EU referendum: Why French workers voted ‘no’
"WE’RE VOTING no. It is a constitution for the bourgeoisie, for
multinationals, for bosses. It is only about the economy, competition,
profits, the market and capitalism. We are against all that; we are
communists. There isn’t any progress for workers. Most workers want to
say "merde", to stick two fingers up at them. We are fed up
with saying yes to politicians".
Thomas Meurnier, a 32 year old history teacher and sympathiser of
the French Communist Party (quoted in the Guardian 28 May)
FRANCE HAS voted on the European constitution and, although a win for
the no camp was predicted, the result came as a shock to the French and
European establishment. On a turnout of 70%, a decisive 55% voted ‘no’.
Karl Debbaut
Commentators are struggling to explain why such a clear majority of
the French people decided to repudiate all mainstream parties, ignoring
the scaremongering by the media and senior politicians.
The French president, Jacques Chirac, and Jean-Pierre Raffarin, the
French Prime Minister, tried every trick in the book to cajole the
electorate into voting ‘yes’. Chirac declared that France would only be
able to defend its interests in Europe if it voted ‘yes’, the
alternative being that it would "cease to exist politically, at
least for a while". Raffarin warned of the, "spectre of chaos
descending on France" and predicted, "long months of economic
crisis" following a defeat.
Some of the British media tried to portray the vote against the
constitution as a victory for French nationalism or even as a victory
for the extreme-right and fascist Front National.
However, while those who voted for the Front National in the last
elections are amongst those who voted against the constitution it is
deceitful to declare that this ‘no’ vote is a victory for nationalism
and the extreme right.
Polls show, for example, that the fear of a ‘flood of Turkish
immigrants’ as a result of the possible entry of Turkey in the EU, an
image raised by the nationalist right and the extreme right, did not
really register as a reason to vote against the constitution.
Referendum campaign
The referendum campaign reflected the class divisions in French
society. At the beginning of 2005, the opinion polls showed 65% support
for the treaty. But during February support for the ‘yes’ camp began to
slide after a series of mobilisations and strikes against the
government’s plans to abolish the 35-hour week.
The CGT, the second biggest trade union confederation, voted in its
leading body, and against the wishes of its own leaders, to appeal for a
‘no’ vote to the constitution.
This lifted the debate about the European constitution to another
level. It made it into a social issue, a political battle against
neo-liberal policies, central to the mobilisation of the working class
against the Raffarin government.
It electrified the activists, polarised the debate and united private
and public-sector workers; pensioners and youth; unemployed and
part-time workers.
On 5 February more than 500,000 public and private-sector workers
took part in demonstrations to defend the 35-hour week, many of them
carrying placards and banners against the European constitution. On
Thursday 10 March more than one million people took to the streets of
France demanding better wages and battling against a longer working
week.
Working-class force
This impressive show of working-class force, the fifth national day
of action since the beginning of 2005, was the most important
mobilisation since the battles against pension reform in the spring of
2003.
At the same time, France was hit by an important mobilisation of
school students against education reform. There were school student
strikes, occupations of schools and a day of action in which 160,000
school students participated in 150 demonstrations across France.
This rise in class consciousness, brought about through the struggles
of the working class, found its expression in the vote against the
European constitution. The majority of workers who earn less than e3,000
a month voted against the constitution. 66% of those who earn less than
e1,500 a month voted against.
The French daily Le Monde (30 May) wrote that 79% of blue collar
workers voted against the European constitution (up by 18 points since
the referendum on the Maastricht treaty in 1992) and amongst white
collar workers opposition reached 67%.
For the establishment, a worrying sign of the deep social crisis is
that, for the first time, a majority (53%) of middle class professionals
voted against the European Union as it stands, unhappy that it does not
do enough to protect their wages in a globalised world.
"It’s ‘May 68’ in the polling stations – a France that the
politicians had better start listening to" said Roland Cayrol of
the polling agency CSA, referring to the revolutionary movements which
took place in France in that year.
Capitalist offensive
RAFFARIN and Chirac came to power with big majorities as a result of
the presidential elections in April 2002. In the first round, Jean-Marie
Le Pen, the candidate of the far right, beat the social democrat and
then Prime Minister Jospin to third place, while Chirac received less
than 20% of the vote.
Two weeks later, Chirac was re-elected as President with 82% because
the mass mobilisation against Le Pen was channelled into the campaign to
vote for Chirac.
The three years that followed saw an offensive of the French
capitalist class against public services and social security. Chirac and
Raffarin had gained political capital and, despite all the talk of
representing the whole of France, they used it to attack the working
class and poor.
The employers’ federation Medef saw things move in their direction –
pension reform in 2003, privatisation or part-privatisation of public
services including La Poste, EDF-GDF (electricity and gas company) and a
tightening of public spending.
According to the CGT, public-sector wages have fallen in real terms
by 5 to 6% in the last three years. Shareholders have never had it so
good. Total, the oil company, published profits for 2004 that were up by
24%, to e9 billion. L’Oreal, the cosmetic group, managed a rise in
profits of 143% while Societe Generale made €3 billion.
The class polarisation in French society has reached such heights –
the anger at the corrupt and wasteful elite, the frustration at
capitalism’s inability to develop society – that it is right to point to
elements of May 1968 reappearing.
May 1968
"The centre-right and the centre-left parties are like the twin
towers. You know they will collapse but we do not know, yet, which one
will go first".
This quote is attributed by the press agency Reuters to a leading
member of the centre-right UMP (Chirac’s party) and an indication of the
political instability in French society aggravated by the campaign
surrounding the European constitution.
The political authority of centre-right and centre-left parties is in
tatters. Raffarin, who has now had to go, was leading the least popular
government in the history of the fifth republic. President Chirac’s
personal approval ratings have slipped to 40%, the lowest in eight
years.
The weakest of the French twin towers is the social democratic Parti
Socialiste (PS). The current leader Francois Hollande organised an
internal referendum in the PS to determine the position the party would
take. The ‘yes’ vote won with 59% of the members in favour of the
constitution.
Under pressure from the working- class mobilisation, and as an
attempt to shore up the support for the PS in general and their own
careers in particular, a second tier of PS leaders began to campaign for
a ‘no’ vote. Henri Emmanueli, ex leader of the PS waded in with sharp
interventions comparing PS members who support the European constitution
with socialists who voted to grant full powers to the Vichy
Nazi-collaborationist regime of Marshal Henri Petain in 1940.
The sharpness of the debate in the Parti Socialiste does not
necessarily reflect a left-wing turn or growing popularity of the party
among working class activists.
Although the PS can gain electorally and defeat the right wing in the
next elections, the PS is devoid of an alternative to the policies of
the present centre-right majority and people have not forgotten the
policies of the Jospin government which started the drive for more
flexibility and privatisations and led to the catastrophic election
results in 2002.
It is telling that the leader of the no vote inside the PS is Laurent
Fabius, the number two of the party and Mitterrand’s Prime Minister in
1983. At the time he belonged to the right wing of the Parti Socialiste.
Not so long ago he claimed to have been a Blairite before Blair. Now
he has reinvented himself in the hope of conquering his party’s
candidacy for the presidential elections in 2007.
It is, however, too soon to predict what will happen to the PS except
to say that it is an unstable force and even a split cannot be ruled
out.
The French working class, having fought against the neo-liberalism of
the Raffarin government on the streets have now given this struggle a
political expression. Now it needs to build a mass political force on
the basis of a fighting socialist programme.
Immediately, the representatives of the working class in the ‘no’
campaign should launch an appeal to workers, trade unionists and
activists in other European countries to come together, draw up a
programme of fighting demands – including nationalisation under workers’
control and management of failing industries – and act as organising
centres to coordinate the future struggles against neo-liberalism.
No to a big-business Europe
THE REJECTION of the European constitution in France is a rejection
of ‘globalised’ capitalism. It is a rejection of neo-liberal reform, a
rejection of privatisation and a dismissal of the free marketeers.
European capitalism is in a profound economic and political crisis.
The Eurozone economy is barely growing and ‘lame-duck’ governments are
in office in France, Britain, Germany, Italy and in several East
European countries. This crisis has been compounded by the EU
constitution vote.
The French and European capitalist class are calling for a period of
‘reflection’. It is more than likely that the European constitution will
be declared officially dead.
While that would be a significant blow to the confidence of the
European capitalist class and could unleash more working-class struggles
against neo-liberal measures in the countries of the European Union, it
will not in itself end the impetus towards further economic and
political cooperation and integration.
Neo-liberal agenda
The ruling classes of the different European countries want to
transform Europe into an economic and political rival to US imperialism
on the world stage. A crucial part of this scheme is the ‘Lisbon agenda’
of privatisation and deregulation – a war on workers’ rights, social
protection and benefits.
This is the kind of European cooperation that the establishment
parties and every employers’ organisation in Europe agrees on. Blair and
Brown have already announced that when Britain takes over the presidency
of the European Union they will push ahead with a neo-liberal agenda to
make the rest of Europe as much a paradise for capitalists as Britain.
Nelli Kroes, the EU Competition commissioner, has called for tighter
rules on state aid and government subsidies. A few weeks from now the
‘Frankenstein’ directive to liberalise Europe’s service sector will come
back to the fore.
At the same time, however, there are increased tensions between the
European states which have been reinforced by the referendum result in
France. The gathering economic crisis means that European inter-state
rivalries and tensions are going to be more pronounced in the future and
governments will come under increasing pressure from the struggles of
their own working class. All this will cut across moves towards economic
and political integration.
Socialists, while fighting to defend the rights of workers and taking
part in all struggles for reforms in favour of the working class, point
to the failure of capitalism to develop society. Socialists and workers
must oppose all attempts to secure and legitimise the EU project of big
business and the rich.
The EU cannot be democratised, either by a constitution or by a
constituent assembly. Only when the whole edifice of this neo-liberal
union is broken down can we begin to build a society based on real
solidarity between the workers and poor of Europe.
This solidarity and unity will be based upon the voluntary
cooperation between the peoples of Europe, upon the construction of a
society in which the key sectors of the economy are taken out of the
hands of the bankers, tycoons and majority shareholders.
A society in which the economy is planned, managed and controlled by
the working class – a socialist society.
- Reject the bosses’ European Union and neo-liberal attacks
- For mass protests across Europe, including strikes and general
strikes to defend workers’ rights and conditions - For a socialist confederation of European states, on an equal
and voluntary basis. - For a European wide planned economy, under the democratic
control and management of working people – people not profits!
