2023-09-21 15:30:02
How can we win back the hearts of the working classes and stop the rise of Marine Le Pen? On Wednesday, September 20, more than 600 left-wing sympathizers and “rebellious” activists came to listen, at the National Conservatory of Arts and Crafts, in Paris, to the two economists Thomas Piketty and Julia Cagé. The duo has just published a thick work entitled A History of Political Conflict (Seuil, 864 pages, 27 euros), which combs through, with supporting archives, two centuries of electoral results in 36,000 French municipalities, and whose conclusions give hope to the left. As host of the evening, Jean-Luc Mélenchon opened the debates, warmly thanking his two guests. “You are at home here”he told them, full of enthusiasm.
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The leader of La France insoumise (LFI) believed he found in the 850 pages of the book the elements validating “the strategy of conquering power” which he has adopted for a decade. The two economists consider that the electoral base of the left is much stronger than we think, including among the working classes. “Those who say that the working classes have abandoned the left, I would like to know where”, refuted Julia Cagé, supporting complex tables and graphs. Income level, as well as social class, continue to largely guide the choice of ballot placed in the ballot box; also, the vote of the rural world in favor of the National Rally could be explained by economic reasons, and not identity, affirms the thesis of the book. “It is not a racist electorate, but disappointed by the right and left in power”summarized Julia Cagé, who thinks that these voters “could join the left”.
In the crowded amphitheater, Jean-Luc Mélenchon was delighted that the researcher made it possible to “get away from clichés and commonplaces”. And “the working classes” left the “traditional left”he deduced, they would have “massively” joined LFI, or took refuge in abstention. Other “punitive” dismantled by the work, according to him, the concept of “rurality”, which would suggest the existence of a “deeply rooted France”. “France is creolized”, retorted the “rebel”, who finds the need to speak differently to popular electorates obsolete. Moreover, where the movement has a militant force, it elects deputies, illustrated the president of the LFI group in the National Assembly, Mathilde Panot, citing the example of Creuse or Haute-Vienne .
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