By Najete Michell and Paul Taylor
After its historic electoral breakthrough in the recent municipal elections, La France Insoumise (LFI) has adopted its political Roadmap for the 2027 presidential election.
The Roadmap emphasises that the March 2026 municipal elections have confirmed that France is experiencing a realignment. The radical left, led by LFI, is growing faster than the far right, and the centre left is collapsing. The traditional right is losing cities it has held for decades. Moreover, that the institutions of the Fifth Republic are increasingly seen as illegitimate by working class communities. The 2027 national elections will be a contest between LFI’s programme of radical change, a far right seeking to capitalise on discontent, and a Macronist centre attempting to survive. On current trends, LFI enters that contest with momentum, local power, and a clear anti-fascist, anti racist, and pro-worker identity.
The Roadmap goes on to say: ‘Thus, while the centre left is losing influence, it is the left advocating a break with the capitalist and productivist system that is gaining momentum. While the leadership of traditional left wing parties almost everywhere chose to exclude LFI from any coalition, to their own detriment.’
The March 2026 local election results
LFI posted its best ever results despite the hostility of the leaderships of the Socialist party, the Greens and the Communist party. The bourgeois press and the right wing parties continued to be united in their demonisation of LFI. The elections took place in the middle of a new torrent of political smears and lies, accusing LFI of antisemitism and violence. The campaign of demonisation was enthusiastically joined by the leaders of the other left parties.
Whilst some important trends are confirmed by the local election results, they must be interpreted with caution.
Last month’s local election results saw a record high abstention of 43% in the second round, for the 5th Republic, excluding the Covid times. For those under 34 years old, it reached nearly 60% in the first round.
The local election results reveal a degree of disgust with politics. Macron’s presidency has made voters deeply cynical about French politics. He has repeatedly ignored the popular will in nominating leaders of parties who did badly in national elections to form governments and also by using decree powers to force through policies rejected by the vast majority.
The high degree of clientelism in local elections, combined with a lack of choice, depressed the turnout. There were 35,000 communes holding elections, and about 33,000 mayors were elected in the 1st round, i.e. 9 out of 10 mayors. In 96% of municipalities there was no second round.
The left
Overall, the general trend remains, with the left winning the bigger cities.
Before the elections, only 30,000 people lived in municipalities administered by LFI. That number has increased 18-fold to more than half a million. LFI won 10 towns which are among the 80 poorest towns of France, mainly in the quartiers populaires suburbs. More than 15,000 people joined LFI during the elections. At least 1,000 members now represent LFI ideas within municipal councils.
Overall, LFI gained 547 seats while the rest of the left lost seats. The SP lost 1,307, the CP 901 and the Greens 407.
The big losers on the left were the Greens, who are down to six towns, losing 10. They kept Lyon thanks to an alliance with LFI in the second round.
The SP won around 800 towns, including five big cities. But four other cities were won because of the alliance with LFI.
The Socialist Party blamed LFI for making the left lose some communes. But there were eight alliances in cities with LFI; four of those cities were won; the other four were lost because the Socialist Party had such a low vote in the first round that the alliance with LFI could not save it.
As the Roadmap explains, ‘The alliance of the Socialist Party, the Greens and the Communist Party lost more than six points in the first round in cities with over 100,000 inhabitants compared to 2020, whereas LFI lists, on the contrary, increased their results by 9.3 points in these same municipalities. While the centre left lost seven of the largest 50 largest cities, the radical left gained ground, winning three additional cities, (2 by LFI and one by the CP).’
Lessons
The big lesson of these elections is that LFI emerged at the municipal level and it’s starting to challenge the traditional left in its strongholds going into the next legislative elections.
The outcome of these elections has also reverberated across the left. Les Verts Populaires have left the Greens. They reject the policy of the current Green leadership that wants to dissolve into the SP, and refuses to work with LFI. There are also people in the CP who want unity of the left and an end to their party leadership’s concessions to racism and its sectarianism towards LFI.
However, the SP in its new 2027 project document has chosen to deepen its opposition to left unity and extend its support for austerity.
The right
The Rassemblement National (RN National Rally) made progress. They won 71 extra towns with their allies. [Note: there are 35,000 municipalities or communes in France.] The RN won 163 communes mainly in the north and the south (generally in small towns of more than 3500 but less than 50,000). They held the city of Perpignan, and Nice was won by Eric Ciotti, who works in alliance with the RN.
The RN did not win any new cities of more than 100,000. The far right was defeated in Marseille thanks to LFI withdrawing their list in the second round. They also failed to win another target, Toulon. In both, it was unity on the left or withdrawal in favour of the leading left party in the second round which stopped them.
LFI summarises the overall result; ‘While National Rally RN lists gained approximately 250,000 votes nationwide in the first round compared to 2014, LFI gained 500,000 compared to the results of the left front lists during the same period. The RN failed to win its main targets and stagnated or even declined in some cases, in municipalities with more than 50,000 inhabitants. However, it continues to gain ground in small and medium-sized towns, often benefiting from…. the growing permeability between the traditional right and the far right.’
Overall, the relationship of forces is indeed more in favour of the right. However, it is important to contrast the rate of momentum. The RN continues to grow, but slowly. But LFI, which has only existed as a party since 2016, is growing faster. The desire of many people to unite against the RN remains, although it is weakened by the leaderships of the SP, the Greens and the CP.
Anti-Racism
The local elections saw a breakthrough with the victories of more black mayors , notably the election of Bally Bagayoko in St Denis, Paris. Bally Bagayoko has also gone on to win the presidency of the Plaine Commune, one of the most populous intermunicipal bodies in the country; a powerful rebuke to the torrent of racist abuse he has endured since being elected mayor.
LFI’s consistent opposition to racism has been critical to its electoral breakthrough, particularly in the quartiers populaires. As the Road Map explains: ‘In recent months we [LFI] have demonstrated our commitment to anti racism through a national campaign against racism, conducted alongside the municipal campaigns. This campaign spanned the entire country, and the victories in the last elections are also genuine anti racist victories.’ The LFI election candidate lists were representative of the working class as a whole. They were ‘subjected to intense smear campaigns from the old political establishment and the media elite, including insults, physical assaults, and even death threats.’
Immediately following the election newly elected mayors were subjected to a campaign of racism. The Roadmap explains that, ‘These attacks are amplified by media establishment riddled with racism and by Macron’s government whose drift towards the right and the far right seems unstoppable.’
Far right and anti-fascism
The municipal elections marked a new phase in the effort to defeat the far right and stop it from winning the presidency in 2027. The RN was defeated in the 2024 legislative elections because there was a united left which had a programme opposed to austerity and racism. In addition, in the second round, there was a Republican front supported by large numbers of voters from other parties.
The Roadmap goes on to say how LFI tried to recreate this strategy in the recent local elections: ‘LFI played a major role in leading the fight against the right to the far right. Wherever there was a risk of victory for the right and the far right, it implemented a clear national position by proposing a technical merger with the left to protect residents from the policies of the right wing and far right municipalities.’
Going forward to 2027
The Roadmap includes proposals to replace the undemocratic and authoritarian Fifth Republic that produces ‘an oligarchic structure that excludes the people from political decision making,’ with a Sixth Republic.
LFI proposes to unite a broad coalition around a programme of radical change or rupture. Coming out of the municipal elections: ‘The 2027 elections must serve to build a sincere and loyal coalition. That is why we are making a unifying offer to the components that wish to remain faithful to the programme of the new Popular Front: we propose to make our candidacy a joint candidacy, to build a coherent union faithful to its programmatic commitments, conducting the presidential and legislative election campaigns within the same alliance framework, and to establish for this purpose a programme commission and a political campaign commission.’
LFI identifies the key priorities in the months ahead to strengthen the left as a whole, including the creation of a common programme for the 2027 elections. Opposition to austerity, racism and war will be at the heart of that programme. There will also be a big focus on a voter registration campaign in July to increase the turnout of working class communities in elections.
Image: Cover of La France Insoumise Roadmap, adopted 19 April 2026