Populist pragmatism: the nationalisation of local government strategies by the Rassemblement National

Abstract

Existing studies have explored the territorialisation of the Rassemblement National (RN) in terms of its regional variation in patterns of support and mobilisation strategies. The extent of regional variation in its local government strategies, however, has been neglected. In this article, we make this enquiry through comparison of two municipalities run by the RN between 2014 and 2020. While similar in local demand and central party supply, the municipalities differ in their socio-economic context and political history. We ask if the party has responded to these contrasting contexts with different strategies of governing. We conduct a qualitative analysis of the policies introduced in both towns and draw on semi-structured interviews with government and opposition actors. In addition, we conduct a quantitative text analysis of their policy agendas, using a dictionary-based analysis to measure the extent of populist radical right ideology in each case. Our findings show that, as well as some limited regional variation in the prominence of their core ideological themes, there is a common emphasis from both on a governing style characterised by ‘pragmatism’. We argue that the prioritisation of the national party aim of mainstreaming can be a force for the nationalisation of local governing strategies from populist radical right parties, as shown here in the case of the RN.