The Gascon of Europernby Derek TurnerrnNow that communism is dead, a new specter is hauntingrnmuch of Europe—the specter of nationaHsm. In severalrncountries, for the first time since World War II, what may bernconveniently termed nationalist, right-wing, populist parties arernon the verge of coming to power, or at least of gaining respectablernnumbers of seats in government. In Slovakia, for example,rnthe Slovak National Party controls the ministries of educationrnand transport as part of a six-part}’ coalition.rnWliat is more remarkable is the upsurge in populist nationalismrnin prosperous Western European countries. In Austria,rn]6rg Haider’s Freedom Part)’ now has a solid 29 percent of thernvote, and Plaider is widely expected to be the next chancellor.rnIn Belgium, the Flemish separatist Vlaams Blok has about 12.3rnpercent of the Flemish vote and is the largest party in Antwerp.rnIn Norway, Carl Hagen’s Progress Part)- gained a surprising 15rnpercent of the vote in the recent general election, on a platformrnof immigration restriction and economic liberalization. InrnDenmark, the People’s Party achieved a remarkable 6.8 percentrnnationwide vote in its first electoral outiirg. In Italy, despiterna recent slight decline in the votes of the National Alliancernto about 24 percent, parties of the nationalist right probablyrnhave majority support. (The only things that stand in the way ofrna right-wing government in Italy are bad memories of the rightistrnForza Italia government and the profound ideological differencesrnbetween the National Alliance, which wants to retainrnItaly’s national unit}’, and the Northern League, which wantsrngreater autonomy or even independence for the northern partrnof the country.) Even in Germany, that most angsf-ridden ofrncountries, small parties like the Bund Freier Btirger and the Republicansrn(now under new leadership) are expected to do reasonablyrnwell in the May elections. But the most significant examplernof resurgent European nationalism is in France, wherernJean Marie Le Pen’s National Front (FN) has recently enjoyedrnphenomenal success.rnDerek Turner is the editor of Right Now!, published in London.rnThe FN was founded in 1972 by Le Pen, a former soldierrnwho had fought gallantiy in Algeria and Indochina and who, inrn1956, was the youngest deputy in P’rance at the age of 27. Forrna long time the FN only obtained around one percent of thernvote. In 1984, however, the FN captured 12 percent of the voternin the European elections. In 1986, the Socialist governmentrnintroduced proportional representation, and the EN’s 11 percentrnnational vote was translated into 3 5 seats in parliament.rnThe establishment parties then combined against the FN (notrnfor the last time) to reintroduce the “first-past-the-post” system,rnand the FN was reduced to one seat in 1988. As CommandantrnJacques Dore, the distinguished ex-naval officer who is thernFN’s Chief of Cabinet for Foreign Affairs, says justifiably:rn”France now has a National Assembly in which the Communistsrnhave 38 Deputies to represent 2,440,951 voters, whereasrnthe FN, with 5,812,797 voters, has only one Deputy. It seemsrnFrance is no longer a democratic country.” For several years afterrnthat, the FN consistentiy polled between 12 and 14 percentrnof tiie vote, an important percentage which ensured that thernmainstream parties were compelled to display at least token interestrnin the FN’s central themes of national identity and independence.rnThe momentum really began to build when the FN scoredrn15 percent in the 1995 presidential elections. In 1996, the FNrnscored over 30 percent of the vote in municipal elections in 14rnof France’s biggest towns and cities, and won control of threerncouncils: Orange, Marignane, and Toulon. In February 1997,rnthey added to these three the southern town of Vitrolles, withrn52.5 percent of the vote —despite the creation of an anti-FNrn”Republican Front.” In September 1997, at the FN’s annualrnfestival, Le Pen announced to 70,000 FN faithful their convincingrnvictory in the cantonal elections at Mulhouse, nearrnStrasbourg. The FN had obtained 53 percent of the vote, andrnthat in the first round. In the May 1998 elections “all the signsrnarc that the party will deepen its implantation within thernFrench political structure,” as the British far-left magazinern16/CHRONICLESrnrnrn