In France, Using
Lessons From Obama Campaign
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/22/world/europe/in-france-hollande-camp-tries-us-style-canvassing.html
By STEVEN ERLANGER
Published: April 21,
2012
PARIS — Arthur Muller, Vincent Pons and
Guillaume Liegey, young Frenchmen who met in Cambridge, Mass., at Harvard’s
Kennedy School of Government and M.I.T., are working hard to get out the vote,
American-style, for the Socialist challenger for the French presidency,
François Hollande.
For the last few
months, they have been working to recruit and train 70,000 volunteers to knock
on almost 3.5 million doors. Having witnessed the successful campaign of
President Obama, they are back in France, using American models of
canvassing to get left-leaning voters who would normally abstain to instead
cast ballots. Their work, said Mr. Liegey, 31, is concentrated in the
banlieues, poorer suburbs heavily populated with ethnic minorities, where
alienation and abstention are high.
Their efforts are
being put to the test on Sunday, as France votes in the first round of
the presidential election, choosing among 10 candidates. President Nicolas
Sarkozy is fighting hard for re-election against what seem to be steep odds,
since every poll shows him losing to Mr. Hollande in the second round on May 6,
when the top two finishers in the first round compete.
For Sunday’s first
round, opinion polls suggest Mr. Sarkozy and Mr. Hollande are running close to
each other, with the far-right National Front leader Marine Le Pen and the
far-left politician Jean-Luc Mélenchon fighting for third place. A centrist,
François Bayrou, appears to be headed for a disappointing fifth place.
But the polls also
show that there are significant numbers of undecided voters among the 43.2
million registered, and that up to 25 percent of all voters said they would
abstain. All parties are trying to get out the vote, but the Socialists are
trying new techniques, at least for France.
“When we saw what
Obama had done, the very systematic way of door-to-door campaigning and the way
he used the Internet to coordinate volunteers, we thought, ‘How can we do that
in France?’
” said Mr. Pons, 28. They did a pilot project in 2010 and then made their pitch
to the Socialist Party and were hired by the head of the Web campaign, Vincent
Feltesse, taking leave from their regular jobs as business consultants. They
hope to bring Mr. Hollande close to half a million new votes, as much as 1
percent of the electorate.
The polls show a lot
of angry voters who feel left out of mainstream politics, at least as
represented by Mr. Sarkozy and Mr. Hollande. The votes for the far right and far
left — for Ms. Le Pen and Mr. Mélenchon — could together total 30 percent and
outstrip the votes for either Mr. Sarkozy or Mr. Hollande.
Most polls have
margins of error of around three percentage points, and in the past they have
underestimated the actual vote for the National Front and, in 2007, for Mr.
Sarkozy. Polling is difficult with 10 candidates. But the polls agree that the
race in the first round is tight.
The two main candidates are already thinking
ahead to the second round. Mr. Sarkozy is hoping to come first on Sunday, to
get new momentum for the next two weeks. The traditional French understanding
is that in the first round, people vote with their hearts, and in the second
round, with their heads. And the second round, barring surprises, should be a
classic French fight between the left and the right.
Those who voted for the eliminated candidates
will have to hold their noses and decide between the top two, and Mr. Sarkozy
is eager to turn the second round into a referendum, not on himself, but on the
character, competence and program of Mr. Hollande. That will not be easy.
On Friday, in a last set of interviews, Mr.
Sarkozy apologized again for mistakes of behavior and symbolism early in his
term, attending flashy parties with rich friends and doing things some
considered undignified, like swearing at hecklers and jogging in public.
“Perhaps the mistake I made at the start of my mandate is not understanding the
symbolic dimension of the president’s role and not being solemn enough in my
acts,” he told RTL radio. “A mistake for which I would like to apologize or
explain myself and which I will not make again,” he said. “Now, I know the
job.”
Mr. Sarkozy has also
said that it is not necessary to change the president, because the president
himself has changed. But the French are unconvinced, and more than half of
those who say they will vote for Mr. Hollande in the second round say they will
do so to be rid of Mr. Sarkozy.
Even the pro-Sarkozy
newspaper Le Figaro said Friday that “confidence has swept into François
Hollande’s camp” where “the candidate is having difficulty concealing his
optimism.” To reassure centrist voters, Mr. Hollande also said he would not do
deals between presidential rounds with other parties, obviously referring to
Mr. Mélenchon.
“There is no place in a presidential election
for negotiations between parties,” Mr. Hollande said. “No bartering, no
concessions, no exchanges.”
Mr. Hollande’s campaign chief, Pierre
Moscovici, told Le Parisien newspaper that voters have a “powerful and tranquil
expectation of change” and will unite the opposition to Mr. Sarkozy.
“Hollande will become the candidate of the
Socialist Party and of its allies,” he said. “He will be the candidate of the
left and of change.”