Recent years have seen a sharp reactionary turn in France — and not just thanks to the mainstreaming of anti-immigrant leader Marine Le Pen. Emmanuel Macron, formerly finance minister under the Parti Socialiste’s François Hollande, won the presidency in 2017 promising to bring together “both Left and Right.” In practice, he has governed from the center-right, with his administration pushing attacks on the welfare system, authoritarian measures against protesters, and even a witch hunt against supposed “Islamo-Leftism” in the country’s universities.

Macron’s term has seen major social movements, from the gilets jaunes protests that began in fall 2018 to the strikes against his pensions reform. Today, French voters list purchasing power as their main concern — a problem exacerbated by soaring inflation. Yet, until now, it had seemed that the Left was struggling to give effective electoral expression to this discontent.

Ahead of the April 10 first round of the presidential election, Jean-Luc Mélenchon was initially one in a crowded field of candidates, with fragmentation on both the Left and the far right of French politics. Yet the waning challenges of such figures as Communist leader Fabien Roussel, the Greens’ (Europe Écologie Les Verts, EELV) Yannick Jadot and soft-left Christiane Taubira have again focused attention on the France Insoumise (LFI) leader. He has risen into a strong third place on 15 percent support, a handful of points behind Le Pen, in the race to make the April 24 runoff against Macron.