The Atlantic: How Being a Woman Helped Marine Le Pen

Still, Le Pen’s ascent coincides with a historic far-right resurgence taking place across the Western world—one that, if successful, could have major implications for Europe’s institutions, its establishment parties, and its future. Le Pen’s candidacy is also historic in a country like France, whose political history, much like that of other western democracies,  doesn’t boast much female representation. French women were only afforded the right to vote and serve in public office in 1944, decades after women in Britain (1918), Germany (1918), and the United States (1920). Édith Cresson became the country’s first and only female prime minister in 1991 under President François Mitterrand, but lost the post less than a year later due to low approval ratings that some attribute to the misogynist attitudes of Socialist-party elites. Ségolène Royal, a Socialist politician who in 2007 became the first woman to be nominated for the presidency by a major party, faced similar discrimination. [...]

Le Pen has done this by attempting to soften the FN’s extremist edges and embrace her role as a woman, while keeping the party focused squarely on immigration and security. Her illiberal rhetoric about Islam and the Holocaust are still likely to curb the support of some voters who aren’t entirely convinced the FN has shed the racist and xenophobic image that has defined it for years. Still, while Le Pen may have no viable path to victory this year, her overhaul of the FN guarantees it has a chance of competing going forward for perhaps the first time in its 50-year history. [...]

Another way Le Pen has drawn more women to FN: by promoting herself as a modern woman of the people. In a recent campaign ad, she discussed being a woman, a mother, and a lawyer—aspects of her identity that she says makes her “proudly, loyally, and resolutely French.” It’s a populist, anti-elitist characterization that has helped her attract new voters to the party, including former Socialist voters who are disillusioned by the deeply unpopular presidency of François Hollande. “She’s twice divorced, she is effectively a single mother, she has a partner of several years who she isn't married to,” Murray said. “She can put herself forward as someone who understands the dilemmas faced by other women in that situation.”

read the article