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From its rebirth in 1971 to its first participation as a government party during a congress of the Socialist International in 1983, the French Socialist Party has been the leading left-wing party in France at every level of government. The ascent of the Socialist Party took place during the Cold War, at the same time as economic and political globalisation began to accelerate. To understand the metamorphosis of the Socialist Party during this key decade, it is necessary to contextualise it both nationally and globally. This article therefore seeks to analyse how the French Socialist Party perceived and integrated the main international dynamics of the 1970s. It proposes various ways to define the set of representations forming the overall “world vision” of the Party and its production of “mental maps”.