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Municipal: do lightning campaigns lead to victory?

2020-02-17T16:19:12.041Z


Macronists still hope to overturn the table in Paris by launching Agnès Buzyn in place of Benjamin Griveaux. Right or wrong ?


And here is Agnes Buzyn launched in an electoral sprint. A few hours after having announced his candidacy for mayor of Paris to replace Benjamin Griveaux, the one who has just made her title of Minister of Health has only a very small month to convince the Parisian voters of the solidity of her commitment . A "flash campaign" that his former government colleagues hope will be successful.

Invited this Monday morning on LCI, government spokeswoman Sibeth Ndiaye herself took care of the elements of language. According to history, it has shown that the shortest campaigns could be the best. And to cite as an example another Parisian municipal election, that of 1977, when Jacques Chirac had moved to the Place de l'Hotel de Ville two short months after his declaration of candidacy.

"In 77, Chirac already had a national scope"

“I decided to go to Paris. I come to the capital of France because in our history, since the Revolution of 1789, each time that Paris has fallen, France has been defeated. It was with these words that Jacques Chirac announced on January 11, 1977, on the television news, his intention to run for mayor of Paris. The voting system has just been changed and Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, the president then in place, hopes to place his men in Paris to serve a new Elyos mandate.

Jacques Chirac does not hear it that way. He who had returned to his Corrèze lands after having resigned from his post as Prime Minister is gradually becoming aware of the interest that a candidacy in Paris could represent for him. And this is how, two months before the first lap, he decides to embark on the race under the banner of the Rally for the Republic he has just created, facing the foal of VGE, Michel d'Ornano. Jacques Chirac plays the overactivity and is omnipresent. It detonates, multiplies meetings and poster campaigns. He snatches the votes one by one and qualifies in the second round behind the left alliance of Henri Fiszbin. Before winning with a fairly comfortable lead.

Difficult, however, to make 1977 a valid element of comparison with our municipal elections in 2020. "1977 has nothing to do with it," analyzes Stéphane Rozès, president of Cap and teacher at Sciences-po and HEC. Chirac already had national scope, he had been Prime Minister and was in open conflict with Giscard, at a time that had nothing to do with ours. The stakes were then very centralized. "

1988, "Tonton Mitterrand"

If the macronists take a little distance from reality on the Chirac case, can other campaigns give them more hope? François Mitterrand himself chose to launch his campaign late for a second presidential term. Even though his supporters have been increasing the number of announcements for several months, with the assistance of the publicist Jacques Séguéla. The outgoing president will finally let his constituents long for his official candidacy until March 22, 1988, just over a month before the first round.

Except that there again, the points in common with "the Buzyn case" do not seem to exceed the only constraints of calendar. "François Mitterrand had perfectly reflected his strategy," continues Stéphane Rozès. He had integrated the fact that the left risked finding itself in the minority after the turning point in austerity in 1983. He wished to remain above the fray, taking the posture of Uncle and letting the right divide over European subjects . Jacques Chirac was launched in a very marked campaign on the right. Mitterrand took advantage of his outgoing president status to the end. His choice was in no way constrained as it is today for Agnès Buzyn. "

The European women of 1999, the "closest case"

Unfortunately for the majority, it is in an electoral rout that our political scientist detects the most common points with the candidacy of Agnes Buzyn: the Europeans of 1999 and the candidacy of Nicolas Sarkozy. The right is then torn apart, scattered like a puzzle since the dissolution of the National Assembly, two years earlier. The candidacies accumulate on the right, with François Bayrou for the UDF, the duo Philippe Séguin and Alain Madelin for the RPR and Liberal Democracy (DL) and the list led by Charles Pasqua, allied with Philippe de Villiers.

Tensions are so high between Philippe Séguin, boss of the RPR, and Jacques Chirac, the President of the Republic, that the first will decide to slam the door of the presidency of his party and his candidacy for the European elections. It is Nicolas Sarkozy who is responsible for carrying the burden of European women, less than two months before the election. "This is undoubtedly the only election with which it would be possible to draw a parallel with 2020," explains Stéphane Rozès this time. There we have a real campaign incident. And while Séguin and Madelin embodied two very distinct currents, the Gaullist Gaullists and the Liberals, the new pair only represented the second. Given in second position in the polls, Nicolas Sarkozy's list will finally collapse in third position, undergoing the humiliation of being surpassed by that of Charles Pasqua.

Valls and the rout of 2017

Stéphane Rozès refuses to speak of a lightning campaign in the case of Agnès Buzyn. "We are in a situation of improvisation," he says. An adventure in which Manuel Valls had to embark himself in 2017 after the resignation of François Hollande to run for a second term.

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We know the rest. Valls had promised to cross France, to make a punch campaign. He will be dryly beaten after less than two months of campaign by the surprise Benoît Hamon, who will himself collapse in the first round of the presidential election with a little more than 6% of the votes.

Source: leparis

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