Extrema-direita e os perdedores da globalização: preditores do voto em Marine Le Pen nas presidenciais francesas de 2012

Abstract

This master dissertation investigates the extreme right-wing phenomenon in Europe. Political parties grouped in this party family are classified as nativist, populist and authoritarian (MUDDE, 2007) and their popularity has been growing in many countries of the region during the last decades. The French National Front has been selected as the case to be studied and the aim of this research is to understand the reasons for supporting this political trend. The National Front is the longest-living extreme right-wing party in the European continent and it currently has a consolidated electoral performance in different types of the countrys electoral competitions. We will analyze the vote for the candidate and party leader Marine Le Pen at the last presidential election (2012) in which the FN won 17.9% of the votes, placed in third position. The investigation aims at answering the following question: which factors can explain Marine Le Pens support? The hypothesis is that voters value orientations are crucial to understand this sort of choice, particularly the opposition to globalization and its effects, such as immigration and the European Union. To answer this question we have developed an analysis using aggregate electoral data. With this data a multiple linear regression model has been run in order to understand the effects of sociological, socioeconomic and political variables on the FN results in the French departments. Then, an analysis of the 2012 Enquête Électorale Française survey data has been performed. In this step we have developed a multinomial logistic regression model, in which the dependent variable has been the vote for president in the first round of 2012 competition and the explanatory variables have been inspired on voting behavior theories: respondents sociodemographic characteristics (gender, age, education, religion and occupation), ideology, party preference, satisfaction with the functioning of democracy, trust in politicians, evaluation of the economy, vote for president in 2007 (1st round), euroskepticism, xenophobia and conservatism. As expected, the economy has no significant impact on this type of electoral choice, which logic is focused on the political and cultural preferences and guidelines of the voters. These preferences have a durable nature, since the vote for Marine Le Pen is anchored in the values of the voters and their previous electoral choice, even after the FN leadership change. In addition to that, the choice for the extreme right-wing party can be explained by the distrust in politicians. These findings mean that the FN can potentially capture the discontentment of the so-called "globalization losers", as well as those who feel disenchanted with politics, since its voters search for the political and cultural insulation inside the state borders as a way to protect themselves from the globalization effects, and they hold an attitude of distrust concerning the political class, but not necessarily towards the functioning of democracy itself.