Forecasting the FN presidential vote in the 2012 elections

Forecasting the Extreme Right vote in French elections is one of the few ‘third-party’ forecasts that has attracted attention in a forecasting literature focusing generally on incumbent performance and winners. Despite being a ‘hard case’ because of third-party status, unstable polling estimates and relatively few data points, previous models have provided relatively strong forecasts of the performance of the Front National (FN) and its erstwhile leader, Jean-Marie Le Pen. The recent succession of Le Pen by his daughter, Marine, and her apparent popularity pose a significant challenge to these models, however. In this article, we consider our previous model's prediction of her likely score in the first round of the presidentials, comparing this to standard forecasting benchmarks, and look at possible adjustments to account for the speculated ‘Marine effect’. We then compare this with other vote indicators including the results of an experimental expert judgment survey, finding that there is currently little evidence for a likely runaway success for the new FN leader in April 2012.