Key points to take away from the local elections in France

France’s municipal elections, held over the last two Sundays, have seen mixed results with gains for both traditional parties and extremes.

The Socialist Party won many of France’s biggest cities, Les Republicains conquered Toulouse, the far-right Rassemblement National took 66 communes among mid-sized towns and the far-left La France Insoumise won in Roubaix (Nord) and Saint-Denis, a Parisian suburb.

You can find a map showing the results in detail via our article here.

The Connexion asked constitutional expert and French lawyer Anne-Charlène Bezzina, who teaches public law at Sciences Po in Paris, for her key takeaways from the results.

Abstention is unusually high

The municipales saw a record-high abstention rate of around 42% in both the first and second rounds, excluding the Covid period.

“Municipales have always been, alongside the presidential election, the ones with the strongest voter turnout. It seems this has changed,” said Ms Bezzina.

There are two reasons for this, she added.

Firstly, these are the first municipales with a new voting system implemented in villages with fewer than 1,000 inhabitants, requiring them to introduce two rounds of elections. 68% of all communes presented one list, making voting pointless.

Secondly, “mayors have lost their capacity to attract sympathy,” she said, adding that mayors are suffering from a general distrust of politics and politicians. The sentiment first affected party leaders and ministers but is now reaching the grassroots levels of politics.

Rassemblement National increases its footing

Although the far-right party Rassemblement National (RN) did not win a major city (Nice was won by RN ally Eric Ciotti), the election shows a consolidation of its popularity. 

In total 61 communes, many in mid-sized cities and towns, were won by the party, smashing its record of 14 communes won in 2014.

Many of the party’s candidates reached second place and have retained many town councillors. 

One significance of this is that it enables the RN to build up a group in the French Senate, giving the party the power to file amendments and take part in legislative debates, she added.

The country resembles the United States and the United Kingdom

France is splitting in a similar way to the United States and many parts of the UK where cities tend to favour the Labour Party or the Democratic Party while rural areas choose more conservative candidates. 

France’s biggest cities saw left-leaning parties win or retain control in the elections, including Paris, Marseille, Lyon, Strasbourg, Lille, Montpellier, Rennes and Nantes. 

Together, these are eight of the 11 most populous cities in the country.

The exceptions are Nice and Toulouse, which remain under right-wing / far-right control, and Bordeaux, won by Thomas Cazenave from President Emmanuel Macron's centrist Renaissance party.

This is a longstanding pattern in the country, Ms Bezzina said, referring to the political adage ‘la gauche des villes, la droite des champs’ (the cities to the left, the countryside to the right), echoing La Fontaine’s fable Le Rat de ville et le Rat des champs.

“These municipals have mainly returned incumbent mayors. Voters favoured stability,” she said.

Traditional parties lack a clear identity

Both the Socialist Party and Les Républicains (LR) did not adopt a national line on whether to align with the far-left La France Insoumise or the far-right RN in the second round, she said.

Several Socialist candidates did align with La France Insoumise while others refused, obtaining various results.

Paris and Marseille were won by the PS without any alliance while Nantes was won with an alliance with LFI. 

But Toulouse and Limoges were lost because of the alliance according to Boris Vallaud, president of the Socialist group in the National Assembly. 

“LFI caused us to lose,” he said.

“Candidates who did not align got the best results. Honesty was what voters rewarded,” added Ms Bezzina.

On Monday, both Valérie Pécresse, president of the Île-de-France Regional Council and a member of LR, and Mr Vallaud called for an end to any alliances with far-right and left parties.