France’s iconic bars-tabacs are closing in droves, stripping communities of a key social lifeline and influencing their politics, according to a study that links the decline of neighbourhood bars with the rise in support for the far-right National Rally.

Analysing electoral data between 2002 and 2022, his study found that the RN vote rose by an extra 1.3%-3.6% in districts that had recently lost a bar-tabac, with the biggest increase occurring in rural areas already stripped of other venues for socialisation.

Is the loss of third spaces, pubs or bars-tabacs etc., related to rightward shifts in voting behaviour, in France, UK, Canada…