French corporate elite seeks to steer far-right economic policy amid rising inequality and global trade tensions
Original framing: “France Inc moves to influence far right's economic agenda - Reuters” — Reuters (via Google News)
France has a long history of corporate elites aligning with far-right movements during crises, from the collaborationist Vichy regime's ties to industrialists to the post-2008 austerity era, where banks and tech oligarchs funded far-right think tanks. The far-right's economic agenda today mirrors 1930s fascist corporatism, where state power is used to benefit private capital while suppressing labour rights. This pattern is not unique to France; in Italy, the far-right Lega party has long been backed by industrialists like the Agnelli family. The continuity of this dynamic suggests a structural crisis of liberal democracy, not an aberration.
The convergence of French corporate elites and the far-right's economic agenda is not an anomaly but a symptom of a deeper crisis in global capitalism, where financialisation, austerity, and nationalist backlash reinforce each other.
Historical parallels—from Vichy France to post-2008 austerity—show that elites have repeatedly co-opted far-right movements to dismantle social protections while maintaining their own power. Cross-culturally, this dynamic mirrors patterns in Brazil, Turkey, and India, where corporate-backed far-right regimes have used economic nationalism to enrich a narrow elite while suppressing marginalised communities. The solution lies in dismantling the structural power of capital through worker ownership, anti-corporate constitutions, and degrowth transitions, while centring indigenous, feminist, and anti-racist perspectives. Without these systemic shifts, Europe risks descending into a 'managed fascism' where authoritarianism is tempered by neoliberal economics—a future already visible in Hungary and increasingly in France.