18
RICE UNIVERSITY STUDIES
Front. The legislative elections of 1958, 1962, and 1967 — and more clear-
ly yet, the municipal elections of March, 1965, when the UNR succeeded
in electing less than a tenth of all municipal councillors —s5 clearly demon-
strate that many who will vote for de Gaulle fail to transfer their loyalty to
the party which claims him, but which is not always claimed in return.
The dramatic rise of the UNR was facilitated by the comparative weak-
ness of party identification in France in the late 1950’s. As a dynamic new
party, holding aloft the Cross of Lorraine, it attracted a large number of
voters whose interest in politics and whose political loyalties were shallow.s'i
The proportion of respondents in IFOP surveys who identified with the
UNR fluctuated from 11 percent in June, 1962, to 27 percent in December,
1962 (at the time of the legislative elections), to 14 percent in June,
1963.s7 A study conducted by the Société Française d’Enquêtes par Sondage
(SOFRES) in early 1966, however, revealed that the UNR was regarded
with “beaucoup de sympathie” or “assez de sympathie" by 6 percent of
those who considered themselves to be of the extreme left, 22 percent of
the moderate left, 66 percent of the center, 77 percent of the moderate
right, 78 percent of the extreme right, and 40 percent of the apolitical
marais.ss This level of support was far greater and broader than that of any
other party, although the intensity of the Communist Party’s strength among
voters of the extreme left (47 percent of whom declared "beaucoup de
sympathie" for it) was greater than the UNR enjoyed in any category.
Along with its first-ballot votes of 38 percent and 43 percent respectively in
the legislative elections of 1967 and 1968 (in this latter year not counting
another 4 percent for Independent Republicans running without official
Gaullist support), this evidence suggests that the Gaullist party gradually
may be establishing those voter loyalties which alone can protect it against
another electoral flash flood.
On the basis of early reports of IFOP’s preelection survey, it appears that
the swelled Gaullist electorate of June, 1968, was very similar in social
characteristics to de Gaulle’s extended electorate. In comparison with the
March, 1967, elections, the Gaullist parties in 1968 apparently drew a
higher proportion of votes from women, from older persons, and from busi-
nessmen. They made limited gains among white collar workers and farmers
and none at all among workers.80 In that crisis election, with the GauIlists
exploiting to the full popular fears of communism and chaos, for the first
time the extended electorate swung behind Gaullist candidates on the first
ballot. Yet undoubtedly many of those voters who joined the Gaullist land-
slide of June, 1968, have only an ephemeral, faute de mieux kind of loyalty
to the Gaullist movement.