The French election, which is of great significance to the future of Europe as a whole, finally began to emerge at 8 p.m. local time on April 24. According to polling data analysis by pollster Ipsos & Sopra Steria, France's current president, Emmanuel Macron, was elected the next French president with 58.2 percent of the vote, ahead of far-right rival Marine Le Pen.
Macron's victory was not a surprise, with the results of the latest round of polls before the final election showing that 55% of people supported Macron's re-election, and Le Pen's support rate was 45%. The day before the showdown, Macron was photographed by the media leisurely dragging his wife for a stroll on the beach and taking photos with supporters.
However, Le Pen, who had previously participated in the presidential election twice, gained more popularity than in previous years through a different style of play and a new image before the final, and was once considered a candidate who was likely to defeat Macron. However, at the last moment, Le Pen finally rubbed shoulders with the presidency again.
In her defeat speech, Le Pen said that despite the defeat, it had the support of nearly 42 percent of French voters, meaning her far-right movement had a solid foundation to lay the groundwork for the future. "Parliamentary elections are going to be held in a few weeks, so the game isn't quite over yet," she said. ”
Where did this woman, who came from a "presidential family" and went all the way from a lawyer to a presidential candidate, lose?
Gilbert-NoëlSfeir Mont-Liban, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Le Pen was the youngest of Jean-Marie Le Pen's three daughters, and the elder Le Pen's political career also deeply influenced Le Pen's childhood life.
Le Pen, a veteran of the military who has been active in politics for a long time after retiring from the army, established the Front National party in 1972 in order to better participate in French nationalism and the far-right political activity "Ordre nouveau", laying the foundation for his future candidacy for the French presidency and the expansion of political power.
Over the years, Le Pen's relentless campaign for the presidency of France may have something to do with his father, Le Pen Sr., who was obsessed with the presidency.
Historical data show that between 1974 and 2007, Le Pen Sr. participated in the French presidential election five times, and the best result was that in the 2002 presidential election, he entered the second round of voting with 16.86% approval in the first round of the election. But Le Pen Sr. met with strong opposition from the entire French political community, because this was the first time that a presidential candidate with a far-right view was eligible to run in the second round of the French presidential election.
According to local media reports, more than a million people in France at the time attended street rallies, shouting slogans such as "Un escroc mieux qu'un facho" ("Un escroc mieux qu'un facho") and "Corruption trumps hatred, And Chirac plutôt que Le Pen" (L'arnaque plutôt que la haine, Chirac plutôt que Le Pen).
The elder Le Pen's political experience also sowed the seeds for Le Pen to embark on the road to presidential election in the future, and she said in an interview in 2010 that deciding to inherit her father's mantle is a fate, and it can even be said to be an infectious disease. She grew up with the disease, she said, "and my father gave me the virus." I was born and raised in politics, and eating and sleeping accompanied politics. I tried to run away from it because I wanted to have my own job, but in the end it was the only thing that excited me. ”
According to Le Pen, le Pen was often involved in political parties at that time, and for Le Pen, the biggest influence on her childhood was not only her father's political ideas, but also the consequent violence.
Since the founding of the National Front, Le Bon Sr. and other party members have often been violently attacked for their overt anti-Semitic rhetoric.
On the night of November 1, 1976, le Pen, who was only 8 years old, suffered a serious explosion at his home, in which the attackers placed explosives weighing up to 5 kilograms outside the apartment where the Le Pen family lived, directly blowing a hole in the outer wall of the house.
In the end, although the Le Pen family was safe and sound, she said the attack had deeply affected her, the family's house had been destroyed, and her parents were afraid that they would affect the children and did not dare to let Le Pen and her sisters get close to the "dangerous" father. Because of her father's political views, Le Pen was teased by her classmates at school, and the teacher ridiculed her father as a "fascist", and these experiences stabbed her hard.
Speaking publicly in 2011, she said: "That's when I knew politics was dangerous. I feel a deep injustice that will stay with me throughout my life. It stayed with me, like fear of what might happen to my father. That's my motivation, and that's probably why I became a lawyer and then a politician. ”
The destruction of Le Pen's home at that time, image source: bbc web page screenshot
In addition to the fact that this incident caused Le Pen a lot of damage, factors within the family also hit Le Pen.
When Le Pen was 16, her mother Pierrete abruptly left the house, eloped with the biographer of le Pen the elder, and divorced the elder Le Pen in 1987. In his autobiography, Le Pen said he suffered "the most terrible, cruel, and painful heartache, and my mother didn't love me."
Later, Le Pen chose to study law at the University of Paris II, earning a master's degree in law in 1991 and a master's degree in advanced studies in criminal law in 1992. For six years, from 1992 to 1998, she was a registered attorney with the Paris Bar Association and regularly held the position of public defender in the Criminal Court of the 23rd Arrondissement court in Paris.
But just as Le Pen decided to begin her career as a lawyer, she was boycotted by many opponents of Le Pen Sr. Eventually she chose to enter politics and began working for the National Front party's judiciary.
A group photo of Le Pen's family in 1984, the far right is Marina Le Pen, image source: bbc web page screenshot
After Le Pen inherited the mantle of his father, his political career was smooth.
Thanks to his father's position in the party and his personal ability, Le Pen joined the National Front party for only 3 years before becoming its vice president. Then, in 2004, after being elected leader of the National Front in the Ile-de-France constituency for European elections, she won a seat in the European Parliament. In 2007, Le Pen even directly participated in the presidential campaign of his father, Le Pen Sr., and gradually became a pivotal figure in the National Front party.
But childhood experiences made her realize that following her father's path would not bring her any closer to the presidency or make the National Front a mainstream party in France.
After gaining a foothold in politics, Le Pen began to distance himself from the extreme views of the National Front party, intending to create a new political image for himself and the party as a whole.
For example, when Le Pen first joined the National Front party, he was involved in the "de-demonization of the National Front" and argued that Europe should adopt a less exaggerated and more pragmatic form of nationalism; that it should be anti-immigrant but "not racist"; anti-EU but not anti-European, anti-globalization but not anti-market.
With a different image from the old Le Pen, Le Pen attracted more traditional voters and successfully succeeded the old Le Pen as the leader of the new Generation of the National Front in January 2011.
After becoming president, Le Pen began preparing for his first presidential campaign. In the 2012 French presidential election, Le Pen received 17.90% of the support in the first round of voting, ranking third, behind the new President Hollande and former President Sarkozy, which has surpassed the old Le Pen's previous record.
Although Le Pen failed this time, she was leading the National Front party to begin its march into the mainstream of French politics. 2014 was a triumphant year for Le Pen and the National Front Party, leading the National Front Party to participate in the French municipal and Senate elections, and finally 11 members of the party became mayors, 2 members became city senators, and members of the National Front party entered the upper house for the first time.
In France's European Parliament elections, the National Front party ranked ahead of other French parties with 24.90% support, winning 24 parliamentary seats, and Le Pen ranked ahead of all French party leaders participating in the European Parliament elections with 24.85%.
In order to completely change the French people's stereotypes of the National Front Party, xenophobia and anti-Semitism under the leadership of le Pen Sr. in the past, Le Pen even kicked out the National Front party in 2015 when he made remarks that downplayed the crimes of the German fascist massacre of Jews. According to a number of media, the relationship between the two also fell into a freezing point.
Jérémy-Günther-Heinz Jähnick / Lille - Marine LePen's meeting for the presidential election, 26 March 2017 in Lille Grand Palais(139) / Wikimedia Commons
After losing the election in 2012, Le Pen ran in the 2017 French presidential election. This time, Le Pen entered the second round of voting, but ultimately lost to Macron with 33.9% to 66.1% support.
However, it can be seen from the vote analysis that the National Front party has the support of the deindustrialization of northern and northeastern France, as well as the working class.
Jean-Yves Camus, director of the Activist Political Observatory at the Fondation Jean-Jaurès Foundation in Paris, predicted in 2017 that "the National Front is not over," explaining: "We have no reason to believe that the job market will get better in the coming years and that the negative effects of globalization will stop." As a result, the number of votes cast by the National Front may fall, but if 2022 is not good, their support rate may rise again. ”
In an effort to shake off the bad image of the past, Le Pen officially renamed the National Front Party to today's "National Union Party" in June 2018. In this election, Le Pen also learned the lessons of the failure of the previous two presidential elections, trying to attract more voters with policy and face changes.
First, Le Pen abandoned proposals to leave the eurozone, Schengen and the European Union, which were not supported by mainstream voters, and advocated a corrective debt policy that softened her long-standing populist economic agenda.
In addition, in the context of the outbreak of the Russo-Ukrainian War, Le Pen changed the previous propaganda slogans to ensure the safety of people's lives and restrict immigration in France, highlighting the rise in energy prices, the sharp rise in inflation, and the weakening of voter purchasing power, and communicated with voters everywhere on these issues.
At the same time, Le Pen has also proposed cutting income taxes and fuel taxes on young people, imposing a low sales tax on necessities from pasta to diapers, and taking a "France first" stance on employment and welfare, opposing Macron's proposal to extend the retirement age in hopes of attracting left-wing voters and young people.
In terms of campaign style, Le Pen also changed from the excitement of his rhetoric in previous years to appearing in front of the Louvre to shoot a campaign propaganda film in front of the Louvre with a calm and calm image, hoping that voters would see themselves as a credible and stable politician (the Louvre later asked Le Pen to remove the video, criticizing its unauthorized and politically motivated use of the body's image).
But those changes didn't put Le Pen in the presidency. The reason for Le Pen's failure was that she did not change her inherent far-right political views, which were difficult to accept by most french people.
Judging from le Pen's program, she still adheres to the nationalist and anti-immigrant positions of the National Union Party, opposes EU citizens in France to enjoy the same social benefits as French citizens, hopes to amend the part of the constitution on immigrant rights through a referendum, supports the extension of the ban on wearing headscarves in public, and hopes to eradicate Islamic ideology in France.
Immigration has become an important political issue in France, and the number of immigrants is likely to increase, and the policy of belittling immigrant groups has affected Le Pen's approval rating to some extent.
In addition, some of Le Pen's previous pro-Putin words and deeds have also become weapons for Macron's attacks, which in turn has reduced her support.
A longtime admirer of Putin, Le Pen visited the Kremlin in 2017 and accepted loans from Russia to fund her party. At a time when the situation was tense in Russia and Ukraine in February, Le Pen also said that she was "completely unconvinced" that Russia would invade Ukraine.
Although Le Pen and the campaign team have since worked hard to clear up her relationship with Putin and condemned the Russian invasion of Ukraine, many pro-Ukrainian voters have worried about Le Pen's rise to power.
In addition, opposition from other parties also dealt a blow to Le Pen. In addition to Macron and the previous left-wing presidential candidate Mélang-sur-Merant-rompon, Reuters reported that before the final election, Le Pen's opponents also intend to form a united front and launch protests against Le Pen in 30 cities to prevent Le Pen from coming to power.
Not only is France concerned about the presidential election, outside France, German Chancellor Schultz, Spanish Prime Minister Sanchez, Portuguese Prime Minister Costa and even jointly wrote an article in the French newspaper Le Monde, calling on the French people not to vote for the far-right presidential candidate Le Pen, saying that "we need a France that defends common European values", and populists and far-right people in all countries will be influenced by Putin.
Macron's victory this time has lifted France and Europe out of danger of moving toward the far right, but unlike the 2017 election, the rise of right-wing forces in this election shows that even if Macron wins, he will still face a turbulent and divided country. Don't forget, those who expressed dissatisfaction with the results after the first round of elections took to the streets to protest, and they didn't want Macron or Le Pen.