Studies
July 2021
2022, the Populist Risk in France - Wave 4
This electoral protest indicator was developed by the Fondation pour l’innovation politique. The survey was conducted by the polling institute OpinionWay. For each wave, the questionnaire is administered to a sample of more than 3,000 registered voters. Out of the many lessons learned from the results of this Wave 4, of particular note are: the readiness for electoral protest in the middle and working classes; the continuation and affirmation of the right-wing shift in public opinion, particularly among the youngest populations; a challenge to media depictions (61% of respondents feel that the media talk about subjects that are not relevant to them) which complements the crisis of political representation already known; the uncovering of a link between the readiness for electoral protest and reliance on 24-hour news channels for information, with voters close to the RN or LR being more likely to find their information via these channels, though it would be inaccurate to reduce their audience to a right-wing world; the observation that, for a majority of respondents, opposition parties, whether on the right or on the left, would not have fared better had they been in charge of managing the pandemic; an attachment to Europe unaltered by the public health crisis; or the widely favourable opinion of the French to a move towards decentralisation.