Aus vier mach eins? Die Kandidatenaufstellung der Linksallianz bei den französischen Parlamentswahlen 2022

Abstract

Tue 2022 legislative elections in France saw a new political player: NUPES, who won about a fourth of the National Assembly seats. Tuis ad hoc alliance of the four main parties of the left-wing political spectrum (socialists, greens, communists, radical left) faced considerable hurdles in nominating candidates. When analyzing the extent to which these were overcome, a number of less well-known factors of the French political system are explained, and the possible effects the electoral alliance might have on the party system are explored. Based on the LEGIS-2022 dataset on candidates in the parliamentary elections, we can show that the party financing rules and the local anchoring of the parties had an impact on the internal balance of power within the Left Alliance. Although electoral successes were hardly predictable not only due to the lack of safe constituencies but also to resistances exercised within their own ranks in the form of counter-candidacies, all four left-leaning parties were able to form their own parliamentary group after the election. In this respect, the electoral alliance functioned as a useful vehicle for maximizing votes in a highly fragmented party system.