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This article offers a comparative analysis of the French riots of 2005 and those that took place in England in 2011, using the flashpoints model of public disorder. The authors identify and study the meaning of a number of underlying causal factors at work in these two episodes of rioting, addressing the fundamental causes (short and long term) and at the same time the “trigger” that caused latent potential violence to end in a riot. The article gives an analytical framework for a comparative study of these two major episodes of rioting, and shows that this model remains pertinent, continuing to offer a sound conceptual framework within which the anatomy of public disorder can be dissected and comprehended.