Washington ( CNN ) -- The French will vote next week to elect a new president . The April 22 election pits incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy against challenger Francois Hollande . Sarkozy , a conservative , argues that France did well compared with other European countries in the Great Recession . Hollande , on the left , urges a more expansionary program of government spending to create jobs . Normal politics , in other words . But the vote to watch is not Sarkozy v. Hollande . It is Sarkozy plus Hollande . The French constitution establishes a two-round voting system . The idea is to ensure that the ultimate winner obtains an outright majority of all votes cast . The system 's side effect is to invite the French to use their first ballot as a protest vote . Thus in 2007 , the nominees of the two big parties won 57 % of the vote between them in Round 1 , with the remainder scattered among the hard-right National Front and various categories of radical left-wing parties . It is that small party vote that is the vote to watch in 2012 . Sarkozy and Hollande disagree on much but not on the euro . Both support the currency , despite the terrible economic toll it has put on the economies of Europe . To sustain the euro , the countries of southern Europe are cutting government expenditures and raising taxes in a futile effort to balance their budgets in the throes of a worsening recession . The euro is doing to Europe in the 2010s what the gold standard did to the United States in the 1930s : magnifying an ordinary downturn into a social catastrophe . Unemployment has risen past 9 % in Italy , to 15 % in Portugal , 22 % in Greece and 23 % in Spain . In the past , generous European social networks cushioned unemployed . Those out of work might suffer anxiety and depression , but they need not fear material deprivation . But that 's changing as radical budget cuts bite . Portugal , for example , has slashed government spending by the equivalent of 7.5 % of GDP over the past two years . How much is 7.5 % of GDP ? To achieve a similar cut in the United States , we 'd have to abolish Social Security and the defense budget . So you can see why the euro project might begin to provoke public discontent . European elites have met that discontent by silencing it . When Greece proposed to hold a referendum on budget cuts , the EU authorities forbade it . When Italy needed aid to remain in the eurozone , the EU authorities forced distrusted Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi to resign and installed in his place an economist prime minister without an intervening election . Yet discontent will emerge somewhere . Radical parties are now rising across Europe . In France , polls show more than one-third of the public now supports radical alternatives to the two big traditional parties . About 16 % support the far-right National Front and about 17 % the neo-communist Left Front ( Front de Gauche ) . The National Front and the neo-communists disagree on issues such as immigration and law enforcement . Yet on economics , the two parties sound increasingly similar . Both want radical change in the European Union . Marine Le Pen , the National Front candidate for president , has voiced sympathy for outright exit from the Euro currency . Jean-Luc Mélenchon , leader of the Left Front , wants to assert political control over the independent European Central Bank . As they attack the EU and the euro , the far left and the far right are gaining supporters they never previously could have hoped for . One poll shows 25 % of French young people supporting the National Front . The National Front is also making inroads in the traditional heartland of French social democracy , the industrial northeast . As Sarkozy and Hollande campaign from TV studios , the neo-communist Mélenchon is exciting frenzied rallies in France 's poorer neighborhoods . When Sarkozy and Hollande belatedly staged public meetings on Sunday , Mélenchon mocked them for imitating his accessible style of campaigning : They `` will now also occupy the streets and risk appearing in public squares . '' Neither Le Pen nor Mélenchon has any hope of winning the presidency , nor even very much of a hope of making it to the second round . What they are doing , however , is giving expression to public distress that is going unexpressed by the mainline parties . They may not win enough votes . But they are exerting enough political force to reshape French politics and possibly the politics of all Europe . The euro was a terrible mistake . It is failing now in exactly the way predicted by its critics : a credit boom followed by a depression . The present policy response offers the people of Europe no hope at all , opening a political opportunity for extremists and demagogues . On April 22 , the voters of France will tell us just how large that political opportunity has grown . The opinions expressed in this column are solely those of David Frum .
Portugal , voting the past two years in first round for president , sees growth of fringe parties . Silvio Berlusconi says the extremists are gaining due to disastrous economic policy . He says preserving the Euro is forcing leaders to cut spending in midst of recession . In France , Mélenchon are gaining , though neither will win , he says .