Why do the French in Belgium vote more in the presidential election than in the rest of the world, and differently?

The Belgian daily La Libre Belgique published this week a long format based on a university study to understand this singularity.

In 2017, just over 46,000 people took part in the ballot out of the 83,000 French citizens registered on the electoral lists in Belgium that year.

This puts Belgium in second place out of the eleven countries with the most French nationals.

Its participation rate (56.6%) of French people abroad was the highest in 2017, after Luxembourg (61.18%).   

This peculiarity can be explained.

First, there is the geographical, cultural and linguistic proximity to France.

"In the national media, we talk about the French election. We are also interested in those who are closer, geographically and culturally to us", estimates Caroline Close, researcher and professor in political science at the Free University of Brussels. , interviewed by "La Libre".

Such a climate promotes the desire to participate in the vote.

Same observation for Bruno Jean-Étienne, secretary general of the French association of Belgium-ADFE, also contacted by the daily.

"When there are presidential elections, Belgium experiences elections by proxy. All of Belgium watches the debate between the two candidates."   

Mimicry and emulation   

Another factor is adaptation to the standard of the country of residence.

As voting is compulsory in Belgium and Luxembourg, we can think that it encourages, by imitation, more willingly expatriates to go to the polls.

At least that's what Caroline Close thinks.

"If we assume that French nationals are socialized and immersed among nationals who go to vote very regularly, like the Swiss for example, that can have an impact on their own motivation to vote."

This is all the more true since French nationals vote less in countries where the participation rate is lower, such as the United States or Canada.   

The small size of the country also has an impact on the vote.

Or rather the distribution of the population on the territory.

In absolute numbers, there are many more French nationals in Canada and the United States than in Belgium, Switzerland and Luxembourg, "but they are dispersed over the territory. The network density may therefore be less strong there" , explains La Libre.

However, "the act of going to vote is also the result of socialization, of the integration of people into networks where we talk about politics, where everyone pushes the others to participate", observes the sociologist.

“I think it is rather a question of dispersion and geographical remoteness within these territories that can have an impact on participation.”  

Voting disparities   

Second question addressed in the long format of La Libre: why is the vote of French expatriates in Belgium different from the national vote?

During the 2017 presidential election, French nationals residing in Belgium voted for Emmanuel Macron with 36% of the vote against 24.01% at the national level, i.e. 12 points difference.

More surprisingly, the candidate Marine Le Pen, who came second in the first round of national results, only came in fifth place in the vote of the French in Belgium.

Here again, these disparities can be explained.   

According to the sociologist interviewed by La Libre, the positions of the candidates on Europe deliver part of the explanation.

"The big difference lies in the vote for the two opposing candidates on the win-lose divide of globalization: Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen."

It is not surprising that French people living in Belgium were sensitive to the Europhile arguments of Emmanuel Macron.

"In Belgium, especially in Brussels, many nationals gravitate around the European Union, through their employment in the institutions or through lobbying", abounds Bruno Jean-Étienne, the secretary general of the French association of Belgium-ADFE.

Same scenario in 2022?  

There are also specific sociological reasons to explain these disparities.

"I'm going to simplify, but Marine Le Pen voters are of a lower socio-economic level," says Caroline Close.

"These are not voters who specifically speak several languages. It is not a profile of a voter who can afford to go and work abroad, for example. They are the losers of globalization. You are not going to therefore not find this profile sociologically among French expatriates, in any case very few.  

Finally, last question: will such disparities occur again in 2022?

Impossible to say until we have the results of the first and second rounds, say the authors of the article, Pauline Denys and Emma Druelles.

Just as it is difficult to know if Emmanuel Macron's candidacy will arouse the same enthusiasm in Belgium in 2022. 

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