Trip to Roubaix, in the heart of the French ‘banlieue’

The rebellious left, the only progressive option with a chance of qualifying for the second round, has part of its hopes pinned on the electorate of these popular neighborhoods and cities. Mélenchon – third in the polls with 18-16%, behind Emmanuel Macron (28-26%) and Marine LePen (24-20%) – was already clearly imposed in Roubaix in 2017 with 35% of the votes. Now he hopes to do the same by benefiting from a useful vote effect, which may leave the other five left-wing candidates with paltry percentages. But he faces a major obstacle: abstention.

“Good afternoon, we have come for the elections,” the rebellious militants called at the doors of the houses. “Thank you very much but I am not registered in the lists elections, I can’t vote,” a neighbor replied. “The truth is that I’m not too interested in politics, but I’m going to read it,” said a young man in his thirties who lives with his parents. They were some of the responses these militants faced as they ran up and down the stairs of geometric, mid-rise apartment blocks set in front of long rows of brick houses face view, inheritors of the architectural tradition of the crowns miners.

Roubaix symbolizes the ravages that the deindustrialization and the neoliberalism caused in the northern fringe of French territory. The factories left and with them the jobs in a town with Unemployment levels around 30%, according to INSEE. One of the richest cities in France at the beginning of the 20th century, considered one of the European textile capitals due to its powerful wool industry, it became one of the poorest in the country. This economic ostracism was accompanied by the political one. This is reflected in the decline of Socialist Party (PS) -and its influential federation of the North-, as well as the difficulties of other progressive formations to reconcile with these popular categories.

“Here we are the French champions of abstention,” lamented Ali Rahni, president of the Reunion and Dialogue association and neighborhood activist. A good example of this is the re-election in 2020 of its mayor, Guillaume Debar (right), with just over 5,000 votes in a city of 100,000 inhabitants. In last year’s regionals 84% abstained of the electorate.

In the presidential elections, the elections par excellence of French political life, the roubaisiens tend to vote more frequently. They did it more than 62% in 2017. But in this year’s elections, overshadowed in the media by the war in ukraine, plan the risk of an especially low stake. The polls predict a percentage slightly above 70% – close to the record in the history of the Fifth Republic in 2002, with 71%. In recent days, however, there have been signs of mobilization of the electorate, which has contributed to the rise of the far-right Marine Le Pen and Mélenchon (eco-socialist), due to the greater dependence of both on the young and popular electorate compared to the electorate. President Emmanuel Macron.

“What seems most significant to me is that abstention does not stop increasing according to social class, with the disparities growing between the levels of participation between the middle and upper classes and the modest classes. We are approaching a similar situation to that of United States“, explains Patrick Lehingue, professor at the University of Picardie (north) and specialist in abstention. Among the inhabitants of the banlieuelike Roubaix, “predominates a feeling of disappointed in politics, of having been constantly betrayed. They consider that they are not taken into account in public decisions and that politics does not solve their daily problems”, says sociologist Julien Talpin, researcher at the CNRS and specialist on Roubaix, where he lives.

Faiza, 27, a nursing student, shares this same feeling of mistrust. “Politicians always do the same thing. They promise us many things, but then they don’t keep their word,” says this young woman, dressed in a brown Islamic veil, who went last Tuesday afternoon to get a package of food aid in the Secours Populaire, a historic solidarity association. The parade of dozens and dozens of people through its premises reflects the ravages of precariousness in Roubaix, where around 40% of its inhabitants live below the poverty line. “Before the pandemic we distributed 300 lots each year, now we distribute 150 a day,” explains Nora Chiheb, deputy director of the Secours Populaire in the northern city.

One of Macron’s main campaign arguments is the alleged France’s good economic health. The neighboring country’s GDP grew by 7% last year (in 2020 it fell by 8%) and unemployment has fallen to 7.4%. But poor people perceive rather little of this economic boom. “Macron hasn’t done much for the workers or to deal with rising prices,” says Yasmina, 48, who works as a health worker. In 2017 she voted for the centrist leader in the second round, but now she would not do so again in the event of a repeat duel with Le Pen.

“The fact of establishing a minimum age of retirement at age 65 (with 42 or 43 years of contributions) does not seem like a good idea to me. I know many people who arrive exhausted at that age”, declares Clément, 28, a construction worker who hesitates between voting for Le Pen or Mélenchon. Despite the cliché that the lower classes were petrified by the song of the sirens lepenismo, in recent years in France the main workers party it was not the extreme right, but abstention. While in multicultural towns like Roubaix -more than 30% of the inhabitants are foreigners and there is a significant French community of North African origin- the favorite candidate among those who vote is Mélenchon, in neighboring Wattrelos, with a greater presence of white workers, Le Pen prevails.

“The insults of Eric Zemmour They made me want to vote more. Not for me, since I am white, but for my North African friends,” says Maxime, 20, dressed in a black hooded sweatshirt and who lives thanks to the help of the Youth Guarantee, of about 500 euros a month. Islamophobic speech by the far-right polemicist turned more than one stomach in recent months in Roubaix, in fact, he used to describe this city as “Afghanistan less than two hours from Paris”.

This exaggerated amalgamation of being a nest of radical Islamism was accentuated after the release in January of a documentary on the chain M6. This sensational report denounced the presence of faceless dolls in one of the shops in the center of the town and Arabic courses, with doses of proselytizing a conservative vision of the Muslim religion, by an association that received subsidies from the City Council. After its broadcast, the journalists who produced the program received death threats.

Even the curator Valérie Pécresse, depressed in the polls, made an express visit at the end of March in front of the controversial store, located in a central street, near the majestic Roubaix Town Hall, a vestige of its rich industrial past. Although candles, holders, cups, as well as books of the Koran are also sold there, the candidate of The Republicans (partners of the PP in France) accused it of being an “Islamist bookstore”.

“This whole story made us suffer a lot. We have received insults and my partner received threats of death both by text messages and by phone,” laments Saida, 27, who owns a fashion store, located near the controversial store. “Until now, I wasn’t too interested in politics, but all this controversy has made me want to vote for Mélenchon”, he assures. After months of trivializing an Islamophobic discourse by Zemmour and in a more sibylline way by Le Pen, the rebellious left is confident of a boomerang effect by the banlieue. But it is not at all clear that he will achieve it. It will depend above all on abstention.