French election: Far-left surge in Airbus’ hometown scares big business – POLITICO
www.politico.eu

The prospect of the hard-left France Unbowed party taking control of Toulouse, France’s fourth-largest city and home to Europe’s best-known airplane maker, is putting industry on edge.

It’s not just that a win in the second round of local elections Sunday could give the party’s anticapitalist leader, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, a major boost ahead of next year’s presidential election. That’s a concern for later.

The immediate fear is that if France Unbowed makes history here — the party has never come close to controlling such a big metropolis — it will heap taxes on local icons like Airbus to pay for a generous manifesto that includes water subsidies, free public transport for residents under 26 years old, and free school meals and educational supplies.

  • Takapapatapaka@tarte.nuage-libre.frFrançais
    8·
    12 hours ago

    Historians at least in France typically divide between left and far left as reformists and revolutionary. So they would be simple left. Just because the old school left parties now support right-wing policies should not make the whole political spectrum move to rhe right. Although right-wingers are playing this card right now in France, calling former leftists with neoliberal programs “left”, reformists “far left” and revolutionary “ultra left” (no joke) but this is outright manipulation and should precisely be avoided.

      • Takapapatapaka@tarte.nuage-libre.frFrançais
        2·
        5 hours ago

        Do you mean what makes the French Socialist Party a right-wing one? Support for neoliberalism, for worse working conditions, opposition to more democratic alternatives, taking their distances from actions led by common people (anti-cops protests, yellow jackets movments and more recently the 10th of September Block Everything action), etc. They are like living dead, both left and right at the same time : left in the official categories and alliances, right in their political orientation. They’re clearly not hard right conservatives, but they clearly are capitalists supporters.

        • ikt@aussie.zoneEnglish
          13·
          5 hours ago

          Support for neoliberalism

          Ideologically, La France Insoumise is variously described as holding democratic socialist,[27][28] anti-neoliberal,[29]

          Ignore this bit if you’re anti-ai:

          LFI strongly opposes the economic policies associated with neoliberalism, such as deregulation, privatisation, and austerity, and advocates for policies like the renationalization of public services, increased social welfare, and economic planning to reduce inequality and prioritise ecological and social justice. Their program and public statements consistently critique neoliberalism as a system that exacerbates inequality and excludes the majority of the population from economic and political power

          It says the source is https://linsoumission.fr/2026/01/22/communes-insoumis-rev-citoyenne/ and wikipedia which says:

          Ideologically, La France Insoumise is variously described as holding democratic socialist,[27][28] anti-neoliberal,[29] eco-socialist,[28] souverainist,[30] left-wing populist,[31][32] and soft Eurosceptic positions.[33] On the political spectrum, the party is described as left-wing,[34] as well as far-left.[35][a] Far-left is also a label often used by its critics, including the incumbent centrist French president Emmanuel Macron and former socialist French President François Hollande.[39][40]

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_France_Insoumise#Ideology_and_political_programme

          they clearly are capitalists supporters

          So by your definition to be far left they have to be communist supporters?

          • Takapapatapaka@tarte.nuage-libre.frFrançais
            2·
            4 hours ago

            Oh there seem to be some confusion here, my bad. My point was that PS (Socialist Party) is center-right, not LFI (which is left to my eyes and to most people excepting right wing fearmongers). I don’t know what you mean by communist supporters, if you mean people fighting for the worker’s rights outside of existing structures, then yes. If you mean leninist and derivatives, then not only : you’d have to include anarchists, libertarian marxists and close forms of revolutionary socialism.