PARIS, Oct 22 - Rivals from the centre-left to the far right have turned on Jean-Luc Melenchon and his France Unbowed (LFI) party, accusing them of fuelling France's worst civil unrest in years.
Melenchon, who launched his fourth presidential bid in May and remains the hard left's strongest hope of reaching next year's election run-off, has faced mounting criticism since unrest engulfed several French cities, with opponents saying years of confrontational rhetoric helped fuel tensions now spilling onto the streets.
Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu sharpened those attacks on Tuesday, telling an LFI lawmaker that the party's "political agenda of instilling violence and chaos in the country was now on full display".
The 75-year-old leader has rejected suggestions that LFI bears responsibility for the unrest, accusing the government instead of failing to address deep-rooted social and economic grievances in France's poorer suburbs.
But criticism has come from across the political spectrum.
Gerard Larcher, the president of the Senate, told Le Figaro this week it was worth considering whether LFI should be banned, a suggestion decried as "authoritarian" by LFI.
Laurent Jacobelli, a spokesperson for Marine Le Pen's National Rally (RN), blamed "the ultra-left, including France Unbowed", as well as what he called uncontrolled immigration, for creating a revolutionary climate.
Marc Fesneau, of centrist party MoDem, said Melenchon had long promoted the idea that "everything must be a battleground".
"When you turn everything into a confrontation, you run serious risks," Fesneau told Reuters.
The attacks underscore both Melenchon's central place in French politics and the unease he provokes as the country heads toward a presidential election expected to pit increasingly strong anti-establishment forces against a weakened political centre.
The unrest has reinforced that contrast, shifting scrutiny onto the hard left while allowing Le Pen to strike a more presidential tone on law and order, an issue that traditionally favours the far right.
Yet with France's political landscape fragmented into three rival blocs and traditional centre-left and centre-right parties struggling, analysts say Melenchon remains a formidable political force.
YOUTH APPEAL AND THE 'NEW FRANCE'
LFI has built its support by mobilising younger voters, many of whom have grown disillusioned with mainstream politics. An IFOP poll for LCI published this month put Melenchon on 16.5%, behind Le Pen's 36% but ahead of all other mainstream candidates.
A Cluster17 poll found nearly half of 18-to-24-year-olds and more than a third of 25-to-34-year-olds would back Melenchon.
That has made him a prominent voice for many students involved in the protest movement and wider unrest that has shaken France in recent weeks.
However, Frederic Dabi, head of pollster IFOP, said the unrest risked reinforcing one of Melenchon's biggest electoral weaknesses: his inability to win over older voters.
"The perception that Jean-Luc Melenchon has been too indulgent towards perpetrators of violence is an absolute red line for a large part of the electorate," Dabi said.
Nevertheless, the party has also built strong support in poorer urban areas and among many voters from immigrant backgrounds who see themselves reflected in Melenchon's vision of a "New France" — a multicultural republic that embraces ethnic and religious diversity and gives greater political representation to communities that often feel overlooked.
Supporters say that reflects social realities rather than identity politics.
"It's the unique synthesis between a programme of revolutionary rupture and the desire to govern the country," LFI lawmaker Hadrien Clouet told Reuters.
Clouet said that meant tackling inequality and reversing a decades-long transfer of wealth towards finance and a narrow oligarchic elite.
Yet critics say LFI often blurs the line between democratic protest and more radical political agitation.
UPRISING LANGUAGE DRAWS SCRUTINY
Melenchon has frequently invoked the language of popular uprising. During the pensions crisis of 2023, he urged supporters to "tear down the citadel" of President Emmanuel Macron's government and has at times spoken favourably of "citizen insurrection" as a democratic force.
Supporters say such language refers to mass political mobilisation, not violence. The party officially advocates non-violent action.
LFI and its allies argue some of the accusations are politically motivated. This week, investigative news outlet Mediapart reported, citing an anonymous intelligence officer, that officials had been instructed to portray LFI as being behind the protest movement despite what the source described as a lack of evidence. The government denied the allegation.
Still, opponents say Melenchon's messaging is often deliberately ambiguous.
"They say they are against vandals, but at the same time they justify masks at demonstrations," said Sylvain Maillard of Macron's Renaissance party. "They never calm things down. They always say it's the police's fault. They want chaos."
Former Socialist President Francois Hollande, however, warned against making Melenchon the sole focus of the debate.
"It is not one political party or one individual that poured fuel on the fire," Hollande told France Inter. While criticising LFI for sometimes drawing an equivalence between rioter violence and police violence, he said: "To fixate on LFI is to fail to see what is happening in the country." REUTERS