Some Reflections on the Upcoming Presidential Elections in France

On April 22, 2007 will be the first round of the presidential elections in France (website, in French). According to the latest survey, the top four candidates are Nicolas Sarkozy (right wing), Ségolène Royal (left wing), François Bayrou (right wing), and Jean-Marie Le Pen (rightist extremist) - thus, Ségolène Royal being the only presidential favorite that belongs to the left wing.

The last presidential elections in France (2002) had been disastrous for the left wing and clouded by rightist extremist Jean-Marie Le Pen being astonishingly successful during the first round of elections - only incumbent Jacques Chirac (right wing) got more votes. Lionel Jospin (left wing) only attained the third place. Jospin reacted to this defeat and stepped down. Consequently, the run-off ballot was between Chirac and Le Pen: most right wing and left wing partisans teamed up and Chirac was elected with paramount majority. For more background information to the presidential election 2002 see Wikipedia [in French].

The current front-runners for the French Presidency seem to be Nicolas Sarkozy (right wing), Ségolène Royal (left wing) ... according to the latest surveys and definitely according to the media coverage. Interestingly, Le Canard Enchaîné [website, in French], a satiric newspaper has attracted attention lately by uncovering some shady conduct of both front-runners ... even the bigger newspapers like Le Monde (France) and FAZ (Germany) referred to those articles. It seems a little bit strange to me that, of all things, a satiric newspaper should assume such a role, but whatever ...

On another note, the www plays an increasing role in electoral politics. Candidates have their website/weblogs where they can communicate their programs and ideologies to their adherents as well as to interested parties. Besides, supporters increasingly take a stake in their favorite candidate's election campaign. Yesterday, for example, I visited Ségolène Royal's website [in French] and found an interesting posting inviting all bloggers supporting Royal to come together in order to make a joint backup effort ... Will this be enough to avoid a defeat similar to the 2002 elections? We will see in 37 days ...