National Front (France)
The National Front, known as Rassemblement National (RN) since 2018, is a far-right nationalist political party in France that was founded in 1972. It emerged from a coalition of various neo-fascist movements that sought to promote extreme nationalist policies, including strong opposition to immigration and communism. Jean-Marie Le Pen was the party's first leader, serving until 2011, and during his tenure, the National Front achieved limited electoral success, primarily remaining on the fringes of French politics.
In 2011, Le Pen's daughter, Marine Le Pen, took over leadership and aimed to reshape the party's image, distancing it from overtly racist ideologies while maintaining its core nationalist values. Marine Le Pen gained significant visibility as a presidential candidate in the 2017 election, advocating for policies such as reducing immigration and withdrawing from the European Union, but ultimately lost to Emmanuel Macron. Despite facing accusations of xenophobia and racism, her leadership marked a period of increased support for the party.
The National Front's history reflects a complex evolution influenced by the socio-political landscape in France, characterized by both successes in European parliamentary elections and challenges in national contests, positioning it as a key player in contemporary far-right politics in France.
National Front (France)
The National Front is a far-right, nationalist political party in France. It was founded in 1972 as a conglomeration of the numerous neo-fascist political movements operating in France at the time. Neo-fascism is a political ideology that supports fascist, or dictatorial, means of implementing extreme nationalist policies, such as isolationism and opposition to immigration. Jean-Marie Le Pen served as the first leader of the National Front from 1972 to 2011. He led the party to some parliamentary victories in that time, but the National Front remained mostly a fringe organization.
Le Pen's daughter Marine Le Pen succeeded her father as National Front leader in 2011. She was a controversial candidate for president of France in the 2017 election, particularly due to her anti-immigrant stances. The younger Le Pen ultimately lost the election. She vowed to reinvent the National Front's public image for future elections.
Background
The National Front was a product of the neo-fascist movements that arose in some European countries after World War II (1939–1945). Neo-fascism is a political ideology that draws on the fascist World War II dogma of countries such as Germany and Italy to advocate for the implementation of nationalist policies. Nationalism is a form of extreme patriotism that portrays one's own country as being superior to all others while depicting immigrants and other foreigners as being untrustworthy and dangerous.
French neo-fascists in the 1950s and 1960s felt that only far-right policies—such as opposition to communism and rejection of foreigners—could make France a significant international power. Ordre Nouveau, or New Order, was a particularly influential neo-fascist movement that took hold in France in the late 1960s. Group leaders claimed their ultimate goal was to remove all those who threatened the safety of the French people from France.
Ordre Nouveau logged dismal showings in Paris elections in 1971. The group then began concentrating on winning national legislative elections in 1973. The organization's leaders felt that doing this would require merging with other far-right neo-fascist groups so Ordre Nouveau could broaden its national appeal. Some movement officials even suggested that the new organization should try to attract votes from political centrists, or those who supported a combination of liberal and conservative views. The neo-fascists saw this restructuring as the only way Ordre Nouveau could transition from being merely a political movement to an official party.
In 1972, Ordre Nouveau and several similar organizations merged into the National Front for French Unity, the original name of the National Front. The party chose as its first leader the politician Jean-Marie Le Pen, whom National Front officials believed was moderate enough to earn the party mainstream attention.
Overview
Leading up to the 1973 legislative elections, Le Pen informed voters that the National Front opposed taxation and supported rigidly controlling France's immigration policies. Immigrants particularly concerned the party. National Front members believed immigrants in France—particularly those from North Africa or other non-white regions—drove up the country's crime rate and generally decreased public safety in urban centers. The National Front also argued that immigrants harmed the French economy by utilizing social services and that they should be deported immediately after violating French law.
The National Front ultimately earned a total of about half a percent of the popular vote in the 1973 elections. Le Pen himself campaigned to become president of France in the 1974 election but secured only 0.75 percent of the popular vote. This slightly improved performance earned the National Front a wealth of new members, but the party still struggled in elections. This trend continued into the 1980s.
In 1984, the National Front elected three members to the European Parliament, the legislative body of the European Union. Some political scientists attributed this sudden success to the French people's rejection of the leftist policies of then French president François Mitterrand. The National Front saw its greatest accomplishment to that point when it elected thirty-five members to the National Assembly, the lower house of the French Parliament, in 1986. Le Pen, meanwhile, performed progressively better in presidential elections but still could not overcome candidates from more mainstream parties.
The 1986 elections began an era of good fortune for the National Front. Le Pen secured more than 14 percent of the popular vote in the first round of presidential voting in 1988. The National Front continued to elect politicians to various offices throughout France into the late 1990s.
The 2000s, however, started the reversal of the party's successes. Around this time, the National Front split ideologically, with some members claiming Le Pen was too rigid and alienating to bring the party much more success. Le Pen made it to the final round of voting in the presidential election of 2002, but his party failed to win a single parliamentary seat that year. Increasing party disagreements and further crushing election defeats in the late 2000s led the National Front to elect Marine Le Pen to replace her father as leader of the party in 2011.
Marine Le Pen was a member of the European Parliament, and she had been elected to various regional offices as a member of the National Front. In her new position, she quickly reformed parts of the party's image by eliminating anti-Semitism and other overtly racist content from the National Front's platform. This angered her father, who went on to feud with her publicly over the next several years. Marine Le Pen retained many of the National Front's hallmark nationalist views, however. She wanted France to become politically independent by leaving the European Union and North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). She also wanted to reduce the number of immigrants accepted into France and limit immigrants' access to social services.
Marine Le Pen promoted these views during her 2017 campaign for president of France, during which time the National Front earned record-high national support. At the same time, political opponents labeled her as xenophobic, racist, and anti-Muslim and compared her unfavorably to US president Donald Trump. Emmanuel Macron of the liberal En Marche Party soundly defeated her in the second round of voting in May of 2017. Marine Le Pen claimed she would significantly reform the National Front's platform in the coming years to increase its national appeal. At that time, the party remained a fringe organization of the French far-right.
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