Archive for the ‘French Left’ Category
Momentum for Electoral Reform Grows as Andy Burnham Backs Proportional Representation.

Andy Burnham says Labour must ‘seize moment’ and back proportional representation.
Labour should back proportional representation for Westminster elections to allow more cooperation between political parties on a programme of urgently needed social reform, says Andy Burnham.
Writing for the Observer in the aftermath of two byelection defeats for the Tories, brought about in part by tactical voting by Labour and Liberal Democrat supporters, the mayor of Greater Manchester says PR should be at the heart of an entirely new approach to politics and policymaking.”
A key body pushing for this is the Labour Campaign for Electoral Reform.
Chartist Magazine has been one of the forums on the left which had promoted electoral reform:

In the UK PR has been the only system, through the European elections, which has given a big voice to the national populist far-right. Notably, UKIP 2014, (27.5%) of any British party, 24 MEPs, Brexit Party, 2019, (30.52%) 29 seats.
Although this Blog is in principle in favour of PR (see articles above) it is also hard not to recall that Jean-Marie Le Pen gained his first foothold in French national politics when François Mitterrand introduced a proportional voting system, the “party list” method, for the French legislative elections in 1986.
The intention, as the far right Front National (FN) led by Le Pen was bubbling support out in the country, and some tentative alliances with the classical right were in the air, was to divide the Socialist Party President’s opponents. Despite some who warmed to the FN anti-immigration theme, the Gaullists (Rassemblement pour la République RPR) and centre-Right (Union pour la démocratie française, UDF) had many reasons to be wary of the FN not least those who recalled Le Pen’s own fight for Algérie Française against the General. The measure, equally transparently, was intended to shore up left support, easier to express nationally than through constituency battles.
In elections the RPR/UDF coalition obtained 43,9 % and were the largest group. Consequently, for the first time of the history of the Fifth Republic, the parliamentary majority was opposed to the President. Thus began a period of “cohabitation”, between the Right, led by PM Jacques Chirac, and Mitterrand, a division of power which the founder, in 1959, of the constitutional framework Charles de Gaulle, did not foresee. (La cohabitation de 1986-1988, une première sous la Ve République.)
The FN was able to form a parliamentary group with its 35 elected members (9,65% of the vote). It marked their entry onto the national political scene, and helped give them, a previously fringe movement with origins in ‘national revolutionary’ tendencies, legitimacy.
PR for Parliamentary elections was abolished by Prime Minister Chirac. Reelected in 1988 Mitterrand did not re-introduce the system for the legislative elections held in the same year.
Nevertheless, “Since their creation in 1986, France’s regional councils were first elected according to a proportional system (used three times between 1986 and 1998) and then, since 2003, through a mixed system which combines proportional distribution and majority bonus in a two-round ballot.
This “tailor-made” election method, which is different than what is used for the National Assembly and departmental councils (two-round binominal system), as well as the European Parliament (single-round proportional election) is similar to that which is used by town councils of cities over 1,000 inhabitants where the majority bonus is greater (50%).”
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As the Class Struggle intensifies Confusionist Grayzone Agents step up attack on Comrade Paul Mason.

Grayzone Political Confusionism.
“The “mutually hostile offshoots from the Enlightenment, liberalism and Marxism, can at least now mount a joint defence operation against fascism.” wrote Paul Mason in How to Stop Fascism, History, Ideology, Resistance. (2021). He argued that “social, economic, climate and racial justice” could form the framework of this alliance against a resurgent far right.
Mason argued that modern fascism wanted a “global race war that reshapes the world into ethnic monocultures and ends modern society”. Yet, the national populist parties of Europe are not mass totalitarian parties, tightly organised “conspiratorial” quasi-military structures in full view (as Hannah Arendt called them), which could mount such a Armageddon. Their importance lies in electorally significant forms and their ideology which has seeped into the wider society.
From Spain’s Vox, Belgium’s Vlaams Belang, Denmark’s: Fremskridtspartiet, Poland’s ruling Prawo i Sprawiedliwość, Hungary’s Fidesz – Magyar Polgári Szövetség and France’s Rassemblement National, who now have an unprecedented 89 seats in the National Assembly, and the other parties in Europe, are anti-immigration (believers in the Great Replacement threat), welfare chauvinist (protecting their ‘own people’), ‘anti woke’ and defenders of national identity and sovereignty. The ruling Boris Johnson Cabinet in Britain has a lot in common – to cite their policies towards refugees alone – with these parties.
The ideas peddled by fellow-travelling national populist networks such as Spiked, GB TV, and a range of media outlets in France, from Valeurs Actuelles, Causer to CNews, centre on issues such as defending Brexit, attack “the bourgeois left”, the liberal “elite”, “PC” (the old word for ‘Woke’), take up issues such as gender, and (in France) “l’écriture inclusive” – making the French language inclusive of real human genders. Mick Hume, the former editor of Living Marxism’s successor, LM, is at the heart of this nexus in the UK, writing in the Mail, ““The Remainstream TV media’s hysterical anti-Boris Johnson obsession is nothing less than an attempted coup,” No doubt those familiar with other countries could add to this brief list. Éric Zemmour, who got 7,07% of the vote in the first round of France’s Presidential elections, after having been credited with between 15 and 18% at one point, and whose 120,00 strong party, La Reconquête, won no MPs in the June Parliamentary elections, has been more important in spreading and popularising these views than its efforts at conquering political power.
In response, this is the nearest thing to a new Popular Front that we have, an immensely heartening vote for the united left in the France, Greens, Socialists, Communists, la France insoumise, and many smaller parties.
One development helping popularise far right themes is confusionism: the disintegration of political landmarks previously stabilised around the left-right axis. In breaking down the left right division those who follow what can be called the ‘anti-imperialism of fools’, align with any anti-West forces. The Grayzone stands accused. “It is known for misleading reporting[20] and sympathetic coverage of authoritarian regimes,[2][13][21] in addition to its denial of the Uyghur genocide.[25] The Grayzone has spread conspiracy theories about Venezuela, Xinjiang, Syria, and other regions. “
Conspiratorial claims about left-wing figures can also play a key role…..
Comrade Paul Mason has been attacked again and again by the Grayzone.
Anybody might think their real aim is to shut him out of the left, and stymie any attempt at creating a new popular front.
British security state collaborator Paul Mason’s war on ‘rogue academics’ exposed
KIT KLARENBERG AND DAVID MILLER·JUNE 21, 2022
Grayzone has found new friends to confuse: