Globalization and political posturing on the Left in France in the 1990s

Abstract

This article analyzes the emerging fault lines on the Left in France during the 1990s on the issue of neo-liberal globalization, in general, and on a proposal to tax financial transactions (Tobin tax) in particular. Faced with the new and growing influence of anti-globalization activists within the Left, the French Socialist Party (PS) initially tried to ignore them. When it could no longer do so, it attempted to marginalize them by showing that it was tough on neo-liberal globalization and that it could put in place concrete policies when it office. The article argues that neo-liberal globalization posed a particular challenge for the PS in that it forced to party to be seen to be taking a stance on an issue that it desperately sought to avoid. In essence, the challenge was for the PS to reform and to accept publicly neo-liberalism or to reject neo-liberalism and to renew with its radical past. The PS attempted to do both. The PS's ambiguous stance contributed to deepen emerging ideological fault lines on the Left and, ultimately, played a large part in discrediting the party and the government in the eyes of its very own supporters and sympathizers.