1. In the French legislative elections on June 30 and July 7, a New Popular Front (NFP) electoral bloc in France was formed by a broad range of left, center-left, and far left parties, both to oppose President Macron’s government, which has imposed harsh anti-worker austerity policies and racist anti-Muslim and anti-immigrant attacks; and also to counter the danger of an electoral victory by the even more racist far right National Rally (RN) party. A left bloc against both Macron and the far right was necessary: defense of the democratic rights of workers, youth, immigrants, Muslims, people of color, women, LGBTQ people, and all oppressed people was and is at stake.
2. The NFP achieved a surprising success in the elections, winning more National Assembly seats than either President Macron’s bloc or the RN in the second round of France’s two-round voting procedure. The numerous mass mobilizations of hundreds of thousands of workers and youth in the streets of France played a key role in achieving this result – both by compelling the formation of the left bloc and by driving the voter turnout that put the NFP in first place. The election results represented a setback for the RN, which had won the most votes in the first round; as well as the popular rejection of Macron, whose bloc lost a third of the seats it had previously held.
3. Some leftists have criticized the New Popular Front for withdrawing its third-place candidates in certain districts from competing in the second round, in return for Macron’s bloc doing the same in other districts; this tactical pact with the working class’s enemy, Macron, was deemed unprincipled. As best as we can judge from afar, the left’s third place candidates had almost no chance to win anyway, and the pact had the effect of preventing the far right from placing first and thereby being able to claim the prime ministership. It turned out that the mutual withdrawals benefitted the left more than Macron.
4. Despite the results of the second round, we cannot ignore the danger of the far right’s growing vote totals. One reason for this is the Socialist Party’s imposition of austerity against working people when it was in power. The electoral success of the New Popular Front in this election is only one step in the continuing struggle both against Macron and his allies and against the far right.
5. The French National Assembly is now divided into three large blocs – the New Popular Front, the Macron bloc, and the far right – without any of them having a majority. So it is essential for workers, youth, and oppressed people to continue to build mass mobilizations in the streets to demand a New Popular Front government to implement its program, starting with the repeal of Macron’s austerity attacks and anti-immigrant attacks. Such mobilizations are necessary no matter whom Macron may try to appoint as the new prime minister.
6. Even though the NFP is the biggest bloc in the Assembly, it does not have a majority. In the absence of sufficient mass mobilizations, workers and oppressed people will face the danger that the New Popular Front will not be able to obtain the support of a majority of the National Assembly to implement the just demands and policies in its program.
7. Workers, youth, oppressed people, and the left must speak out loudly against the danger of traitors among the more conservative elements within the New Popular Front, who may attempt to betray the demands of the voters who elected them by trying to make a rotten deal with Macron and his allies to form some motley sort of “center-right-left” governing majority. Against that, workers and youth should denounce deserters from the New Popular Front and oppose any coalition government with Macron’s bloc.
8. Such a rotten coalition of the center-left with Macron and his allies would preside over continued austerity and other reactionary attacks against workers and oppressed people. Not only would this betray the supporters who voted for and elected the New Popular Front, it would also provide propaganda for the far right: They will tell demoralized and disillusioned French workers that the left and the New Popular Front sold them out again, like ex-President Hollande’s Socialist Party government before Macron. Any coalition between Macron and any section of the left will be used by the far right to try to win votes in the next presidential election. Workers, youth, oppressed people, and the left must not allow this to happen!
9. Revolutionary socialists have the duty to warn that even if popular pressure leads to a New Popular Front government that moves to implement its program, sooner or later those demands, and the basic interests of workers and oppressed people, will inevitably and increasingly clash with the crisis-ridden capitalist system. A permanent end to the miseries of poverty and exploitation and the threat of the far right will only be achieved when the struggles of the working class and oppressed people culminate in the overthrow of capitalism and the building of a socialist society of abundance and freedom in its place. To this end, a revolutionary socialist party of the working class must be built to lead the masses’ struggles to victory.