The 'new discourse of the Front National under Marine Le Pen : A slight change with a big impact

In recent years, the Front National, under the leadership of Marine Le Pen, has experienced a political revival. In elections, membership numbers and public opinion polls, the party has made impressive gains. We argue in this article that these gains stem, at least in part, from a strategic repositioning of the party based on a more populist discourse and communication style. Through a content analysis of posts (press releases) on the party’s Facebook page from 2013 to 2015, we first highlight that, besides giving the Front National a more presentable image, Marine Le Pen has changed the Front National on two fronts: (1) she has rendered the party’s discourse more populist and (2) she has managed to reframe the party’s leitmotif of immigration. Second, through quantitative analysis of ‘Likes’ for each post, we find that this new discourse resonates well with Front National sympathizers.