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A major investigation of the possibility of a new type of revolution in our epoch by the leader of the French radical left
In summer 2024, France stood on the brink of a far-right takeover. But the disaster was avoided thanks to a New Popular Front of parties headed by long-standing left-wing leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon. It won the most seats in the snap parliamentary elections, running on a radical, progressive, inclusive agenda, in large part inspired by Mélenchon’s presidential programme. Now, the People! details his vision of revolution in our time.
In this book, Mélenchon embarks on a survey of human history from its earliest moments to the crisis-
ridden present. He outlines his vision for a new strategy for radical parties to reach the highest levels of government and peacefully transform the capitalist system: a citizens’ revolution.
In this revolution, individuals come together to form a single, politically mobilised people. They assert their power over the collective conditions of urbanised life, against the oligarchy that still controls them.
France’s far-left firebrand
France’s Bernie Sanders
A gifted orator and debater, Mélenchon is the most successful recent vote-winner for the left
The leftist philosopher-orator Mélenchon is famous for his firebrand speeches
Mélenchon has a knack for improvisation on the campaign trail and appears at ease when he veers into unchartered territory. Even his fiercest critics acknowledge he’s an excellent orator: Mélenchon has a booming voice, an excellent sense of pace, a depth of historical and literary references at his disposal, and a masterful command of language – including an ability to deliver pithy one-liners against his foes
This is not a book by a politician like the others (neither the politician nor the book). It is not just another 'what I believe', nor a programme, but a compilation of concrete and theoretical reflections on the world as it is and as it should be. In many ways, Now, the People! is a little treatise for the new revolutionary.
It is as a "people's tribune" that Jean-Luc Mélenchon is proposing "a global deciphering", in order to understand why and how, now that the world has become "unsustainable", we need to move towards a "change of civilisation".
His pages on the importance of cities and networks in raising political awareness, on the eruption of the gilets jaunes, the movement against pension reform and the revolt in the neighbourhoods that would herald the "citizens' revolution", or his plea for "alterglobalist diplomacy", will inevitably generate controversy. We hope that they will rise to the level of the arguments presented here.
Jean Luc Mélenchon is not just a great politician who has reinvented the French left and given it incredible strength. He is also an original and visionary theorist who, like Jean Jaurès, thinks politics through as much as he engages in it.