'' in Paris, where Olivier Besancenot was holding a meeting Besancenot's engagement in left-wing politics started early. He joined the
Revolutionary Communist Youth (
Jeunesses communistes révolutionnaires, or JCR) in 1988 when he was fourteen. When at university studying for his history
licence, he formed a branch of the
Confédération générale du travail trade union in the supermarket,
Shopi, where he worked. In 1991, he joined the LCR. Since 1997, he has been a member of the
Sud-PTT trade union. He took a break from his job at the postal services in 1999 and 2000 to serve as a parliamentary attaché to Alain Krivine in the
European Parliament. In 2001 and 2002, he participated in the
World Social Forum at
Porto Alegre. He gained national prominence when he stood for the
2002 French presidential election. At twenty-eight, he was the youngest presidential candidate in the country's history. Standing on a
revolutionary socialist platform, he gained 1.3 million votes, 4.25% of the total. Among voters under the age of 25, he gained 13.9 percent, beating
Lionel Jospin and
Jean-Marie Le Pen. In the run-up to the second round of voting, Besancenot urged voters to ensure that the far-right Le Pen did not gain power, by re-electing
Jacques Chirac, despite his own misgivings about Chirac's political positions. Besancenot ran again for the
2007 presidential election. His slogan throughout the campaign was "Nos vies valent plus que leurs profits" ("Our lives are worth more than their profits"); and he campaigned for
redistribution of wealth, an increase in the
minimum wage, prohibition of layoffs for profitable companies, and taxation of profits from capital speculation. He stood for political and electoral independence of the
anti-capitalist left from the
Socialist Party (
Parti Socialiste, PS), and against its participation in a centre-left government. Besancenot was endorsed by British filmmaker
Ken Loach, known for depictions of working-class struggles. His campaign's closing rally, in Paris, was attended by 4,000, the largest meeting organised by the LCR or its predecessors since 1968. Besancenot gained 1,498,581 votes or 4.08%, around 300,000 votes more than 2002. He is the first in votes and in dominant position among candidates to the left of the Socialist Party's candidate,
Ségolène Royal. For the second round of the elections, Besancenot, after calling for participation, stated that, "On 6 May, we will be on the side of those who want to prevent Nicolas Sarkozy from attaining the presidency of the republic. It is not a matter of supporting Ségolène Royal, but voting against Nicolas Sarkozy.", fighting the Right in the street as well as at the ballot boxes. This led, in June 2008, to the launching of the
New Anticapitalist Party (
Nouveau parti anticapitaliste, NPA), intended to unify the parties and movements of the far left. The party aims to field its first electoral candidates at the
2009 EU parliamentary elections. Whilst plans were being put in place for the formation of this party, Besancenot was able to capitalise on the infighting occurring in the PS in the summer of 2008, as its members prepared to convene at
La Rochelle for their annual party leadership contest. His popularity continued to increase, as he remonstrated the PS for focusing its attention on him, and not the incumbent president, Sarkozy. Besancenot told French TV, a medium in which he found himself in greater demand, that, "It's up to the population to get there [force a revolution] one way or another"; he also told a LCR conference that the left had been failing in its opposition. ==The "Besancenot affair"==