Reader Question: Who decides if a political party in France is known as extreme-left or far-right? Can this really be defined objectively?
The labelling of political parties and their ideology is a contentious topic in France, particularly as parties from the margins continue to hold a place in mainstream discourse.
Media outlets and journalists are free to label parties as they wish, but most mainstream media outlets generally apply the same labelling.
In many cases, these are self-evident and uncontroversial – Les Républicains are right-wing, the Socialist Party left-wing, and more recently President Emmanuel Macron was a self-declared proponent of a ‘third way’ that was neither left nor right but centrist in nature.
These parties and their politicians actively support the use of the political tags.
When it comes to the margins however, this becomes more difficult as a level of nuance exists between a party being merely classed as ‘right/left’ or a ‘far-’ or ‘extreme-’ variant.
A growth in support of parties on the margins of both flanks – namely Rassemblement National and La France Insoumise – means the issue of how these parties are labelled is now more prominent.
If a party is described as ‘extreme’ its supporters often claim this is a move by the state to delegitimise it that can ultimately impact its vote share.
Note that issues also remain when labelling independent supporters, for example during the recent death of protestor Quentin Deranque at a La France Insoumise event.
The student was labelled as both ‘right-wing’ and ‘far-right’ by various media sources. As he was not running for a political position, no official label could be placed on his beliefs.
Interior ministry gives official listing
There are some quasi-official labels given to French parties.
At the start of each election cycle, France’s interior ministry publishes a list of the participating parties and how polling stations must list their candidates at upcoming elections.
The Connexion chooses to follow these official labels where possible, alongside those of international media groups including, for example, the BBC in the UK.
While the exact procedure changes based on the election (for the upcoming municipal elections for example, many candidates in smaller communes do not run affiliated to a specific party, which can make assigning their affiliation more difficult), the principle remains the same.
Government authorities including prefectures and sub-prefectures base the listings off of “a set of consistent and objective indicators” that includes political slogans, campaign promises, etc, across the recent period.
It is then applied to voting campaign information and placed alongside a candidate’s name on voting slips.
For the 2026 municipal elections, the ministry has officially labelled La France Insoumise as ’extreme-left’ for the first time since its founding in 2016, placing it alongside the fringe Lutte ouvrière, Nouveau Parti anticapitaliste and Parti ouvrier indépendant.
These parties have generally gained around 1% - 2% in recent presidential elections, compared to 20% for La France Insoumise, with the latter also joining wider left-wing alliances in the last two legislative elections.
The listing only applies to candidates supported but not officially endorsed by the party, whereas in the case of the latter candidates were simply described as belonging to ‘La France Insoumise’ and not the ‘extreme-left’ block.
The change led to criticism from groups across the left, including Socialist Party leader Olivier Faure who called it “unfair” and part of a wider series of practices to legitimise the far-right.
It remains to be seen whether the extreme-left label will be upheld for the 2027 presidential elections, where labelling is more significant and straightforward as all candidates are officially endorsed by a party and given a political label.
Parties can contest label
The ministry claims political labels are not given to influence voters but to be used for electoral analysis.
A candidate in the municipal election who disagrees with its electoral labelling can ask for the prefecture to reassess its labelling, providing evidence to the contrary.
For their part, parties can make an emergency appeal to the highest administrative authority the Conseil d’Etat over their listing, which must be responded to within one month.
Success of appeals varies.
In 2020, Nicolas Dupont-Aignan and his Debout la France party contested an ‘extreme-right’ label given for the municipal elections, which was overturned and replaced with a right wing label.
The party pointed towards a lack of evidence for the label, with the only association with the far-right being a call by Mr Dupont-Aignan for supporters to vote for Marine Le Pen in the second round of the 2017 presidential election.
It said its manifesto did not contain traditional far-right policies, nor did they have any form of electoral pact with a far-right party.
However, an appeal from the far-right Rassemblement National was rejected in 2023, with an appeal to the Conseil d’Etat upholding the labelling in 2024.
The party argued the label cost it votes during the 2023 Senate elections and pointed towards what it called an inconsistency in labelling: if it was far-right, La France Insoumise and the French Communist Party should be labelled as far-left instead of just merely left.
