September 9, 2024 editorial of the New Anticapitalist Party-Revolutionaries (NPA-R) in France, translated from French
The appointment of [right-wing politician] Barnier as Prime Minister seals the alliance between [French President] Macron and the RN (National Rally), Le Pen’s far right party. He knows he needs the votes of RN MPs (Members of Parliament) to avoid a vote of no confidence. [RN leader] Bardella immediately proclaimed that Barnier would be under his party’s close surveillance. This voluntary dependence is nothing new: the Darmanin law (recent anti-immigration legislation) was passed with the votes of the far right, and Macron is multiplying his ideological winks at the RN. Barnier has everything it takes to please the RN: in the past, he opposed the decriminalization of homosexuality, the reimbursement of abortion by the social security system, the contract of civil union… And now he’s constantly attacking immigration. The icing on the cake: the French employers’ federation, Medef, has found it hard to hide its delight at the appointment of this loyal servant of the bosses, who negotiated a Brexit tailor-made for the financial world and spoke out in favor of retirement at 65 (higher than normal for France)!
A “Republican front” (i.e. “antifascist” electoral front) that disarms our struggles and ultimately strengthens the far right
The leaders of the [reformist left] New Popular Front nurtured the illusion that we could combat the RN’s breakthrough by calling for a republican front during the last legislative elections, even if it meant calling for votes for Borne (former Prime Minister under Macron, craftperson of the pension reform) or Darmanin (currently Macron’s police minister, ideologically very far right). Macron willingly accepted these left-wing votes, which helped limit his losses in terms of MPs. But who could have imagined that this would commit him in any way? Unless the lessons of the 2017 and 2022 elections have been erased, after the brutal repression of the Gilets jaunes (Yellow Vests movement) and the forced passage of the pension reform…
The [government] dissolution provoked by Macron opened up a political crisis that the left-wing parties now calling for a cohabitation with him are helping to maintain on an institutional and parliamentary level, without danger to the interests of the capitalists. They denounce as a “coup de force” the fact that a two-thirds right-wing Assembly will not approve a left-wing Prime Minister! Only the far right can profit from this circus.
Putting our anger at the service of a program of struggle
Following Barnier’s appointment, tens of thousands of people, many of them young, demonstrated in many French towns, expressing their disgust and anger. It’s not in the Assembly, not in Matignon (the Prime Minister’s office), not in the Élysée (presidential) Palace, that we’ll achieve anything, but in the streets, through struggle. There will be no shortcuts. Millions of us demonstrated and went on strike against the pension reform. Thousands of demonstrators have been tirelessly affirming their solidarity with the Palestinian people for almost a year. Millions showed in the second round of parliamentary elections that they reject the extreme right and its unbridled racism. We are far more numerous than those we are fighting, the bosses and the rulers!
These objectives can only be achieved through our mobilization.
We need a battle plan to bring “the country to a standstill.” We need to attack the root of the problem: the employers’ offensive, which is widening inequalities by lowering wages, degrading working conditions, multiplying job cuts and destroying public services that are useful to the population. Only the struggles of workers and young people can put a stop to this and reverse the balance of power. Struggles that go right to the end, without getting bogged down in so-called social dialogue or limiting themselves to the parliamentary calendar. This is where we need to focus all our forces, all together, right now, against a Barnier-Macron-Le Pen government on the offensive. The cross-union and cross-industry call to strike on October 1st could be the first round. Let’s respond massively.
