mance during the past three elections. In 1984, the party received 11.2 per cent of the votes and won 10 seats. By 1989, the party had slipped to 7.71 per cent of the votes and won 7 seats. In 1994, the Communists regained a portion of their political strength and garnered 10.5 per cent of the vote and 10 seats. As recently as 1979, the PCF was still capturing upwards of 20 per cent of the French vote. The peak of Communist power occured in 1946 when the party received 28.2 per cent of French voter support.
Communist power has survived in France mainly through the activity of the PCF on the municipal level. Of the 226 largest cities in France, 46 are PCF-held. The party has 15 Communist senators, and Communist mayors run 68 of the 390 towns with populations above 20,000, of which Le Havre is the only Communist-run city with more than 100,000 inhabitants. The Communist-run industrial suburbs that surround Paris are known as the "red belt." These towns have remained staunch Communist supporters since the 1930s. Communists control 37 out o
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