The Socialists Implode in France

Being a political junkie, I've followed the contest for the leadership of the Socialist Party in France closely.  Since the summer, it's been apparent that the party is split between a more moderate faction, who are amenable to a coalition with the center-left "MoDem" party of Francois Bayrou, and a hard left faction, who believe the party should sharpen its differences with the right.  The more moderate faction is lead by Segoline Royal, the party's unsuccessful candidate in the last presidential election; the more leftist faction is now lead by Martine Aubrey, the mayor of Lille.

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="360" caption="Martine Aubrey (left) and Segoline Royal"][/caption]

From the perspective of an American, the process by which the Socialist Party selects its leader (and its candidate for President) is an interesting hybrid.  Every member of the Socialist Party can vote, but to be a member of the party you have to actually join and pay dues.  The election itself is managed and run by the party; the government is not involved at all.  Members of the party go to the nearest "section" of the party to vote, and the voting is open during the evening between 5 p.m. and 10 p.m.  Thus the contest is something akin to, but not exactly like, a primary election in the U.S.

Originally, four candidates were in the running for the leadership of the Socialist Party.  Three of them, including Martine Aubrey, were in the "leftist" camp.  Early on, one candidate withdrew and threw his support to Aubrey.  In the first round of voting, Royal got 42.45 percent of votes, and Aubry came second with 34.73 percent.  Because no one obtained a majority of the votes, a second round of voting was required (which, amazingly, took place the very next evening).  The third candidate in the first round also threw his support to Aubrey, which meant that, mathematically, Aubrey had the upper hand.

The second round voting took place last night, and it looks as if a little bit of recent American experience has been imported into France.  During the night, it first appeared that Royal would win the contest, then as the night went on, Aubrey partisans claimed victory, as a result of large margins of victory for her in the areas in the north near Lille.  It commenced then to get ugly:  "Nous ne nous laisserons pas voler cette victoire. Nous contestons les résultats dans le Nord de la manière la plus ferme" 'We're not going to let this election be stolen.  We strongly contest the results from the North.'  Hmmmm, sounds familiar.

Finally, at 5:30, the party announced the official results of the election -- and whoo-eee, it's not pretty:  Martine Aubry, 67.413 votes; Ségolène Royal, 67.371 votes, a tiny margin of 42 votes out of more than 130,000, 50.02% to 49.98%.  More suggestions, of course, from the Royal camp that the election was flawed, that the party insiders who managed the election favored Aubrey, that the election should be redone.  The worst possible result for the Socialists, an contested election that did not produce a clear leader, a party still divided, which seems to have no clue and no clear path to challenge Nicholas Sarkozy's center-right UMP party on a national level (although, interesting, the Socialists have been quite successful in local and regional elections).

My view, as an outsider, is that the Socialists would have been better served by tacking towards the center.  Whether Segoline Royal is the best leader is, I think, another question.  But it is difficult to see a Socialist Party headed by the trenchant Martine Aubrey posing a serious challenge to Sarkozy in the next Presidental election.  But, as a political junkie, I look forward to the next few weeks -- charges, counter-charges, investigations, committees, allegations of wrong-doing, possibly a do-over!  Stay tuned.