Three million Trotskyists? Explaining extreme left voting in France in the 2002 presidential election

In the first round of the 2002 French presidential election, three million voters (10.4 per cent of the national vote) supported Trotskyist candidates. This unprecedented electoral result has received little academic attention. This study aimed to identify the strongest socio-demographic and attitudinal predictors of support for the new extreme left in 2002. A multivariate framework was applied in a series of models, using data from the 2002 French Electoral Panel. The study also aimed to understand the rise of the Trotskyists in the context of broader social and political developments. The analysis was grounded in series of hypotheses constituting a model of class voting in postindustrial France. Overall, the analysis tended to confirm the predictions of the model, with younger voters at the lower end of the service sector being the most likely to support the three Trotskyist parties. With regard to attitudes, opposition to economic liberalism proved the strongest single predictor of Trotskyist voting, followed by liberal attitudes on cultural issues, political distrust and political disengagement. However, in terms of economic attitudes, Trotskyist voters still came out as surprisingly close to mainstream left voters. In conclusion, it is argued that models of class voting should reconsider the political role of social class in a postindustrial context, and pay particular attention to the trajectories of different classes over time in terms of changing employment conditions and life chances in order to understand how class is likely to shape party preferences.