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Ségolène's Summer
Socialist Party presidential hopeful Ségolène Royal has had quite a summer. First, those photos of the trim 52 year old frolicking on the beach in the south of France. Then her return from holiday to find the flat she shares with colleague Francois Holland was ransacked - and a subsequent scandal when she hinted that government figures might have been involved in the break-in. Third, her poll ratings rose above rival Nicolas Sarkozy for the first time since she broke free of the chasing pack for next year's presidential election.
And now, with the rentrée, comes news that her biggest obstacle for the presidency next year might be party, whose most prominent figures are ganging up to scupper the chances of the left's most popular candidate for years.
French party rivalries are unusually bitter, and the highbrow Socialists are no exception. Royal has been attacked for her gender ("Who will look after the children?" one rival sneered, when she declared her interest last year); her pulchritude (“A beauty contest is not what the French want,” said former PM Laurent Fabius, following the publication of the paparazzi snaps this month and a lad's mag poll which counted her among the world's sexiest women); and her "hollow" references to Socialist hero Francois Mitterand, who gave her political career a start.
Royal's relationship with the press drives party colleagues insane with jealously: It isn't only EURSOC and the readers of Closer's French edition who have been drooling over Mme Royal: It has been almost impossible to find a hostile profile in the international, never mind the French press.
Royal has always had a knack of attracting the right sort of press attention. In the 1980s, Elysee Palace insiders nicknamed her "Princess" - and it didn't seem to hurt her prospects, even in Republican France. Her habit of bringing toddlers to work raised eyebrows in the fiercely male world of Paris politics, but made for good copy (as well as sympathy from working mothers). She hasn't been above stunts, either, delighting snappers and farmers when she wore a farmer's costume to an Elysee garden party: Royal was already popular among farmers for fighting EU directives aimed at disrupting their traditions, such as regulations on selling unpasteurised cheese.
Naturally, her media-friendliness has led to speculation that Mme Royal might not be a political heavyweight. Critics have pointed to the amount of time she is said to spend surfing her online forum, which she hopes will bring her closer to the concerns of average citizens. While she plans a book based on her web-peering findings, Socialist rivals have muttered that the ideas she has aired so far lack definition.
Worse, her declared admiration for Tony Blair has worried fellow Socialists that Ségolène Royal might not be that left-wing after all - like Blair, a potential traitor to the leftist cause.
Not that's there's much in her record to suggest this. True, she has remarked that the 35-hour week may not help France's economic prospects, and she has called for tougher treatment for young offenders. But following a dressing down by party bigwigs, she added several qualifications to her proposals, adding a sprinkle of populist left promises for good measure.
Indeed, there is little to suggest Royal is anything other than a traditional patrician social democrat in the French mould: However, her social democratic centrism, coupled with a willingness to at least countenance some reform, may be as good as those who wish France well can hope for.
That's because others in her party see their best hope of defeating Sarkozy in appealling to the left. The Times gives a handy form guide to other PS contenders. Former PM Fabius sees himself as the natural leader, having been the main focus of party discontent when Royal's partner, PS secretary Francois Hollande, called for Socialists to support the EU constitution. As PM in the 1980s, Fabius used to style himself as a reformer, "Blair before Blair": Now he believes that the PS failed to beat Jacques Chirac in the 2002 election because the party leant too heavily to the centre, driving unhappy socialists to extreme-left parties.
Fabius's men are leading the briefing against Royal, though to little effect: She still has a 30 point lead over her rivals.
Her campaign has thrown the party hierarchy into shock. Seniority counts in French politics: Unlike in the UK, for example, when a failed general election run usually signals the end of a party leader's chances of running for the top job, French politicans are expected to patiently wait their turn for the presidency. A career strewn with failure (and, in some cases, swindling) is no obstacle to advancement, provided the candidate has served his time, made the right friends and comes from the upper echelons of the nation's elite intellectual class.
Royal, like her likely opponent Sarkozy, is young. Unlike Sarkozy, she schooled at the elite ENA academy. Nevertheless, her rivals feel that she is jumping the queue for the presidency, pushing ahead on a wave of popular acclaim while failing to respect her party's traditional approach to candidate selection.
Royal will find out for sure what the Socialists feel about her in November, when the party choses its candidate. She's in for a gruelling few months before that - previous stops on what the Brits describe as the "rubber chicken circuit" have seen Royal heckled by leftists, much to the delight of other party figures.
Nevertheless, Socialist Party members are beginning to see Royal as their only opportunity to keep Nicolas Sarkozy out of the Elysee. Polls suggest that any other candidate other than Ségolène Royal would lead to the unthinkable: That the Socialists could once again fail to reach the second round, and Sarko could face the fascist Jean Marie Le Pen in the presidential run-off. This nightmare scenario, where Socialists would once again be obliged to vote for the centre right candidate to keep Le Pen out - and in the process, hand Sarko an unprecedented mandate - could split the party for good.
EURSOC spoke to several party activists over the summer, and heard the same story: Beyond the inner circles of the various leading figures, it doesn't matter so much who wins the party candidacy but what they do, and the priority for Socialists of all stripes should be preventing Sarko from winning 2007's presidential election.
Maybe, as with Blair, the party could chose a figure it doesn't exactly trust, yet who will deliver power. It's hard to imagine a party pushing away its greatest - only? - asset.
