The French elections of 2002 broke all records for fragmentation, abstention and far-right protest voting, yet returned incumbent President Chirac in triumph and gave him a solid basis of parliamentary support. Parties and the Party System in France seeks to explain the paradox of France's current relationship to politics through a comprehensive analysis of French political parties and their interaction over the last fifty years, set against the two contexts of French history and of contemporary theories of parties and party systems.

Autorentext
ANDREW KNAPP is Senior Lecturer in French Studies at the University of Reading, UK. He is the author of Le Gaullisme Après de Gaulle (1996), and co-author of Government and Politics in Western Europe (third edition, with Yves Mény) and of The Government and Politics of France (fourth edition, with Vincent Wright).

Zusammenfassung
Parties and the Party System in France seeks to explain the paradox of France's current relationship to politics through a comprehensive analysis of French political parties and their interaction over the last fifty years, set against the two contexts of French history and of contemporary theories of parties and party systems.

Inhalt
Perspectives on Parties in France The Fifth Republic and the Course of Electoral Politics The Left: Dynamics of Co-operation and Conflict The Communist Collapse Influence of Supremacy: The Socialists Under Mitterrand and After The Green Dilemma The Centre Cannot Hold: The Rise and Fall of the UDF The End of Gaullism and the Birth of the President's Party The Rise and Rise of the Far Right From the Barrel of a Gun: Chasse, Pêche, Nature et Traditions A Disconnected Democracy?