The Reckoning

Abstract

The defeat of March 1978 shattered the morale of (in Mitterrand’s phrase) the people of the Left. On the parties and unions of the Left its effect was that of a fragmentation bomb, hurling each organisation centrifugally away from every other while simultaneously splintering them internally. This effect was visible within days — even hours — of the second ballot on 19 March. Michel Rocard, interviewed on television as the results rolled in, made little attempt to hide his view that the insufficiencies of Mitterrand’s leadership were partly to blame for the PS disaster. ‘Fortunately,’ he added, ‘it’s only three more years from now to 1981.’¹ With this, the gauntlet was thrown down for a bitter struggle over the PS presidential nomination — and thus, inevitably, the party leadership. Robert Fabre, the MRG leader, was equally quick to react, declaring that the result freed him from all commitments he had made since signing the Common Programme in 1972. Drawing the lesson from the double defeat of the MRG and the Union of the Left, he would tender his resignation from the party ’s leadership. Giscard, never one to miss a chance of wooing over further fractions of the Centre-Left, quickly invited Fabre to the Elysée, an invitation which was as quickly accepted.