Benoît Hamon (; born 26 June 1967) is a French politician known for his former role within the
Socialist Party (PS) and
Party of European Socialists (PES) and his political party
Génération.s.
Hamon joined the Socialist Party in 1988 and by 1993 became the leader of the
Young Socialist Movement, serving until 1995. In 2004, Hamon was elected MEP for East of France and during his time as MEP he ran for leadership of the Socialist Party, losing in the first round of the
Reims Congress and endorsing the
Eurosceptic option in the
2005 European Constitution referendum.
In 2012, Hamon was elected to the National Assembly in Yveline's 11th constituency, though he resigned after being appointed as junior minister for the Social Economy at the
Ministry of the Economy, Finance, and External Trade by President
François Hollande
François Gérard Georges Nicolas Hollande (; born 12 August 1954) is a French politician who served as President of France from 2012 to 2017. Before his presidency, he was First Secretary of the Socialist Party (France), First Secretary of th ...
. Hamon was then appointed Minister of National Education in
Manuel Valls' new government. He was removed from this position alongside
Economy Minister Arnaud Montebourg when they both publicly opposed the government economic policy. He later returned to the National Assembly in September of the same year, running in his previous constituency. Hamon's stint in the National Assembly consisted of voting in line with a group labelled the Frondeurs, a socialist group opposed to the social-liberal politics of
Francois Hollande and
Manuel Valls.
In 2016, Hamon declared his intention to run in the
Socialist Party primary for the
2017 presidential election. Being dubbed the "
Jeremy Corbyn
Jeremy Bernard Corbyn (; born 26 May 1949) is a British politician who has been Member of Parliament (United Kingdom), Member of Parliament (MP) for Islington North (UK Parliament constituency), Islington North since 1983. Now an Independent ...
of the French-left"
and "reinventing the French left", Hamon ran on ideas accused of being "far-out" such as
legalising cannabis, taxing
automation
Automation describes a wide range of technologies that reduce human intervention in processes, mainly by predetermining decision criteria, subprocess relationships, and related actions, as well as embodying those predeterminations in machine ...
and introducing a
universal basic income
Universal basic income (UBI) is a social welfare proposal in which all citizens of a given population regularly receive a minimum income in the form of an unconditional transfer payment, i.e., without a means test or need to perform Work (hu ...
.
Hamon eventually won in a run-off against former Prime Minister Manuel Valls and campaigned on similar ideals in the general election, though only gathering 6.36 per cent of votes. Shortly following his loss in the legislative election, Hamon left the Socialist Party in July 2017 to found his own political party called 1 July Movement, later renamed
Génération.s.
After failing to win any seats in the
2019 European elections, Hamon said that he would step back to reflect on his and his movement's political future.
Early life
Hamon was born 26 June 1967 in
Saint-Renan,
Finistère to an engineer father who worked for
Naval Group in
Brest and a secretary mother.
Hamon lived in Brest until 1980, moving with his parents to Dakar, Senegal where he attended a
Cours Sainte Marie de Hann private school. Hamon credited growing up in Dakar as influential to the future of his life due to the religious and ethnic diversity of the region. Hamon returned to Brittany following his parents divorce in 1984 and eventually enrolled in the
University of Western Brittany studying a degree in History where he joined the Young Socialist movement. Hamon lived in an apartment with current Socialist Party first secretary
Olivier Faure
Olivier Faure (; born 18 August 1968) is a French politician who has served as the First Secretary of the French Socialist Party, First Secretary of the Socialist Party (France), Socialist Party since 2018 and Deputy (France), Member of the Nati ...
during his academic life.
Political career
Beginnings
After obtaining a degree in history at the University of Western Brittany in 1991, Hamon started his parliamentary career as an assistant to Socialist Party deputy Pierre Brana at the age of 24. Hamon had been taking part in student protests since the age of 19, starting his involvement in politics during a demonstration against
Alain Devaquet's 1986-1987 education reform.
Hamon joined the Socialist Party afterwards and became active in the Brest Socialist Party, being an advocate and supporter of Prime Minister
Michel Rocard.
Hamon also campaigned
in support of the Maastricht Treaty in 1992.
Following the Socialist Party's loss in the
1993 legislative election, Michel Rocard, with the support of the socialist wing of the party, became the first secretary.
The subsequent shake-up of the party's establishment led to the Socialist Party's secretary of communication, Manuel Valls', appointing Hamon within the administration of the Young Socialists.
Hamon was a regional manager with supervision over
Brittany
Brittany ( ) is a peninsula, historical country and cultural area in the north-west of modern France, covering the western part of what was known as Armorica in Roman Gaul. It became an Kingdom of Brittany, independent kingdom and then a Duch ...
,
Nancy and
Lyon
Lyon (Franco-Provençal: ''Liyon'') is a city in France. It is located at the confluence of the rivers Rhône and Saône, to the northwest of the French Alps, southeast of Paris, north of Marseille, southwest of Geneva, Switzerland, north ...
. Hamon's leadership was inspired entirely by Rocard, independent from the then-leadership of the Young Socialists. Hamon was elected the leader of the Young Socialists in November 1993.
Hamon's leadership of the Young Socialists was marked by a closeness to student unions, which helped current Socialist Party politicians such as
Pouria Amirshahi win elections for leadership positions within different student unions.
Hamon also led an increase in membership from 500 members to 3,000, an expansion in terms of bases the Young Socialists have in universities and an increase of membership age from 25 to 29, mainly due to Hamon's own age of 26 at the time.
Following the revelation that then-president
François Mitterrand and former high ranking Vichy member
René Bousquet had a friendship, Hamon resigned as the leader of the Young Socialists. He was succeeded by
Régis Juanico and became the national Representative of youth issues for the Socialist Party and then the advisor for youth policy in Lionel Jospin's 1995 presidential election.
Hamon ran for the National Assembly in 1997, in Morbihan's 2nd constituency's, losing in the second round. Hamon was then appointed as an advisor to Martine Aubry's Employment Ministry, mainly in charge of youth employment from 1997 to 1998 before becoming a senior advisor in 1998 to 2000.
Hamon became a city councillor for Brétigny-sur-Orge in 2001, serving until 2008. He was also the director for strategic planning at Ipsos from 2001 to 2004.
European Parliament
In 2003, Hamon founded a caucus within the Socialist Party called the "New Socialist Party" with
Arnaud Montebourg,
Vincent Peillon,
Julien Dray. The caucus was able to gathered 17% of votes at the
Dijon Congress, the second most behind Francois Hollande, who was eventually elected the first secretary of the Socialist Party. The caucus became the main Socialist Left affiliation within the party following an endorsement by former-first secretary
Henri Emmanuelli.
The "New Socialist Party" split after a motion proposed by the party at the
Le Mans Congress, was rejected by leading member
Arnaud Montebourg. The caucus finally collapsed in 2006 after the leadership of the caucus endorsed different candidates during the
primary for the presidential election.
Hamon was
Member of the European Parliament
A member of the European Parliament (MEP) is a person who has been Election, elected to serve as a popular representative in the European Parliament.
When the European Parliament (then known as the Common Assembly of the European Coal and S ...
(MEP) for the East of France from 2004 to 2009, attached to the
PES Group.
He served as a member of the Committee of Economic and Monetary affairs, an alternative member of the Committee on Consumer Protection and the Vice-Chairman of the Delegate for the United States. Hamon was a campaigner for a "no" vote in the
2005 European Constitution referendum and was the national secretary for the PES Group, elected in 2005 and resigning in 2007 after the Socialist Party's support of the
Lisbon Treaty
The Treaty of Lisbon (initially known as the Reform Treaty) is a European agreement that amends the two Treaty, treaties which form the constitutional basis of the European Union (EU). The Treaty of Lisbon, which was signed by all Member stat ...
despite promises made during the Le Mans Congress.
Hamon became a spokesman for the Socialist Party in the
2007 legislative elections.
After the candidacy for the First Secretary of the became a contest between , Hamon urged his supporters to vote for Aubry, who secured a narrow, contested majority.
On 16 May 2012, Hamon was appointed Junior Minister for the Social Economy at the French
Ministry of the Economy, Finance, and External Trade by President
François Hollande
François Gérard Georges Nicolas Hollande (; born 12 August 1954) is a French politician who served as President of France from 2012 to 2017. Before his presidency, he was First Secretary of the Socialist Party (France), First Secretary of th ...
. Hamon was
Minister of National Education from 2 April 2014 until 25 August 2014, resigning as a result of Hollande's abandonment of a socialist agenda. He was national secretary for Europe and spokesperson for the Socialist Party.
2017 presidential campaign
Hamon announced his intention to
seek the French presidency in August 2016. Critical of the
social-liberal politics of Hollande and Prime Minister
Manuel Valls, Hamon represented the
left-wing
Left-wing politics describes the range of Ideology#Political ideologies, political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy either as a whole or of certain social ...
and
green
Green is the color between cyan and yellow on the visible spectrum. It is evoked by light which has a dominant wavelength of roughly 495570 nm. In subtractive color systems, used in painting and color printing, it is created by a com ...
side of the Socialist Party during the primary.

Hamon wants to give all French citizens a
basic income, believing that the availability of work will decrease due to
automation
Automation describes a wide range of technologies that reduce human intervention in processes, mainly by predetermining decision criteria, subprocess relationships, and related actions, as well as embodying those predeterminations in machine ...
. He supports a 35-hour workweek, and less if a worker chooses in exchange for state compensation, and supports the
legalisation of cannabis and
euthanasia
Euthanasia (from : + ) is the practice of intentionally ending life to eliminate pain and suffering.
Different countries have different Legality of euthanasia, euthanasia laws. The British House of Lords Select committee (United Kingdom), se ...
. He also argues for sizeable investments in renewable energy, aiming for renewable sources to provide 50% of French energy by 2025, and wants to protect the "common goods" (water, air, biodiversity) in the Constitution. Hamon is also very critical of the
neoliberal
Neoliberalism is a political and economic ideology that advocates for free-market capitalism, which became dominant in policy-making from the late 20th century onward. The term has multiple, competing definitions, and is most often used pej ...
"myth of infinite
economic growth
In economics, economic growth is an increase in the quantity and quality of the economic goods and Service (economics), services that a society Production (economics), produces. It can be measured as the increase in the inflation-adjusted Outp ...
", which he blames for "
destroying the planet" and argues is a "quasi-religion" among politicians, saying: "There is an urgency to change now our way to produce and consume.
..We can negotiate with bankers, but we can't negotiate with the planet".
Polling in January 2017 showed that his support had tripled and put him into serious contention for the nomination. On 22 January 2017, Hamon came in first in the first round of the primary, ahead of Valls.
He secured the support of
Arnaud Montebourg, who placed third, soon thereafter.
In the runoff on 29 January, he won the Socialist Party nomination.
Hamon conceded defeat after the first round of the presidential election on 23 April, and immediately announced his support for
Emmanuel Macron
Emmanuel Jean-Michel Frédéric Macron (; born 21 December 1977) is a French politician who has served as President of France and Co-Prince of Andorra since 2017. He was Ministry of Economy and Finance (France), Minister of Economics, Industr ...
in the second round.
Addressing the
1 July Movement on 1 July 2017, Hamon said he was leaving the Socialist Party, but not socialism and called for the formation of local committees of the left to decide the movement's future.
Personal life
Hamon is in a civil union, also known as ''
PACS'' in France, with Gabrielle Guallar with whom he has two daughters.
The couple met while Hamon was an MEP for East France.
Hamon has an estate in his home department of
Finistère and an apartment in
Hauts-de-Seine.
References
External links
*
, -
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hamon, Benoit
1967 births
Living people
Candidates in the 2017 French presidential election
Ministers of national education of France
Government ministers of France
MEPs for East France 2004–2009
People from Saint-Renan
Socialist Party (France) MEPs
University of Western Brittany alumni
Génération.s politicians