Editing François Mitterrand (section)

==Opposition during the Fifth Republic==
{{Further|French Fifth Republic}}

===Crossing the desert: 1958–1964===
[[File:François Mitterrand 1959.JPG|left|thumb|Mitterrand in 1959]]
In 1958, Mitterrand was one of the few to object to the nomination of [[Charles de Gaulle]] as head of government and to de Gaulle's plan for a [[French Fifth Republic|Fifth Republic]]. He justified his opposition by the circumstances of de Gaulle's comeback: the [[May 1958 crisis|13 May 1958 quasi-putsch]] and military pressure. In September 1958, determinedly opposed to Charles de Gaulle, François Mitterrand made an appeal to vote "no" in the [[1958 French constitutional referendum|referendum over the Constitution]], which was nevertheless adopted on 4 October 1958. This defeated coalition of the "No" was composed of the PCF and some left-wing republican politicians (such as Pierre Mendès-France and François Mitterrand).

This attitude may have been a factor in Mitterrand's losing his seat in the [[1958 French legislative election|1958 elections]], beginning a long "crossing of the desert" (this term is usually applied to de Gaulle's decline in influence for a similar period). Indeed, in the second round of the legislative election, François Mitterrand was supported by the Communists but the [[French Section of the Workers' International]] (SFIO) refused to withdraw its candidate. This division caused the election of the [[Gaullist Party|Gaullist]] candidate. One year later, he was [[1959 French Senate election|elected]] to represent [[Nièvre]] in the [[French Senate|Senate]], where he was part of the [[Democratic Left (France)|Group of the Democratic Left]]. At the same time, he was not admitted to the ranks of the [[Unified Socialist Party (France)|Unified Socialist Party]] (''Parti socialiste unifié'', PSU) which was created by Mendès-France, former internal opponents of Mollet and reform-minded former members of the Communist Party. The PSU leaders justified their decision by referring to his non-resignation from Mollet's cabinet and by his past in Vichy.

[[File:Portret van Francois Mitterrand, Bestanddeelnr 910-7485 (cropped).jpg|thumb|Mitterrand on 16 October 1959]]
Also in that same year, on the Avenue de l'Observatoire in Paris, Mitterrand claimed to have escaped an assassin's bullet by diving behind a hedge, in what became known as the "Observatory Affair".<ref>{{cite news | url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B0DE4D9173BF93BA15755C0A961948260 | work=The New York Times | title=The Mitterrand Mystery | first1=Robert O. | last1=Paxton | date=28 June 1987 | access-date=2 May 2010 | archive-date=23 February 2008 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080223204430/http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B0DE4D9173BF93BA15755C0A961948260 | url-status=live }}{{sic}}</ref> The incident brought him a great deal of publicity, initially boosting his political ambitions. Some of Mitterrand's critics claimed, however, that he had staged the incident himself, resulting in a backlash against him. He later said he had earlier been warned by right-wing deputy [[Robert Pesquet]] that he was the target of an ''[[Algérie française]]'' death squad and accused Prime Minister [[Michel Debré]] of being its instigator. Before his death, Pesquet claimed that Mitterrand had set up a fake attempt on his life. Prosecution was initiated against François Mitterrand but was later dropped. Nonetheless, the Observatory Affair cast a lasting shadow over Mitterrand's reputation. Years later in 1965, when François Mitterrand emerged as the challenger to de Gaulle in the second round of the presidential elections, de Gaulle was urged by an aide to use the Observatory Affair to discredit his opponent. "No, and don't insist" was the General's response, "It would be wrong to demean the office of the Presidency, since one day he [Mitterrand] may have the job."<ref>Tiersky, Ronald. ''François Mitterrand: a Very French President.'' Page 30. Lanham, Maryland; Rowman and Littlefield; 2000.</ref>

Mitterrand visited China in 1961, during the worst of the [[Great Chinese Famine]], but denied the existence of starvation.<ref>{{cite magazine |last= Mishra |first= Pankaj |author-link= Pankaj Mishra |date= 20 December 2010 |title= Staying Power |url= https://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/books/2010/12/20/101220crbo_books_mishra?currentPage=all |magazine= [[The New Yorker]] |access-date= 27 August 2012 |archive-date= 28 August 2012 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20120828080633/http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/books/2010/12/20/101220crbo_books_mishra?currentPage=all |url-status= live }}</ref>

===Opposition to De Gaulle: 1964–1971===
[[File:17.12.1965. F; Mitterrand cloture sa campagne à Toulouse. (1965) - 53Fi3417.jpg|thumb|Mitterrand in [[Toulouse]] on 17 December 1965 during the [[1965 French presidential election|1965 presidential election]] campaign]]

In the [[1962 French legislative election|1962 election]], Mitterrand regained his seat in the National Assembly with the support of the PCF and the SFIO. Practising left unity in Nièvre, he advocated the rallying of left-wing forces at the national level, including the PCF, in order to challenge Gaullist domination. Two years later, he became the president (chairman) of the General Council of Nièvre. While the opposition to De Gaulle organized in clubs, he founded his own group, the [[Convention of Republican Institutions]] (''Convention des institutions républicaines'', CIR). He reinforced his position as a left-wing opponent to [[Charles de Gaulle]] in publishing ''Le Coup d'État permanent'' (The permanent coup, 1964), which criticized de Gaulle's personal power, the weaknesses of Parliament and of the government, the President's exclusive control of foreign affairs, and defence, etc.

In 1965, Mitterrand was the first left-wing politician who saw the [[1965 French presidential election|presidential election]] by universal suffrage as a way to defeat the opposition leadership. Not a member of any specific political party, his candidacy for presidency was accepted by all left-wing parties (the [[French Section of the Workers' International]] (SFIO), [[French Communist Party]] (PCF), [[Radical-Socialist Party (France)|Radical-Socialist Party]] (PR) and [[Unified Socialist Party (France)|Unified Socialist Party]] (PSU)). He ended the ''[[Cordon sanitaire (politics)|cordon sanitaire]]'' of the PCF which the party had been subject to since 1947. For the SFIO leader [[Guy Mollet]], Mitterrand's candidacy prevented [[Gaston Defferre]], his rival in the SFIO, from running for the presidency. Furthermore, François Mitterrand was a lone figure, so he did not appear as a danger to the left-wing parties' staff members.

De Gaulle was expected to win in the first round, but Mitterrand received 31.7% of the vote, denying De Gaulle a first-round victory. François Mitterrand was supported in the second round by the left and other [[anti-Gaullists]]: centrist [[Jean Monnet]], moderate conservative [[Paul Reynaud]] and [[Jean-Louis Tixier-Vignancour]], an extreme right-winger and the lawyer who had defended [[Raoul Salan]], one of the four generals who had organized the 1961 [[Algiers putsch]] during the [[Algerian War]].

Mitterrand received 44.8% of votes in the second round and de Gaulle, with the majority, was thus elected for another term, but this defeat was regarded as honourable, for no one was really expected to defeat de Gaulle. François Mitterrand took the lead of a centre-left alliance: the [[Federation of the Democratic and Socialist Left]] (''Fédération de la gauche démocrate et socialiste'', FGDS). It was composed of the SFIO, the Radicals and several left-wing republican clubs (such the CIR of François Mitterrand).

[[File:François Mitterrand 1968.jpg|thumb|Mitterrand on 29 May 1968]]
In the [[1967 French legislative election|legislative election of March 1967]], the system where all candidates who failed to pass a 10% threshold in the first round were eliminated from the second round favoured the pro-Gaullist majority, which faced a split opposition (PCF, FGDS and centrists of [[Jacques Duhamel]]). Nevertheless, the parties of the left managed to gain 63 seats more than previously for a total of 194. The Communists remained the largest left-wing group with 22.5% of votes. The governing coalition won with its majority reduced by only one seat (247 seats out of 487).

In Paris, the Left (FGDS, PSU, PCF) managed to win more votes in the first round than the two governing parties (46% against 42.6%) while the [[Democratic Centre (France)|Democratic Centre]] of Duhamel got 7% of votes. But with 38% of votes, de Gaulle's [[Union des Démocrates pour la République|Union for the Fifth Republic]] remained the leading French party.<ref>[[René Rémond]], ''Notre siècle'', 1988, Fayard, p.664 ff.</ref>

During the [[May 1968 events in France|May 1968]] governmental crisis, François Mitterrand held a press conference to announce his candidacy if a new presidential election was held. But after the Gaullist demonstration on the [[Champs-Élysées]], de Gaulle dissolved the Assembly and called for a legislative election instead. In [[1968 French legislative election|this election]], the right-wing won its largest majority since the ''[[National Bloc (France)|Bloc National]]'' [[1919 French legislative election|in 1919]].

Mitterrand was accused of being responsible for this huge legislative defeat and the FGDS split. In 1969, François Mitterrand could not run for the Presidency: [[Guy Mollet]] refused to give him the support of the SFIO. The left-wing was eliminated in the first round, with the Socialist candidate Gaston Defferre winning a humiliating 5.1 per cent of the total vote. [[Georges Pompidou]] faced the centrist [[Alain Poher]] in the [[1969 French presidential election|second round]].

===Socialist Party leader: 1971–1981===
After the FGDS's implosion Mitterrand turned to the [[French Socialist Party|Socialist Party]] (''Parti socialiste'' or PS). In June 1971, at the time of the [[Epinay Congress]], the CIR joined the PS, which had succeeded the SFIO in 1969. The executive of the PS was then dominated by [[Guy Mollet]]'s supporters. They proposed an "ideological dialogue" with the Communists. For François Mitterrand, an electoral alliance with the Communists was necessary to rise to power. With this in mind, François Mitterrand obtained the support of all the internal opponents to Mollet's faction and was elected as the first secretary of the PS. At the 1971 congress, he declared: "Whoever does not accept the break with the established order, with capitalist society, cannot be an adherent of the Socialist Party."<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x4t3wo_congres-d-epinay-1971-francois-mitt_news|title=Congrès d'Epinay (1971)|date=22 March 2008|website=Dailymotion|language=en-US|access-date=22 March 2017|quote=Celui qui n’accepte pas la rupture avec l’ordre établi, avec la société capitaliste, celui là, il ne peut pas être adhèrent du Parti Socialiste.|archive-date=23 February 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170223075715/http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x4t3wo_congres-d-epinay-1971-francois-mitt_news|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.jacobinmag.com/2015/08/francois-mitterrand-socialist-party-common-program-communist-pcf-1981-elections-austerity/|title=The Many Lives of François Mitterrand|last=Birch|first=Jonah|date=19 August 2015|website=[[Jacobin (magazine)|Jacobin]]|language=en-US|access-date=22 March 2017|archive-date=23 March 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170323130713/https://www.jacobinmag.com/2015/08/francois-mitterrand-socialist-party-common-program-communist-pcf-1981-elections-austerity/|url-status=live}}</ref>

In June 1972, Mitterrand signed the [[Programme commun|Common Programme of Government]] with the Communist [[Georges Marchais]] and the [[Left Radical Party|Left Radical]] [[Robert Fabre]]. With this programme, he led the [[1973 French legislative election|1973 legislative campaign]] of the "Union of the Left".

[[File:Strasbourg-1979-05-06 (3758237073).jpg|thumb|Mitterrand in Strasbourg on 5 May 1979]]
At the [[1974 French presidential election|1974 presidential election]], François Mitterrand received 43.2% of the vote in the first round, as the common candidate of the left. He faced [[Valéry Giscard d'Estaing]] in the second round. During the national TV debate, Giscard d'Estaing criticised him as being "a man of the past", due to his long political career. François Mitterrand was narrowly defeated by Giscard d'Estaing, François Mitterrand receiving 49.19% and Giscard 50.81%.

In 1977, the Communist and Socialist parties failed to update the ''Common Programme'', and then lost the [[1978 French legislative election|1978 legislative election]]. While the Socialists took the leading position on the left, by obtaining more votes than the Communists for the first time [[1936 French legislative election|since 1936]], the leadership of François Mitterrand was challenged by an internal opposition led by [[Michel Rocard]] who criticized the programme of the PS as being "archaic" and "unrealistic". The polls indicated Rocard was more popular than François Mitterrand. Nevertheless, François Mitterrand won the vote at the Party's [[Metz Congress]] (1979) and Rocard renounced his candidacy for the [[1981 French presidential election|1981 presidential election]].

For his third candidacy for the presidency, Mitterrand was not supported by the PCF but only by the PS. François Mitterrand projected a reassuring image with the slogan "the quiet force". He campaigned for "another politics", based on the Socialist programme ''[[110 Propositions for France]]'',<ref>{{cite web |url=http://miroirs.ironie.org/socialisme/www.psinfo.net/elections/president/1981/index.html |title=Élection présidentielle de 1981 |publisher=Miroirs.ironie.org |access-date=11 March 2013 |archive-date=28 June 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130628193727/http://miroirs.ironie.org/socialisme/www.psinfo.net/elections/president/1981/index.html |url-status=live }}</ref> and denounced the performance of the incumbent president. Furthermore, he benefited from divisions in the right-wing majority. He obtained 25.85% of votes in the first round (against 15% for the PCF candidate [[Georges Marchais]]), then defeated President Giscard d'Estaing in the second round, with 51.76%. He became the first left-wing politician elected [[President of France]] by universal suffrage.