Latest editorial
French President Francois Hollande's failure to honour election promises on jobs has brought inevitably poor results in Sunday's first round of municipal elections.
His Socialist Party administration's adherence to orthodox neoliberal policies gave victory to the conservative Union for a Popular Movement (UMP) and some gains to the racist National Front (FN).
Most striking was the FN's outright triumph in former mining town Henin-Beaumont in the Pas-de-Calais department, where its candidate Steeve Briois took 50.26 per cent of the vote and won the mayoralty.
The disputed election of a far-right president, who is also a US citizen, signals further consolidation of Washington’s regional power and represents a threat to the country’s democracy and sovereignty, writes WT WHITNEY JNR
While Italy’s communist tradition remains fragmented and politically marginal, France’s party is attempting to re-establish itself as an independent force rooted in working-class organisation, says NICK WRIGHT
Far-right forces are rising across Latin America and the Caribbean, armed with a common agenda of anti-communism, the culture war, and neoliberal economics, writes VIJAY PRASHAD