The meaning of Popular Front politics today
Gilles Candar, Alexis Henri, Aymeric Monville, Victor
Platypus Review 190 | October 2026
On September 28, 2024, the Platypus Affiliated Society hosted a panel discussion on the reemergence of the Popular Front in French politics under the original title “Le sens d’une politique de Front populaire aujourd’hui.” The panelists were Gilles Candar (historian, president of the Société d'études jaurésiennes), Aymeric Monville (writer, founder of Les éditions Delga), Victor (L’Offensive), and Alexis Henri (Ligue trotskyste de France, section of the International Communist League in France). Platypus member Lucas Zabotin moderated the panel. An edited transcript follows.[1]
Introduction
For nearly 90 years, since the French 1936 legislative election, the anti-fascist Popular Front has been a recurrent political form in the Left's repertoire. In 1935, after the rise of Hitler to power, and after developments in France and Spain, Stalin’s Communist International declared "the popular front against fascism and war," or "Popular Front" — a strategy calling on socialists to join large coalitions including bourgeois parties.[2] This was the official policy of the Communist International until 1939 when war erupted.
After the dissolution of the Assemblée nationale (National Assembly) by Macron after the European elections of June 9th, 2024, in which the Rassemblement National (National Gathering/Round Up) emerged largely in the lead, the principal parties of the Left, with the help of the joint union and civil society actors, resuscitated this history with the Nouveau Front Populaire (New Popular Front) — itself a front similar to the front of NUPES in 2022.[3] The experience of 1936 was reappropriated in a way that was completely conscious and intentional. What is the meaning of a Popular Front politics today? What were the stakes for the Left after the "victory" of the NFP? How should the Left think of the persistent "menace" of the Rassemblement National? In what way is the current political crisis, characterized by the rise of RN, as well as proposals of "a Left of separation," a crisis of neoliberalism?
Opening remarks
Gilles Candar: The classic historical example for the application of the Popular Front remains French for various reasons. There were countries where the question of a Popular Front was off the table because far-Right dictatorships had taken power: Germany, Italy, as well as Spain after the civil war. There is of course the Spanish Popular Front, but the fact that it is tied to the civil war in the collective memory of the Left raises different questions.
Thereby, something of international significance — the defense of democratic liberties for the workers’ movement — takes on a much more distinctive, and certainly more lively, character in French history, in which the republic and issue of democratic freedoms chronologically precede the social question. In the country of the French Revolution, popular movements had to deal with the question of liberties and determine how to act under different regimes even before it made any sense to speak of the workers’ movement. What therefore is surprising about the revolution of 1830 is that working-class neighborhoods sided with the liberals in their conflict against the absolutists of King Charles X. Even though the revolution was co-opted by Orléanists and liberals who proclaimed the July Monarchy, it could only have taken place with popular intervention. Doesn't one encounter a somewhat similar pattern later: with the Paris Commune in 1871 facing the threat of a royalist restoration, or with the elections of 1885 and the subsequent Boulangist and nationalist campaigns? I say all of this to remind you why, in France, communist and socialist militants alike took notice of the significant threat that arose in 1934. With the “leagues”[4] threatening to storm the Palais Bourbon,[5] the call for unity and a Popular Front became very strong.
The originality of the Popular Front is that it's not a "classic" alliance between revolutionaries and reformists within the labor movement. What makes the Popular Front much more important, innovative, and complex is the fact that, in France, the Communists soon extended this alliance to the Parti Radical de Gauche — a party which didn't claim to be part of the labor movement, nor did it consider socialism a necessity.
One could talk about the fate of the Popular Front itself, the social movement, the strikes, the achievements, and its dismantling. But the basic defensive reflex, so to speak, of the Popular Front became an important reference of the French Left whenever one was under the impression — rightly or wrongly — that an authoritarian regime could take power. With the strong turnout for the Rassemblement National (RN)[6] in the first round of the last elections,[7] it's only natural that this "reflex" jumped into action, ultimately prompting a response from various party headquarters.
Regarding the panel questions on the current crisis, the RN and the meaning of Popular Front politics today — I don't know. I believe that the fundamental problem we face today is somewhat similar to the issues of 1936, 1937, and 1938. One can easily see how the Popular Front as a defensive alliance prevents the far Right from taking power. But what are its goals after that? That's the big question that was posed from 1936-1938 in a number of disputes. It ended with the Right returning to power in alliance with the Radicals, with Paul Reynaud[8] declaring: “We are living in a capitalist system. The capitalist system being what it is, if it is to function, its laws must be obeyed.”[9] One sees that a fundamental question is posed. Groups of the very far Left have also for this reason fundamentally questioned the Popular Front, but without, historically speaking, producing tangible results. So, it seems to me the basic question remains: how to achieve results after a successful Popular Front? Does the Popular Front necessarily confine us to the terrain of parliamentary politics or not? This is in my opinion the existential question for organizations on the Left which claim to be socialist.
Aymeric Monville: I’m glad to have heard the contribution of a historian who summarized with great professionalism the main issues surrounding the historical Popular Front. It enables me to respond to the question of a possible resurrection of the Popular Front which I find unnerving because I would prefer to respond in an affirmative rather than a negative way.
If we are to pay tribute to these great moments of Leftist mobilization, these great moments of antifascism and unity, I must add that they did not only create the Popular Front but also the conditions for the French Resistance. The majority of the FTP-MOI[10] were active in the Popular Front. There was no Fascism sui generis in our country. It was imposed by a foreign power. This still remains one of the big achievements of the French people, one which was obviously grounded in a long revolutionary tradition.
The threat is no less great today. One really wants to believe that there is a mobilization against fascism. However, I don't want to reduce the process of fascization to the RN, because I believe it is far more vast. Aside from a large part of the Right in France it also concerns a certain part of the Left which I consider to be Atlanticist. A rabid pro-Atlanticist like Raphaël Glucksmann leading the Parti Socialiste seems to me to be a threat to peace. What I find hard to believe is that the so-called Nouveau Front Populaire (NFP) rallies behind a foreign policy of weapons shipments to Ukraine and supporting a NATO policy tied to the 2014 US-backed coup by a fascist junta discriminating against the Russian minority, bombing the Donbas, and using neo-Nazi fighters. I have doubts about the antifascist commitment of this new Popular Front.
At the same time, I clearly see that it mobilized the French people. I see that when the French people march in all their diversity, Russophobia doesn't work most of the time. They refuse to march for Emmanuel Macron's war. What's interesting is that the parties’ leaderships, on the contrary, push against this. I am a communist and feel close to the Pôle de Renaissance Communiste en France (PRCF),[11] of which I am a member, but I speak on my personal behalf. However, I think for every Marxist, for every Leninist, it's necessary to remember these issues concerning imperialism.
Despite everything, I want to believe in the Popular Front. It's the only thing that allows us to change this situation, and above all, allows us to wage war on war, as Lenin always told us to. One has to start building on this union of Leftist forces, but also has to really engage with its base, in order to be able to overthrow some of its rotten leadership. I believe the French Communist Party (PCF) stopped being Communist a long time ago, going back to the abandonment of the dictatorship of the proletariat and Marxism-Leninism.[12] And yet what's for certain is that the majority of communist activists do not support this road to war.
A popular front deserving of its name is one that fights against imperialism and fascism. I remind you that during the time of the original Popular Front, everyone at least agreed on which side to support during the Spanish Civil War. Accordingly, the problem was: Did Léon Blum abandon the Republican camp? Compare that to Hollande, whose foreign minister squarely supported the Al-Nusra Islamists and thought they did “good work.”[13] Today, some support Banderites. What is this Left? We really have to go back to basics and know what we stand for.
Is there an inter-imperialist war between Ukraine and Russia? I obviously consider Putin's government to be a bourgeois government. Faced with an existential threat of neo-Nazis bombarding the Donbas and banning the Russian language — all with NATO support — simply any government would be forced to react, no matter what kind of regime and mode of production there is in Russia. Are these imperialist reasons? I will remind you that there is only one Russian bank among the world's 100 largest banks. It is obvious that Russia is governed by a national bourgeoisie living off some kind of fossil fuel dividend. But are these really the sort of imperialist reasons — to return a bit to the terms of Lenin[14] — of an economy amidst the merger of bank and industrial capital into finance capital? Were economic reasons really decisive in this intervention? I doubt it.
Nevertheless, I remind you that we have no choice but to then pursue a certain kind of politics. Even if we were to engage in anti-imperialist politics, we would first have to fight against our own imperialism. I'm not turning this into some kind of conventional wisdom. I prefer Mrs. Castets,[15] as bad as she may be, to Mr. Barnier.[16] I would support her like Lenin supported Kerensky. Going beyond the comparison with the Popular Front, it's more about 1917 and about the difference between those who want to continue the imperialist war and those who want to end it. In this way, I believe we are again in a Leninian moment. One always has the right to make historical comparisons, it nourishes our thinking. I do believe that certain people within Left-wing parties understand what is happening and don't want war. I think that we can still win within the struggles for party leadership, but we must think about matters dialectically, in their movement, and push for this. Where all comparison with Lenin ends, however, is that today we are playing with the survival of humanity.
Victor: L’Offensive is a young organization founded in 2021. We came into being through the participation of Antifascists in Lille in the so-called “People’s Solidarity Brigades” during the first Covid lockdown. These brigades distributed essential goods to people in need, and they were soon joined by people who worked in the “social and solidarity economy.”[17]
There were reflections on the strategy of far-Left organizations in response to the rise of fascism in France and the impending climate crisis. These discussions brought an ideological turn towards what we call social ecology. Social ecology doesn't mean gardening in the style of Yannick Jadot.[18] Instead, it's tied to libertarian communism. We think about the democratization of the control of the means of production, the redistribution of wealth, the reorganization of political life, and notably reorienting commodity production. We also think about how to put a stop to the production of useless and polluting goods, how to protect natural resources and how to use technology to work less and better.
A democratic instrument that seems interesting to us is libertarian municipalism[19] and communalism. We take inspiration, albeit critically, from what is happening in Rojava and from what happened in Spain in 1936 — the organization of society around popular assemblies on the local level, then grouped together in a democratic confederation of assemblies where we can decide how to produce and how to live.
For us it was always important to work with multiple organizations. For that reason, despite all the caveats that came up at the moment of the dissolution of the National Assembly, we found it vital to join the NFP. Despite Hollande, despite Glucksmann, we saw in it the possibility to end the neoliberal policies practiced in France for years by the Hollandists, the Sarkozyists, and the Macronists.
It also fit the strategy of dual power which L’Offensive adopts. This means uniting under a common banner, achieving local victories, and experimenting with a new model of society in order to grow our influence and create global forms of solidarity which will ultimately enable us to supplant the bourgeois state. The idea of participating in the NFP was at the core of this strategy because it was a formal way for us, at our local level, to connect with other organizations on the Left — radical organizations, but also more institutional ones like the La France Insoumise (LFI). Remember that we started working on this during the battle against Macron’s pension reform,[20] where we succeeded in creating an “inter-organization” around LFI, the Action Antifasciste, but also the CGT union, the Nouveau Parti Anticapitaliste, the SUD Rail union, and others. For us, the political meaning of a Popular Front is to start to create more links between organizations so that we avoid working in a way that overlaps and holds us back. We aren't naïve. We know that there are internal differences. But at least we can find agreements on certain points and advance in the same direction — to take the offensive in order to gain new rights instead of continually being on the defensive about social gains from several decades ago. In our strategy of dual power, the mission after the victory (of the NFP) is to reappropriate the space in our towns, districts, and villages for a Left that is radical, anticapitalist, and at a maximum distance from the Socialist Party. The task for us in the coming two years with the municipal and presidential elections is to create and expand new channels of news and information to "de-Bolorize"[21] society; to start to think about public services that belong to us, parallel to the state; to invent new spaces for debate to inspire people to see themselves in what could be a society governed by a radical Left — a society without private ownership of the means of production.
Alexis Henri: The terms of the debate today are clear. On the one side there are popular front apologists like the Stalinist Aymeric Monville and the academic Gilles Candar, as well as a form of commentary that tries to appear detached like Platypus. On the other side is us, the Ligue Trotskyste de France, who have intervened in the elections with all our forces in an effort to forge an anti-RN working-class pole that is opposed to the NFP.
Opposition to the Popular Front is a question of principle for Marxists. Trotsky wrote a great number of articles on this. The meaning of popular fronts is to forge a class collaborationist alliance with a sector of the bourgeoisie deemed progressive against another sector of the bourgeoisie that relies on fascist parties or simply is more reactionary than others. The RN, of course, falls in the last category.The strategy is therefore contrary to the class independence of the proletariat as it ties the proletariat to the bourgeoisie. It necessarily leads to the defeat of the workers, to their demoralization, and to the victory of the very reaction it was supposed to prevent.
The adoption of the Popular Front by the Stalinized Communist International in 1935 amounted to a complete rejection of all the lessons of the Russian Revolution and everything for which Lenin had struggled throughout his life. In the civil war in Spain, since it was evoked, the Popular Front prevented the expropriation of capitalists and landowners in order to avoid frightening the Republican bourgeoisie. By demobilizing the workers and peasants, it inexorably paved the way for Franco. The same in France — the Popular Front was an alliance with the Radical Party, the party of French colonial imperialism under the Third Republic par excellence. In the name of this alliance, the revolution which had broken out in June of 1936 was channeled into some economic concessions, as PCF leader Maurice Thorez charged himself with getting workers back to work while they were occupying a large portion of the factories and means of production of the country. The demoralization this caused paved the way towards the crushing of the general strike on November 30, 1938, towards banning the PCF, and towards the Vichy regime's rise to power.
Likewise, for the past 40 years the cycle of popular fronts and the forceful return of the reaction has been repeating itself with increasingly catastrophic consequences for workers. Le Pen was virtually unknown in 1980. The Front National[22] has become a force thanks to the blows Mitterrand dealt to the workers. The blows dealt to them subsequently by Jospin propelled Jean-Marie Le Pen to being in the second round of the presidential elections in 2002. The blows dealt by Hollande’s government paved the way for a second round between Macron and Marine Le Pen. She is now at the gates of power. She already exerts control on the current government. Every time the Left has lied to the workers, trying to convince them that a Popular Front in one or another form could stop Le Pen. It is not true that this strategy helps to buy time. By chaining the workers to the bourgeoisie, the Popular Front delays and obstructs the constitution of a working-class pole against the reaction.
French imperialism is today in a phase of advanced decomposition. The US-dominated global liberal order as it was constituted on the rubble of the capitalist counter-revolution in the Soviet Union is today challenged. The US are pressuring their imperialist rivals even more, including France, which took part in the endless pillaging of the open world of liberal globalization in the last 30 years. This is where Macron’s rage to destroy the gains of the working class in France comes from. Nothing can be wrested from this bourgeoisie if we don’t seriously threaten to take everything from them. It would require a confrontation with French capitalism that neither the NFP nor any of its components are ready to lead. This was clear with the pension reform protests, where union bureaucrats and the Mélenchonists led the struggle to a defeat by containing it within bounds tolerable for the bourgeoisie. This is why we need communist leadership.
The far Left that identifies with Trotskyism needed to build an anti-RN working-class pole opposed to the Popular Front. Those of us at the Ligue Trotskyste seized upon the fine words of Lutte Ouvrière (LO), NPA-Révolutionnaires,[23] and Révolution Permanente (RP) which were critical of the NFP and its predecessors. We wrote them an open letter once Parliament was dissolved so that they would form a block with candidates across the country capable of being an alternative to the NFP. They refused to do so, notably LO who thought it was impossible to have the slightest impact in these elections. LO, NPA-R, and RP would not confront Mélenchon and his blah blah about working class and immigrant neighborhoods. In the end, what did they do? They each separately led miserable campaigns which were not seen as alternatives to the NFP. They were not ready to confront the NFP head-on. For the second round of the elections, RP and NPA-R, just like the PRCF, called to vote for the PCF and for LFI — while LO told their voters, who justifiably are concerned about the rise of the RN, that they should not feel bad about voting NFP. This was a badly masked call to vote for the NFP. This capitulation to the NFP hinders the struggle for an anti-RN working-class pole. If during the elections the NFP is taken to be a lesser evil to the RN, allowing us to block them at least temporarily, then why struggle against the illusions of popular front politics outside of election periods at all?
We’re preparing for a bad remake of the last elections in July, except that the next time the RN may well win. We must therefore break with the NFP and its Left-most component and, therefore, the component most detrimental to working-class interests — LFI. We must struggle for a real anti-RN working-class pole.
Responses
GC: Alexis reminded us that Trotsky and the majority of Trotskyists critiqued the new politics of the Communist International. Their split with the Comintern had already happened — before the formation of the Popular Front. They were very critical of the Popular Front. This Trotskyist opposition quickly subdivided into a number of groups and tendencies. There were the Trotskyists closest to Trotsky himself. Then, there were a number of “Trotskysant” groups participating in the Popular Front in a critical manner. The Pivertists, a far-Left faction of the Socialist Party which would leave it in 1938 to found the Parti Socialiste Ouvrier et Paysan (PSOP), had a slight tendency towards Trotskyism and participated in the Popular Front. Marceau Pivert even had some responsibilities for the propaganda of the Popular Front in the beginning.
In 2024, among the groups reclaiming Trotskyism for themselves, the NPA-Anticapitaliste and the Lambertist Parti Ouvrier Indépendant (POI) participate in the NFP — while NPA-Révolutionnaires, the Lambertist Parti Ouvrier Indépendent Démocratique (now called Parti des Travailleurs), Lutte Ouvrière, and the Ligue Trotskystehaven't found common ground with it. One could say that, in this respect, the history of the extreme Left continues. The question remains what kind of perspectives are opened up by this.
With regards to Victor — I don’t know L’Offensive at all, but I was glad to learn that, if I understood correctly, there is a eco-libertarian tendency close to LFI working with local initiatives. Here too there are historical precedents. One can find this with the Syndicaliste Révolutionnaire tendency in the CGT union and elsewhere.
Regarding what Aymeric was saying, I don’t have the same analysis of the situation in Ukraine — on which, by the way, I am no specialist. But what is clear — and important to recall — is that the Left in France has always structured itself around the question of the secular, democratic, and social republic. On these points there can occasionally be a convergence of the different Lefts. Concerning international politics, however, it's extremely difficult. Take the French Revolution: questions of war or peace divide the revolutionary camp. Faced with Germany in 1870, in 1918, and in 1945, these divisions return. Therefore, it is rather normal that there are chasms today regarding international politics.
It’s true, finding an agreement on this in the NFP will be difficult. However, they have defined a number of positions which are neither those of Aymeric nor those of Raphaël Glucksmann, who is criticized from the other side by the moderate positions in the NFP. We might be able to say that Ukraine was indeed attacked by Russia, and at the same time that support for Ukraine must avoid leading to a new world war. It's true that there is a problem. The solution doesn't appear simple.
AM: I agree with Gilles Candar that foreign policy is obviously not what defines the Left generally. However, as Gilles agreed, we still are in a dangerous situation. I suggest that we concern ourselves with it. I would offer a counterexample to what Gilles said: the Tours Congress, at which support of the USSR was decisive for the split between Communists and Socialists. There are still moments where splits are important and in which foreign policy becomes a dominant issue.
GC: Yes, but for divisions! The Left very often falls apart on international politics.
AM: About fleeing the NFP due to its imperfections and its support for imperialism — it's not possible. If the alternative is to join the NPA or other groups, I would just remind you that Gilbert Achcar had suggested arms shipments to Ukraine starting in 2022. For me, it’s like jumping from Scylla into Charybdis. Last September 19, LFI agreed to strikes with French and British missiles with American guidance on Russian soil.[24] Do they realize what they’re doing? This is no longer about Marx and Lenin. This is simply about the survival of humanity. In spite of everything concerning Russia, I believe we still need to stick to the Minsk Accords which France was meant to defend — a peace process that Hollande himself later admitted he had betrayed. Now, Lionel Jospin[25] is saying that our enemy is Russia. Where are these people leading us?
On strategy — it's not about supporting the NFP, flawed as it is, but as Lenin always said, we need to be one step ahead of the masses, not ten thousand steps ahead. There were elections in which the French people refused the fascization of the country. This fact should not be taken lightly. They voted for such an imperfect coalition because it at least meant a refusal of the RN. That’s not insignificant. We should build on that in some way. Macron is in a weakened position with Michel Barnier as Prime Minister. We need to take advantage of this in our struggles. Of course, it's not only about supporting a policy. There are of course strikes, class contradiction and all of those things. I do think there is enough agreement to come together on the streets.
V: A point that I found interesting in Gilles’s statement was when he said that whenever there is a Popular Front or an alliance, it is defensive and often stops once it achieves its goal. We have just now succeeded in convincing people to strike down the RN and the Macronists. But right after that, the social democrats are trying to blow the whole thing up.
Alexis spoke of the desire of LFI and major labor unions to stall a growing movement. I'm far from defending the CGT and LFI. Many among us in L’Offensive have an Autonomist background, so we have never been fans of these large organizations. And yet to us, it seems like we of the radical Left need to look at ourselves in the mirror and recognize that in a sense we have failed to radicalize workers around our concerns and inspire them to go all the way. Hence our strategic turn away from using every social movement as potentially leading to revolution, and towards a strategy of dual power in order to lay the ground for a more ideal society here and now.
AH: We still need to take stock of the defeats and retreats if we want to advance. Contrary to what Victor said, if we are to honestly assess what happened in the NFP, we must recognize that it was not the workers who didn't want to fight but the leadership. Why did they not want to fight? Because they didn’t want to confront the bourgeoisie. To return to what I was saying about Mélenchon and immigrant working-class neighborhoods — he likewise was able to make some speeches but unable to go any further. He was unable to mobilize workers and minorities because he is the epitome of a French republican militant secularist [laïcard]. Despite being a Leftist, he could not confront the bourgeoisie on this issue because the hatred of Muslims is central to the ideology of the French imperialist republic today.
Briefly on the question of Ukraine, there's no problem with Aymeric attacking the Atlanticism of Roussel and the New Anticapitalist Party (NPA) of Poutou — and we could also add that of Gilles Candar. It’s all well and good to attack Roussel, but we must remember that the Pole of Communist Revival in France (PRCF) voted for the French Communist Party (PCF) and remains silent about Mélenchon who also supports the imperialist sanctions against Russia. But what is the Marxist position on Ukraine? The war was provoked by the EU and NATO’s Eastward expansion in the past decades. At a certain point, the Russian regime said "Nyet." The entire issue at stake in the current war is: Who will incorporate, oppress, and ferociously exploit the Ukrainian workers — the EU and NATO or the Russian oligarchs? It's clear that this war is reactionary on both sides. Therefore, there is only one Leninist position: revolutionary defeatism on both sides, like in the first imperialist war of 1914 — even though we consider Russia to be capitalist, not imperialist. Our position is to call Russian and Ukrainian workers to turn their guns against their own bourgeoisies on both sides. This is how we will be able to advance the struggle against imperialism, and notably French imperialism.
Q&A
Fundamental question: is the RN really a fascist party?
AH: I already responded "No," so I won't go further into it.
GC: I understand well why one would ask this question. I don’t think we can characterize the RN as a fascist party. You would first have to define fascism. Right away, you will encounter specialists who say, “Careful, fascism has such and such characteristics. In Germany there was Nazism which was different, Franco was Francoism, Salazarism during the Estado Novo in Portugal which was yet another thing.” There is a kernel of truth in all of these claims. But when we colloquially speak of fascism, we don’t necessarily mean all the characteristics of the Italian regime in power in the 1920s and 1930s. What is colloquially understood by fascism is an authoritarian regime which suspends democratic liberties — political and social.
The historical parallel that seems perhaps more tenable to me is the one around the debate about how the RN had become less demonized. I'm strongly reminded of the French situation in 1934, the moment the Popular Front emerged. Something that always troubled historians was La Rocque's Croix de Feu. Was it fascist — or not? Was it authoritarian — or not? Was it a precursor of De Gaulle's Rassemblement du peuple français (RPF), or of various far-Right formations? Those are interesting discussions but with a limited political scope. The concern with La Rocque's movement in the 1930s was that it opened the door towards a more firm and authoritarian Right — that it opened the door to something worse.
The fundamental supposition of the popular front is to say: It is in the interest of the workers’ movement, and the communist and socialist Left to prevent tightened, repressive policies and the establishment of an anti-liberal, authoritarian, far-Right regime in France. Such a development would be very harmful for society as a whole, particularly for the ideas and social milieus that we represent. This is what we mean by an "anti-fascist front". Another response to this is possible, as the Ligue Trotskyste proves through its rejection of popular front politics.
Do you think, for example, that Donald Trump is a fascist?
GC: Let's say that he represents a danger for a system of peaceful transfer of power, a danger for a system of democratic and republican governance. We saw with Trump in the last election, the strong temptation to have a government no longer called into question by elections — and in my opinion he will act on it this time around. We could say that this is somewhat the difference between a dictatorship and a democracy. Of course, there are intermediate forms. The regime under Napoleon III was very authoritarian — a police state. At the same time, there were elections — not free elections, but elections nonetheless in which the opposition could get elected. Nazism had a worse dictatorship than the one in Italy. With Trump, democratic liberties are in danger like they probably will be with the RN — perhaps not through things the RN would implement, but rather with what would follow.
Going back to the statement my colleague of the Ligue Trotskyiste made: he obviously believes that these dangers can exist in other forms of government. Alright. On an intellectual level, it doesn't shock me that one could arrive at such a point of view. The place from which I speak, to use an expression of the 1970s, is with those who prefer to have Popular Front politics because it's better to live in a society with a certain number of liberties, imperfect as they may be. I'm not surprised that the Popular Front corresponds to a strong social and political demand whenever this kind of problem arises in our country. Besides, the Popular Front can always be critiqued and one can make an assessment that something different should be put in place. Why not? On an intellectual level, I'm happy to listen to it.
AM: When talking about fascism, I don't like how Dimitrov's definition, “the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie,” often leads people to the notion that one just passes from one into the other. Conversely, what Dimitrov, Stalin, Thorez, and Togliatti saw at the 7th congress of the Communist International was the possibility for a deep split of the bourgeoisie into fascist and non-fascist — a split due to the contradiction between fascism and the gains of the bourgeois revolution as part of the evolution of the imperialist stage of capitalism. It became necessary to force this split, to gamble on it. This is what the USSR did at the time, allowing it to win WWII. It’s worth noting! We can all agree on the necessity of a popular front there! At the same time, there isn't such a thing as too small of a struggle — the small fronts matter. Clearly, the battle-front of democratic liberty is extremely important.
On the issue of the RN: The real drama is that it's not only the RN which has a political tendency towards fascism. Looking at Macron’s warmongering politics, his excessive domestic use of rubber bullets, his calls to effectively strike Russia — there's a complete change of the paradigm. I will correct myself regarding the LFI: the majority of their parliamentarians shamefully abstained on September 19.[26] And their member of parliament Omarjee squarely voted in favor of British-French arms deliveries and strikes on Russian soil. Need I say more?
To summarize: Do we need a Popular Front? — Yes. The whole question is: what kind of Popular Front, when, and how?
V: Even though it might seem difficult to classify the RN as a fascist party, as Gilles said; it's noteworthy that ultra-reactionary, far-Right militants are tailing it. The party’s own line is already very reactionary. But they are closely followed by all the identitarian supporters of Eric Zemmour[27], who are causing harm in the streets of France. In line with what Gilles and Aymeric concluded, L’Offensive joined the NFP because we believe that it would be close to impossible for us to continue our struggles under a RN government. It's already very difficult under Macron. Many of the organizations we are friendly towards have been vilified or even banned by Darmanin. For us, it was unacceptable to let the RN win by playing on our divisions.
AH: Gilles talked about the struggle for democratic rights. Of course, we must fight tooth and nail to defend our rights. But the question lies elsewhere. The question is how to win. Here, Aymeric answered by some sleight of hand. He says that of course we must fight for democratic rights and that this means doing a popular front. Not at all! This is not the conclusion that follows. Quite the contrary. In my statement, I explained through historical examples how popular fronts never stopped fascism: Spain in 1936; France in 1936, leading to 1940 and the establishment of the Vichy regime. NPA-R used a somewhat blunt formulation which I quite like. They said that 40 years of Popular Front — under Mitterrand and others — has led to 40% for the far Right.[28] Do you seriously want to fight to defend democratic rights and the gains the working class made? The conclusion that follows from history is that we must break with the popular front which paralyzes this struggle. Today, the elections that are unfolding are about to give us yet another bad historical example. If we refuse to learn this lesson from history, we will continue to sink, democratic rights will continue to be squashed, whether now through Barnier, soon through Darmanin, or through his successor, likely to be Bardella or another one of Le Pen’s henchmen.
Aymeric, do you want to answer?
AM: No, I think our differences have become clear. We won't solve them today.
GC: Trotsky’s Left Opposition is 100 years old soon! These, too, are old debates!
I'm also a member of the Ligue Trotskyste. The Popular Front isn't complicated: in Spain, it paved the way for Franco; in France, it paved the way for Vichy; in Chile in 1973, it paved the way for Pinochet. The current popular front continues to pave the way for the RN —
AM: "Allende is Pinochet, everything is in everything else, black is white."
Yes, Allende's Popular Front paved the way for Pinochet.
AM: Yeah. We know your story.
Now, what is the result of the NFP's Republican Front this time around, which is supported by most of the Left except for us of the Ligue Trotskyste? It has merely succeeded in saving Macron from a debacle. The government — and I think comrade Aymeric would agree — is hardly distinguishable from the far Right. Thus, the NFP has even further legitimized the RN as the only viable opposition to Macron. And why is this? Because at the core of any popular front is the subordination of workers’ interests to those of the bourgeoisie. Therefore, the Popular Front can only paralyze and demoralize the working class. Also, this is why it is useless for the defense of our democratic rights. I would add that there is a fundamental convergence between the PRCF and Mélenchon. Promoting French patriotism and French independence is a capitulation to imperialist chauvinism. It seeks to restore for French imperialism a spot in world politics independent from the US. This is Mélenchon’s program, wrapped with nice words about peace, decolonization, etc. Today, the European Union is an economic instrument complementary to NATO. It's an instrument of French imperialism, in alliance with the US and Germany, with which it pillages the economies of the poor, dependent countries of Europe. It also oppresses countries in Africa, notably the colonies of French imperialism. The PRCF is for France’s independence but not for the independence of Kanaky, for example. Comrade Monville takes Putin’s talk about the de-Nazification of Ukraine at face value. In France or in Ukraine — the PRCF’s policy is to reject the interests of workers and to tail a supposedly progressive wing of the bourgeoisie: Mélenchon here, Putin there.
AM: It's good that, in 2024, the Trotskyist opposition remains more or less the same as what it was at its foundation in 1924 — it hardly adapted to anything concrete and still denies the national phenomenon. It remains incapable of understanding patriotism as the defense of one’s own country and nationalism as the aggression of another country. We can’t rehearse all of these debates. But indeed, France can be threatened in its national integrity, as it currently is through the EU. Indeed, the colonialist policy of French imperialism, now at half-mast, must be combatted — you can't pretend that we're against that. All of this leads us to an old conflict around inter-nationalism — that is, the fact of bringing nations together without denying their reality via bourgeois cosmopolitanism. That's what all of this really is about — bourgeois cosmopolitanism — and it always led us to the same kind of impasses.
Could you reiterate whether you see a difference between the Popular Front of LĂ©on Blum and the New Popular Front of Jean-Luc MĂ©lenchon? If so, would this imply a change in strategy?
V: The difference between the Popular Front of 36 and today’s is that society itself has changed. The problematics are no longer exactly the same. Therefore we cannot simply transpose the old model onto the present. We have 90 years of hindsight which can help us avoid repeating the same mistakes. What the far-Left needs to learn from this history is that we need to carry on, because we’ve left too much slack to the bourgeois Left in the past 80 years. We need to be ready to get our hands dirty, to exercise power. We need to take advantage of the current moment, saturate the media, the Assembly, and the municipal councils in order to push the discourse in our favor. What we want is communism. We want to take it all. So let’s deploy all the means we have in order to do so.
AH: Of course there are differences between the 1930s and today. Back then, the PS and the PCF were mass parties, and they allied with the bourgeois of the Radical Party to their Right. Today, the PS and the PCF are but shadows of their past selves. In fact, the bourgeois component of the Popular Front — that is, Mélenchon’s LFI — today represents its "Left" wing. Clearly there are differences.
Back then, fascism was literally around the corner. Today, the bourgeoisie doesn’t even need to release its fascist dogs. But fundamentally, the political lessons remain the same. Class collaboration leads to defeat, and this is why we fought in these elections for a working-class pole against the reaction. Victor himself said, rightfully so, that 150 years of alliance with the Left had led us straight into a wall. Indeed! Yet afterwards he concludes that we must nonetheless make an alliance today. You need to make up your mind.
V: 150 years of alliance with the bourgeois Left has failed, but 80 years of Trotskyist radicalism hasn’t been much better. I would even say that Trotskyist tactics have never won power anywhere, whereas one of the authors from whom l’Offensive draws inspiration, Murray Bookchin, has developed theories which have borne fruit, notably in Rojava. |P
Transcribed and translated by Daron Chiu and Lucas Zabotin
[1] Video of the panel is available at <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHWVgY38aIc>.
[2] See Maurice Thoreze “The Communist Party of France Fights for the People’s Front,” in The People’s Front in France (New York: Workers Library Publishers, 1935), 4–19, <https://www.marxists.org/history/international/comintern/7th-congress/7th-congress-france.pdf>.
[3] Nouvelle Union populaire écologique et sociale (New Ecological and Social People’s Union), French Left-wing electoral alliance formed on May Day 2022.
[4] Far-Right anti-parliamentarist movements in France in the late 19th-early 20th centuries.
[5] Meeting place of the National Assembly, stormed in February 1934 by the leagues.
[6] National Rally, party of Marine Le Pen.
[7] European elections, after which Macron dissolved the National Assembly and called for snap legislative elections.
[8] Minister of Finance.
[9] Tony Cliff, “Trotsky on France,” in Trotsky: The darker the night the brighter the star (1927-1940) (London: Bookmarks, 1993), <https://www.marxists.org/archive/cliff/works/1993/trotsky4/09-france.html>.
[10] An armed resistance group during WWII made up primarily of immigrants.
[11] Pole of Communist Revival in France, founded in 2004.
[12] 1976, at the PCF’s 22nd Congress.
[13] Adrien Sénécat, “Laurent Fabius et le « bon boulot » du Front Al-Nosra en Syrie, histoire d’une citation dévoyée,” Le Monde (March 21, 2017), <https://www.lemonde.fr/les-decodeurs/article/2017/03/21/laurent-fabius-et-le-bon-boulot-du-front-al-nosra-en-syrie-histoire-d-une-citation-devoyee_5098486_4355770.html>.
[14] See V. I. Lenin, Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism (1916).
[15] PCF member and the NFP’s recommended candidate for Prime Minister.
[16] Les RĂ©publicains party member chosen by Macron to be Prime Minister after the results of the legislative snap elections.
[17] “Économie sociale et solidaire.”
[18] 2022 presidential candidate for The Ecologists party.
[19] A concept developed by Murray Bookchin.
[20] The 2022–23 protest wave.
[21] In reference to French billionaire Vincent Bolloré whose conglomerate owns and manages a large portion of the French media industry.
[22] The National Front party of Jean-Marie Le Pen, predecessor to the Rassemblement National.
[23] Nouveau Parti anticapitaliste (New Anticapitalist Party), which split between the NPA-L’Anticapitaliste which joined the NFP and NPA-Révolutionnaires which remained independent.
[24] Monville corrects himself below, stating that LFI abstained from the vote.
[25] Former Prime Minister and First Secretary of the Socialist Party.
[26] Monville is correcting his assertion earlier in the panel that LFI voted for strikes on Russia, stating that they in fact abstained.
[27] President of the party ReconquĂŞte.
[28] “Législatives 2024 : Profession de Foi Des Candidats Du NPA-Révolutionnaires,” NPA Révolutionnaires (June 18, 2024), <https://npa-revolutionnaires.org/articles/legislatives-2024-professions-de-foi-des-candidats-du-npa-revolutionnaires>.
