The French right-wing opposition party the National Front (FN) will officially pick its new leader Jan. 16 at a major conference in Tours. The 82-year old Jean-Marie Le Pen, who famously faced off against Jacques Chirac in the second round of the 2002 French presidential elections, is stepping down as long-time party leader. The favorite to succeed him, and Le Pen's pick for the next FN leader, is his 42-year-old daughter, Marine Le Pen. The younger Le Pen is reported to have already secured enough votes to become the next leader. Marine represents a more mainstream image of the French far right. This makes her a serious challenger to the current center-right French President Nicolas Sarkozy, transforming the FN into a political force that could capitalize on the resentment and anger toward both Sarkozy's government in particular and wider European institutions in general. Resentment toward Sarkozy's government has built for more than two years. Even before the recession, Sarkozy faced criticism for everything from his personal life to international diplomacy. Since then, his handling of the economic downturn and subsequent crisis caused widespread protests and strikes in October that culminated in street violence. Protesters were particularly angry at Sarkozy's pension reforms. The issue was a lightning rod for angry students and workers. Latest approval ratings for the president in a Jan. 6-7 poll by the French Institute of Public Opinion stood at 34 percent, a 2 percent drop from December and just 1 percent above his record low in April. Just under the surface of the general angst against the government's handling of the economy is also disillusionment with European institutions and the euro. These feelings are buried deep in France and can occasionally resurface, as evidenced by the failed EU constitutional referendum in summer 2005 — which admittedly also had to do with then anti-Chirac sentiment. As Sarkozy implements his budget cuts in 2011 and pushes ahead with more labor reform, anger at his handling of the economy quickly could mutate into wider anger toward EU institutions and French acquiescence to the German-imposed austerity measures. Marine could tap into this angst. Her father successfully played upon French fears of immigration and anti-EU sentiment in his 2002 presidential run. Following his surprising second-place finish in the first round, STRATFOR asked: "If Le Pen can do as well as he has in a time of prosperity, how will his party do when there are serious economic problems and the ranks of the discontented swell? … if Le Pen is in second place during a time when the stress on the center is trivial, how much stress will it take for the center to fold under the pressure of nationalist sentiment?" Marine will have an opportunity to answer STRATFOR's now 8-year-old question in the first round of the French presidential elections set for April. The younger Le Pen represents a more polished image of the far right in France. She does not make the same kind of anti-Semitic gaffes her father was prone to, such as when he referred to the Holocaust as a "detail" of history, instead representing herself as a staunch defender of French values. She talks tough on immigration, and on France's Muslims in general, which appeals to a large segment of the French population. She also has a plan for the French withdrawal from the eurozone. Though generally a hard-line euroskeptic, she has not called for French withdrawal from the European Union, however, unlike her far-right British counterparts. Ultimately, Le Pen is attempting to add center-right polish to far-right populism. This is a reversal of Sarkozy's strategy in the 2007 French presidential election, when he added some far-right rhetoric, particularly on immigration and banlieue violence, to the mainstream, largely sidelining her father and bleeding his far-right support. The younger Le Pen's success is significant not just to France, but also as a model for other European countries experiencing the same level of social angst over German-imposed austerity measures and wider EU institutions. France has led European political evolutions in the past, especially when it comes to the politics of the left. It may do so yet again, this time with regard to the politics of the right. Marine Le Pen could present a "proof of concept" of a far-right leader with mainstream appeal that catches on in the rest of the continent.