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France: Polarization, fascism and local elections

Victories for far right and left in the municipal elections


18/03/2026

In the middle of the most comprehensive smear campaign against the radical Left that France has seen for the last 50 years, this month’s municipal elections are key struggles for fascists and antifascists alike. The first round on 15th March saw a strong showing for the radical Left and worrying steps forward for the fascists.

The first round of France’s municipal elections took place on Sunday 15th March, with the second round scheduled for the 22nd. Municipal councils in France have considerably more power than their counterparts in many countries. They are responsible, for example, for building and maintaining primary schools, developing social housing, and sometimes running a municipal police force.

The electoral system is a two-round list ballot with a substantial winner’s bonus. A list that comes first —either with over 50% in the first round or with whatever figure in the second round—receives a bonus of roughly half the council seats. The remaining seats are then distributed proportionally among all lists that obtained more than 5% of the vote. In practice, this means that a list winning 51% of the vote will usually obtain around 75% of the seats.

Occasionally, a list wins an outright majority in the first round. If not, a second round is held. Lists that received at least 10% in the first round can stand again or merge with others. Lists scoring between 5% and 10% cannot run independently in the second round but may join a qualified list.

Between the two rounds, lists frequently merge—often among left-wing parties seeking to prevent victory by the right or the far right. These mergers take two main forms. A political merger is based on a shared programme and usually includes a commitment to support the municipal budget. A technical merger, by contrast, simply places candidates from different lists on the same slate without any promise of political solidarity once elected. Supporters argue that this arrangement allows the council’s composition to reflect more democratically the range of opinions in the electorate.

Polarization 

In the six years since the last municipal elections, political polarization in France has deepened. President Emmanuel Macron’s camp, the traditional right, and the social-liberal Socialist Party have all lost ground, while both the far right—led by the National Rally (RN)—and the radical left, La France Insoumise (France in Revolt – FI), have expanded their support.

Predictions remain difficult. Turnout in municipal elections can be very low—abstention sometimes exceeds 50 percent—and the alliances formed between the two rounds are often decisive yet highly unpredictable.

A growing section of the traditional right is now willing to ally with the far right, giving the RN hope of taking control of a number of municipalities. Before these elections, fewer than a dozen of the roughly thousand French towns with more than 10,000 inhabitants were governed by the far right, (even though the RN holds 118 seats in the National Assembly and won 13 million votes in the last presidential election under Marine Le Pen). One of the main reasons for this gap is the RN’s historically weak local party organization. Nevertheless, with support from the establishment media, the RN has been promoting the message that it—together with the traditional right—can “save France” from the threat to democracy posed by La France Insoumise!

In three towns in the South -Toulon (170 000 inhabitants), Nice (350,000) and Marseille (850 000), the RN scored high in the first round and may win in the second round. In this last, the second-round result depends on whether the Socialist Party agrees a united Left slate. A rally to demand such a slate is scheduled for Monday night.

In the rest of the country the fascists did not at all see the breakthrough we feared in the big towns, but quite a lot of medium-sized communes saw them improve their score considerably.

The Left and antifascist fronts

On the Left also there has been much turbulence in recent months. The France Insoumise has been subject to a huge smear campaign claiming that the organization and its best-known leader, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, are hostile to Jews. 

The campaign is in many ways identical to the smear campaign in Britain against Jeremy Corbyn around eight years ago. In both cases, left-wing figures elected and re-elected to parliament for decades were never accused of anti-semitism until the Palestine movement and the radical Left became a real problem for the powers-that-be. The arguments used were generally laughable – how much had Corbyn studied some mural? Why did Mélenchon joke that Epstein’s name might be pronounced as if it were a Russian name? Establishment cronies work fulltime sifting through Mélenchon’s very long public speeches looking for ten-second excerpts to misinterpret. All the other classic smears – “friends of dictators”, “threat to democracy” and so on, are also blared out on the media day and night. Because the France Insoumise is getting stronger, the determination of the capitalists to smash it is also reinforced.

The Socialist Party (PS), which was pushed in 2024 into signing up to a radical programme jointly with the France Insoumise, the Greens and the Communists, has been looking for a way to reassert a break with any radicalism. They have joined in the smear campaign against the FI with enthusiasm. Several key figures have been arguing that no alliance should be made in any circumstances, even to keep the fascists out. Raphael Glucksmann, who is likely to be the presidential candidate for the Socialist bloc next year, demanded in a public meeting where he shared the platform with PS General Secretary Olivier Faure this week, that the Socialist Party “break definitively” with the FI. “We cannot fight for democracy with a friend of tyrants among us” he thundered. Leading PS senator, former minister for Women’s rights and feminist, Laurence Rossignol, circulated on social media an extract from my local FI group leaflet, (which committed itself to boycotting companies supporting Israel) ; alongside it she placed a large photo of Nazi graffiti (“Jude”) on 1930s shops in Germany.

Other parts of the Socialist Party, though, will not agree to rule out cooperation, since refusing all alliances would no doubt mean victory for the Right and even for fascists in a number of towns. The Socialist Party, much reduced in parliament since its horrific austerity governments of 2012-17, is still extremely dominant locally. Around half of all towns with over 10 000 inhabitants are run by the PS or by alliances which they dominate. PS mayors govern Paris, Rennes, Caen, Nantes and Montpellier, among many others. 

The national council of the Socialist Party voted last week against a national agreement on mergers with France Insoumise lists, but the France Insoumise leadership has proposed technical mergers for the second round with all other left lists, including those of the Socialist Party, in particular in towns where this could stop the fascists from winning. In a few dozen towns, united left lists already existed for the first round. Some second-round mergers will no doubt be announced this week (Toulouse has just announced one) but in other towns, the PS will refuse. PS heavyweight Boris Vallaud grumbled Sunday night “We thought the FI were going to lose out in these elections, but they’ve come out stronger”.

Citizens’ revolution?

The far-right has of course much profited from the attacks on the FI. After a fascist street fighter was killed in a street fight with antifascists in Lyon last month, a death blamed on the FI by the media despite all evidence, far right violence has soared. Dozens of leafletters or fly posters across the country (three in my town of Montreuil alone) have been attacked by fascist individuals. Many FI headquarters have been vandalized and a couple of meetings attacked by groups. Some of the revolutionary left (but not all) has stepped up to loudly defend the France Insoumise. Left wing Jewish groups published an open letter supporting Mélenchon.

The France Insoumise election campaign has been the most dynamic campaign in local elections for decades. A number of meetings with Jean-Luc Mélenchon attracted thousands, and mass door to door canvassing, not a tradition in France, has been generalized in working class estates. La France Insoumise leaflets call for “a citizens’ revolution in your town”, free school meals for all children, rent freezes where the legal instruments exist, requisition of vacant building for housing (just to give a couple of examples) as well as emphasizing green policies, opposition to Trump’s war and active solidarity with Palestine.

Before these elections, the France Insoumise, a young movement, governed only three towns, none of them over 20 000 people. Several impressive results were announced on Sunday night. Saint-Denis (150 000 inhabitants) was won outright. In Roubaix (100 000), the FI got 47%, making victory in the second round almost certain. In the cities Lille, Limoges, Toulouse, Argenteuil and in Montreuil, where I live, FI scores were over 20%.

The good results of the FI have made the PS smear campaign look stupid and unprincipled. In any case, the FI campaign has kept antifascism and opposition to austerity and war in the public eye. It has also ensured that in hundreds of towns there will be a radical left opposition for the first time. Finally, it is clear that for a number of years at least, the France Insoumise, which has progressed at each election, will remain the centre of gravity of the radical Left, and is attracting many of the best young activists. The far left needs to come to terms with this.

Fightback

Recent weeks have seen dozens of antifascist initiatives around the country, some organized by the France Insoumise, others by multiple local alliances. And on March 14th, there were 85 demonstrations around the country, coordinated by the Marche des Solidarités. The slogan on the call to demonstrate showed some anarchist influence and could have been better chosen (“Against racism, fascism and state violence”), but the whole of the radical left supported the demonstrations, and the timing- the day before the first round of crucial elections- was perfect.

If the state-sponsored pogroms we have seen in recent months in Minneapolis have not been happening in Marseille and Lyon, it is partly due to the magnificent antifascist mobilization during the parliamentary election campaign in 2024, which ensured that the National Rally eventually came in third in the number of seats won. All opinion polls had predicted a fascist Prime Minister.

A combination of electoral opposition and permanent antifascist education, combined with harassment of the RN, is the way forward.

23 March 1931 – Revolutionaries hanged in connection to the Lahore conspiracy case

This week in working class history


“…on behalf of the helpless Indian masses, we want to emphasize the lesson often repeated by history, that it is easy to kill individuals but you cannot kill the ideas.”

On 23 March 1931, the death penalty was meted out rapidly to the south Asian revolutionaries Bhagat Singh, Rajguru and Sukhdev Thapar of the Hindustan Socialist Republican Association (HSRA) by the British following the judgement passed coincidentally on October 7, 1930 for the murder of a British police officer in 1928. They were all 23 years old.

Reemerging from hiding, Bhagat Singh–arguably the most famous revolutionary of his time–and another fellow member Batukeshwar Dutt gave themselves up to the police following a strategic public action in the Lahore Assembly in 1929. They set off two low-intensity bombs in an empty area of the assembly in session and threw flyers intended to attract public attention to their cause. Their arrest and Singh’s eventual execution were among the final blows to the revolutionary cause in British India, leaving the hegemonical Indian National Congress and the Muslim League to fight it out till independence in 1947. 

HSRA, like many revolutionary youth organisations of its time, was founded in diametric opposition to Gandhian non-violence following the debacle of the Gandhi-led Non-Cooperation movement (1919-1922). A violent incident in Chauri Chaura led Gandhi to call off the successful popular mobilisation against the British which he intended to be “non-violent”. Bhagat Singh, who closely followed the developments in Russia and espoused anarchist and communist ideas, had several family members involved in the anti-imperialist struggle. Singh dived head first into the revolutionary movement, which was spreading across the north of India and Bengal. HSRA was involved in the Kakori conspiracy to steal arms from a British train and in the bombing of the Viceroy Lord Irwin’s train. Responding to Gandhi’s “Cult of the Bomb”, HSRA wrote a brilliant piece called the “Philosophy of the Bomb”, stressing on violence as the answer to imperialist oppression. HSRA members were young poets, scientists and university students across different faiths. 

In a peaceful protest in October-November 1928, the radical Congress leader Lala Lajpat Rai was killed following a lathi (baton) charge in front of Bhagat Singh. As a prominent member of HSRA at the time, Singh conspired to kill James Scott, the superintendent who called for the lathi charge. In December 1928 he acted, along with Rajguru, Sukhdev and Chandrasekhar Azad but mistakenly killed a young police officer John Saunders instead, forcing them into hiding. As HSRA members were picked off one by one, Singh knew his time was near, and decided to exploit the power of the court to publicise their cause. The Lahore Assembly bombing was thus carried out, inspired by the French Auguste Valliant. Bhagat Singh defended himself in court, the published proceedings in newspapers made him a household name in India. He was initially given a life sentence in connection with the bombing. 

While in prison, Bhagat Singh witnessed discrimination between Indian and other European prisoners, and demanded to be treated as a political prisoner which meant better access to food and reading material. Thus began a 116-day hunger strike along with fellow revolutionaries, that also included the death of Jatin Das on day 63. British force-feeding and Congress lobbying did not deter him and his comrades. By this time, the British managed to tie up the ends regarding Saunders’ murder and sentenced the trio including him to death by hanging. The British were afraid that their eventual murder would set off nationwide clashes, and secretly killed them on March 23, 1931.

It is said that the three went to the gallows laughing, singing “Inquilab Zindabad” (Long live the revolution). The site where their bodies were disposed of in Husseiniwala ironically stands on a heavily fenced border area between India and Pakistan. Bhagat Singh remains a popular figure in the subcontinent, co-opted by all parts of the political spectrum.

Bhagat Singh famously read Clara Zetkin’s reminiscences of Lenin as the police came to take him to the gallows. For his last wish, he wished he could finish that book. He was an excellent writer and his writings are all over the internet. The reader is advised to start here.

Inquilab Zindabad!

12-Hour workdays, crushed rights: Argentina under Milei’s labor law 

The new labor reform in Argentina drastically reduces the rights of employees.


President of Argentina Javier Milei speaking at the 2025 Conservative Political Action Conference

On Friday, March 6, 2026, in Argentina, the labor reform came into force. One of the cornerstones of Milei’s administration is now law. The reform affects the relationship between workers and employers. Voted in the Senate on February 11 and in the Congreso Nacional on February 27, it left behind a wave of controversy, mobilization, and, above all, repression. Strongly criticized by the opposition, this reform changes the regulation of labor relations, favoring employers and drastically reducing the rights of employees. According to Deputy Myriam Bregman, the law was supported and backed only by “entrepreneurs and law firm lawyers”, maintaining a strongly anti-popular character. Composed of 25 chapters, it introduces radical changes on issues such as compensation, dismissals, vacations, and overtime. Crucial and dangerous is the freedom granted by the new rules to employers. These create a relationship between employer and employee that is extremely unbalanced in favor of the former. It is because of this imbalance that the reform has been defined as “slavish”. According to Bregman, “the only freedom Javier Milei defends is the freedom to enslave.” 

The first major change concerns the length of the workday. The maximum limit of 8 hours per day is eliminated, introducing the possibility of working up to 12 hours a day, provided that 48 hours per week are not exceeded and 12 hours of rest are available between shifts. Another problematic point concerns the possibility for employers to pay wages with food, housing, or goods instead of money. Another ambiguity concerns the creation of a bank of hours. Under this mechanism, overtime may not be remunerated. The alternative to payment consists of compensation through additional days off. On paper, these options must result from an agreement between the two parties. In practice, the employer always holds the upper hand, especially considering the increasingly weak role of unions. 

Also worrying is the attack on workers’ right to strike, particularly in sectors such as commerce, education, port services, and telecommunications. For these categories, it is mandatory to guarantee at least 75% of services during strike days. 

The approval of the law has been, and continues to be, at the center of struggles by Argentine social movements. Strikes and demonstrations have highlighted the strong unpopularity of the reform. Bregman herself was present at the mass mobilization on February 11 that took to the streets of Buenos Aires and the country’s main cities. Her testimony is a crucial denunciation of the brutality used by the police to suppress the protest. “They approached (the police) to the sidewalk on motorcycles and started shooting from two or three meters away.” Saved only, according to her, by “the enormous solidarity of the people.” According to the deputy, the repression had the declared aim of concealing the massive rejection of the labor reform. The far-right responds once again to general discontent with its most representative weapon: repression, at any cost. 

The struggle, however, does not stop. The main Argentine unions and opposition politicians have called for a large popular demonstration on March 24. Not a random date, since that day marks 50 years since the coup that led to the dictatorship of the military juntas initiated by Videla, lasting until 1983 and stained with crimes such as murders, repression, and forced disappearances. Beyond the demand for a trial and adequate punishment for the remaining unpunished perpetrators, the organizers call for the repeal of the labor reform itself. 

The measure represents a huge blow to workers’ rights. The government continues with a hardline approach, saying that the situation in Argentina will improve. Improvements that come at a high cost for workers, stripped of their rights. The number of informal or precarious workers is extremely high. Reforms like this risk widening the gap between wages and the cost of living, effectively increasing this phenomenon. Once again, Milei’s ultraliberal policies end up favoring large companies and foreign investors, placed first, ahead of the needs of the people he had promised to uplift. 

Charges are dropped against Palestinian couple raided by the police

Repression in Berlin – report #5


17/03/2026

In February 2025, after a five-minute court hearing, the case against a young Palestinian-American student was dropped: a case that had entangled her, as well as her Palestinian-German partner in a month-long campaign of targeted state violence and persecution.

Ten months earlier, the home of the couple was stormed at 6am by a the State Criminal Police Office (LKA), as well as forces from the Special Operations Unit (SEK). While the official pretext for the raid and subsequent court case was a Facebook post that read “From the River to the Sea, Palestine Will Be Free”, the case illustrates that rather than merely criminalising a slogan, the German state attempts to terrorise and intimidate those who publicly express dissent to the genocidal “Staatsräson” paradigm.

The investigation was triggered when a person, likely a neighbour, scanned the student’s facebook profile and reported her to the anti-discrimination office in Hesse called “Hessen gegen Hetze” (Hesse Against Agitation). This office escalated the case to the Frankfurt Public Prosecutor’s Office, who then forwarded it to Berlin.

After the raid the couple learned that then a three-month long investigation followed, in which they were never addressed to respond to accusations, which they first heard off when charges were read to them during the raid.

Moreover, files accessed by their lawyer showed that enquiries were made about both to all kinds of authorities: from regular police, the state resident’s registration, to enquiries to the Office for the Protection of the Constitution (Verfassungsschutz).

The student described the raid, which left her in utter disbelief of the disproportionate measures taken by the cops:

On 16 May 2024, at around 6 am, my husband and I were woken by a knock at the door. My husband quickly got up to see what the commotion was about. When he opened the door, police officers stormed in. I got up quickly and tried to shut the door. As I did so, two female officers burst in – I was half-naked! I was ordered to get dressed so they could take me to the living room.

Her partner, who was later also charged for the same slogan, as well as the alleged use of banned organisations and trespassing, relayed:

While two female police officers were in the room with my wife, supervising her as she got dressed, my details were being checked and I was made to wait in my own living room. When my wife was ready, she was sat down next to me, and we were finally told what was happening.

As it turned out in hindsight, the raid itself had also been thoroughly prepared, in a bizarre display of state power. Two days prior to it, the police came to the building, photographed the outside, the nameplate on the doorbell, the front door, letterbox, and wrote a report on how many entrances and exits the building had, the window facade, and other details. The Palestinian-German engineer described the absurdity:

Later, we found out that the police had frantically rung all the neighbours’ doorbells to get into the building. While they were knocking at our door, they had covered our peephole with black tape. It’s all pretty excessive for such an allegation.

The actual reason a judge signed this search warrant was that the police couldn’t definitively identify my wife from the profile pictures on Facebook. So nowadays, the police can conduct house searches just to establish someone’s identity.

The case, which culminated in the suspension of proceedings illustrates that state repression does not always aim for eventual conviction in court, as cops are well aware of the frequent insubstantiality of accusations. Instead, raids and the terror and intimidation they are supposed to inflict appear to be a goal in themselves.

However, in this case, as in many others, the accused continued their activism for Palestine unafraid, as reflected in the students’ statement:

Anyone else facing repression needs to speak out about it! And make sure you get good lawyers. Most of these allegations have no legal basis that would hold up in court. Keep fighting, and Free Palestine, forever and ever!

Ramadan behind bars

A fictional story inspired by the experiences of young North African men in Berlin


16/03/2026

Many arrive at Kottbusser Tor in Berlin either without documents or after their asylum has been rejected. With no legal means to earn money and their social benefits cut, they often end up surviving by selling drugs on the streets. During the processing of their asylum claims, they are housed in refugee camps known as ‘Wohnheime’. This story draws on those realities to follow one character’s journey through a system that too often leads from the Wohnheim to the pre-trial detention center at Moabit. For more of my work on this topic, please see here.

Throughout the year, the boys at Kotti will always talk about their wish to spend Ramadan out of jail. Especially those that experienced it inside. Twenty-eight-year-old Omar heard those stories and, as Ramadan was drawing closer, he, like the other boys, really prayed that he wouldn’t go to jail until the Holy month is over. Remembering this now makes him laugh. He has been held in pre-trial detention in Moabit’s correctional facility, Justizvollzugsanstalt Moabit, since November. Until now, there has been no decision regarding what he is accused of, and the court date remains undetermined.

He was calling his best friend Mohammad everyday when he first came to prison. But even that doesn’t comfort him anymore. He sits here locked up between four walls as he waits for Iftar; it must have been over a week since he last called Mohammad. He just doesn’t have the energy for anything anymore. The outside world seems so far, and sometimes calling reminds him of the isolation rather than breaks it.

Prior to coming here, he and Mohammad were inseparable. In fact, Omar was heading to Mohammad’s room to sleep over there when he got caught by the police. It was a random Thursday that seemed like any other Thursday. He called Mohammed to ask him which S-Bahn to take and quickly hung up on him to answer a call from his mum.

Everyone knows how close he is to his mum. She prays everyday that he will stay safe, she tells him. What she doesn’t tell him is that she prays to see him in person one last time before she dies. She is still grateful that now there is WhatsApp and video calls to stay in touch. She remembers the uncle that left to Europe when she was a child; no one ever saw his face again or even knew what he looked like after he left home. He would call his mother twice or three times a year, just to say a few words. The short, expensive call that was fraught with bad connection did nothing but make him feel more separated from his family. And those calls were the only connection that her grandmother and mother had with him. Now, with Omar unreachable in Moabit, that old, familiar feeling of a son being swallowed by Europe has returned, as sharp and as painful as her grandmother must have felt it.

Until that Thursday, this had not happened to her. Omar called her all the time. They were close in a way her grandmother never could be with her uncle. But this last call was quite short. He said he will call her back and quickly hung up. His number didn’t ring again. She knew something was wrong. She called his friend Mohammad over and over again but he didn’t dare to pick up before he could find out what had happened to his friend. It wasn’t until several days later that he picked up her call with some news. During those several days, she couldn’t eat or sleep or think of anything other than Omar.

Mohammad was waiting for the formal confirmation from the social worker, but deep inside he knew from the first minute that Omar had been taken by the police. This is the moment that Mohammad and Omar and all the other boys fear the most—the moment when they get stopped by the police in a busy S-Bahn station, get asked for the papers they don’t have, and get searched in front of everyone. The police make sure they don’t search in a discrete way. They are trained to turn the boys into a spectacle. It’s called the art of policing and law enforcement.

But still, for Omar, even when all hope disappeared on that day and he knew he would get taken to jail, he never imagined that he would be held without a trial date all the way to Ramadan, which is March. They didn’t catch him with anything on him and he wasn’t doing anything wrong other than just being in the station. So why would it take such a long time for them to determine the accusation and decide on a court date. He hasn’t even been assigned a social worker in jail, which means that people on the outside have no possibility to communicate with him. And that his only channel to the outside world is the phone number of his friend Mohammad, which he can only call if he has money left on his card. Omar keeps asking his lawyer, who was hired by his social worker, to find out when he will get some answers, but she just shrugs or tells him to wait. No one knows anything yet.

He keeps thinking of this over and over again. He is locked up 23 hours a day, so lots of time to think. One of his Arab cellmates say that Moabit detention is like a luxury hotel. But he doesn’t think so. In fact, he doesn’t like anything about it. Being locked up in here, his mind goes to places he never thought of before. And now that he has been fasting all alone here, and half of Ramadan is already behind him, he has started to lose his patience. The dark thoughts keep on increasing. This morning, he found himself wondering how long it would take for his mother to find out that sometimes he used to take Lyrica, the infamous anxiety pill that his mates at Kotti introduced him to. Would she find out that he even sells this stuff? Would she forgive him if she found out? How would he explain to her that there is no other way for him to make money. His Sozialleistung had been cut since he stopped going to his Wohnheim. He got too scared after the security woke up one of his mates at four a.m. and deported him. Even when he was still going regularly, the Sozialleistung was hardly enough for his basic needs.

These questions keep coming to his mind. Suddenly he gets all these feelings that he can no longer describe, feelings that are both heavy and strong, but he doesn’t know what to call them. Fear. Regret. Grief. Loneliness. He doesn’t even know or use those words. He heard others saying things like that since he came to Moabit. He even started to avoid calling his Mohammad because he doesn’t know what to say when his friend asks how he is doing.

He tries to remember his mum’s voice telling him to look for patience from within, and warning him of the pain of those who lose patience inside prison. He knows she is right, but he can’t take it anymore. Ramadan isn’t over yet. Half is behind him, half still ahead filled with uncertainties, like everything else in here.

He doesn’t know about the trial date. Doesn’t know if he’ll call Mohammad tomorrow. His mother’s messages pile up somewhere he can’t reach. And somewhere in Morocco, his mother sits with her phone in her hands, waiting. She thinks of her uncle again, of the grandmother who waited for calls that never came. She always thought technology would protect her from that fate.

In his cell, Omar doesn’t know she’s praying for him. But for a moment, the dark thoughts stop. He doesn’t know why. He only knows that tomorrow, maybe, he’ll try calling Mohammad.

Outside, the boys at Kotti are still talking, still praying they don’t end up here.