France's far-left shapes up for election battle

With France's presidential elections less than a year away, the smaller parties that tripped up the Socialist Party challenge in 2002 by drawing off left-wing support are once again on the march.
This week's announcement by Jose Bove, the radical farmer activist and icon of the anti-globalisation movement, that he was prepared to stand as a candidate of the "anti-liberal, ecological" left was a first step.
The charismatic Bove enjoys a high profile and considerable popularity, despite brushes with the law in his protests against fast food chains and genetically modified crops. But it remains to be seen whether he can rally supporters from camps as diverse as the trade union movement, environmentalists and Marxists and whether left-leaning voters shocked by the disunity of the left four years ago will follow.
A string of small parties, none with a realistic hope of power, have put forward candidates in the past, from the far-left Lutte Ouvriere to communists or environmental Greens and the chances of their uniting behind one candidate are small. "The experience of 2002 was traumatic in many ways," said Florence Haegel, a political scientist at Sciences Po in Paris.
"But I think the parties are going to play the same role, in that they're all putting candidates forward. It's not clear what the voters are going to do though," she said. The Socialists remain embittered by the experience of 2002, when support for Arlette Laguiller of the far-left Lutte Ouvriere, or the Green Party's Noel Mamere drained left-wing support from Socialist candidate Lionel Jospin.
That helped bring a humiliating loss for Jospin in the first round of the vote, ensuring the re-election of conservative President Jacques Chirac after an unprecedented second round runoff with Jean-Marie Le Pen of the far-right Front National.
Although many of the issues that triggered voter discontent in 2002 remain, from worries about market-driven reforms and globalisation to general discontent with the political class, the impact of Le Pen's success has changed perceptions. "There is a feeling of guilt among many supporters of the left," said Jean-Daniel Levy, research director at CSA, a polling organisation.
"Whether they support the Socialists or not, they don't want to see a candidate of the left failing to get through to the second round again." Socialist Party leader Francois Hollande has repeatedly said a vote for the other parties is a vote for hard-line Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy, the right's most likely candidate.
The two frontrunners to lead the Socialist challenge, Segolene Royal and former Finance Minister Dominique Strauss-Kahn, are aiming at the centre ground, and it should not be hard for others to claim the mantle of the "true left".