Obama's 2008 presidential victory in the USA triggered a debate in Europe and the UK as to whether someone from an ethnic minority could achieve similar success in national politics. The 2010 General Election saw a small increase in ethnic minority candidates, but a near doubling of the number of black and Asian members of parliament (MPs) in the House of Commons. During 2010 and 2011, the Univ…
In the 2012 legislative elections, 11 new deputies were elected representing newly created constituencies for the French expatriate community. The Right-wing Union pour un Mouvement Populaire (UMP) that initiated this legislation expected to create a clutch of safe seats for its own party, because expatriate voters have, since extra-territorial voting was introduced in 1981, always given massiv…
The victory of the Left in 2012, and the application of reinforced parity legislation, led to significant gains for women in French politics, with 27% women in parliament and 50% in government, including a powerful Women's Minister. However, a poor performance by the Right, and the concentration of women in less powerful positions, indicate that the battle for equality is not yet won. Ségolène …
The electoral challenge of the far right is an enduringly problematic feature of contemporary French politics. In the first rounds of the 2012 presidential and parliamentary elections, the Front National (FN) under new leader Marine Le Pen attracted a combined total of ten million votes, bringing its ultra-nationalist policies to the centre of national political debate. This article examines th…
In the first round of the 2012 French presidential election, Marine Le Pen drew a record score of 17.9% of the valid votes. Her success was attributed to the ‘de-demonization’ strategy she implemented to soften the party’s image, make it credible on other issues than immigration, and diversify its electoral audience. Survey data from 1988 to 2012 show a more complex picture. Marine Le Pen’s sup…
This article analyses and evaluates the role of the media in the 2012 presidential election. In particular, it focuses on campaign coverage by television and the internet from the perspective of both the main candidates' usage of the media (candidate communication) and the media's coverage of the campaign (political reportage and commentary). It argues that television, the dominant medium in th…
European and global affairs are typically downplayed at election time in France, as elsewhere, and a rudimentary observation of the French 2012 presidential elections would appear to confirm this hypothesis. However, this article argues that in the case of the 2012 French elections the issues of ‘Europe’ and ‘the world’ were significant and inextricably linked to many of the ostensibly domestic…
This article analyses Hollande's presidential election campaign and victory of 2012, placing them in the historical, organisational and ideological context of French Socialism and the French party system. It argues that an effective campaign, an unpopular adversary and a French party system context unusually conducive to pooling the Left's electoral resources akin to 1981 all aided Hollande's c…
Like other European democracies, France appears to be moving towards a ‘new politics’. Cultural issues such as immigration and multiculturalism are now said to be more influential on voting behaviour than socioeconomic issues. In this paper we question the impact of values on the French presidential elections since 1988 and show that: (1) both new and old politics are playing a role; (2) this t…
As tax policy is one of the most prominent issues for France at a time of great economic crisis and public debt, this article analyses how redistribution has been viewed and considered by voters. Assuming three main hypotheses about attitudes towards redistribution (egotropic perspective, sociotropic perspective and voter incompetence), we propose a series of empirical tests of these various ex…
We review theories of French elections, drawing on a recent general theory developed in our analysis of presidential elections (1988–2007). We offer an explanation for why President Sarkozy was not re-elected in 2012. Two key theoretical variables were involved: one long term—ideological identification—and one short term—economic evaluation. The effect of these variables changed greatly from 20…
The Sarkozy presidency is shot through with paradox and contrast. Sarkozy was a well-elected president swiftly loathed by most voters; a ‘hyperpresident’ who probably weakened the office; a talented party leader who lost effective control of his party; a right-wing president who was readily compared with Tony Blair; and an ambitious reformer who promised a clean break with the indecision of his…
This article proposes a framework based on three levels of analysis for understanding the 2012 presidential election: the institutional, the partisan and the situational. The 2012 election confirmed the bipolar institutional incentives that structure political competition in the Fifth Republic. The partisan dimension, however, was more fluid than this bipolar reading would lead one to expect. T…
In 2012 the Socialist Party (PS) presidential candidate, François Hollande, defeated the incumbent, Nicolas Sarkozy. The victory was convincing, though not overwhelming. Hollande thus became only the second Socialist president of the Fifth Republic after François Mitterrand. Hollande's success in the presidential contest was reinforced a few weeks later when the PS and immediate allies won an a…
This book is based on Women Research Institute’s study on “Feminist Leadership in the Post Authoritarian Regime in Indonesia: Its Impact on Social Movements and Women’s Welfare” (2012). The goal of the research was to capture the landscape of women’s leadership in Indonesia after the downfall of Suharto in 1998. There were not many studies and analysis on the condition of Indonesian women in t…
Buku ini merupakan hasil penelitian yang diterjemahkan dari versi aslinya berbahasa Inggris. Tujuan penelitian ini adalah untuk secara empiris mengkaji dinamika perkembangan industry media di Indonesia dan bagaimana dinamika-dinamika ini mementukan cara masyarakat sipil dan kelompok-kelompok warga Negara menggunakan haknya dalam bermedia. Penelitian ini bertujuan juga untuk memotret lanskap pe…
Buku ini merupakan hasil penelitian yang diterjemahkan dari versi aslinya berbahasa Inggris. Tujuan penelitian ini adalah untuk menelaah kebijakan media di Indonesia dan mengkaji dampaknya terhadap berbagai bentuk media dan warga negara serta hak-haknya, terutama yang berkaitan dengan hak mereka atas media. Dalam penelitian ini, hak semacam itu mengacu pada hak untuk mengakses media, mengakses…