe parties into mainstream politics can be seen in the Netherlands, Hungary and Austria.

The recent crises are reshaping Europe. Europeans—be they French, German, Swedish, Spanish, Danish, Greek, Hungarian or Austrian—are calling for change in the established system. But the change they are looking for means returning to a much older, deep-rooted system.

These European crises are remarkably similar to those of the 1930s. Europeans were desperate for answers and sought out radical parties for extreme solutions—just like today. For more on where this rise of nationalism and fringe parties is heading, read Trumpet writer Richard Palmer’s article “Déjà Vu.”