France's
"yellow vest" protests against fuel prices weren't
organized by the Left. But the fight to widen their demands is key to
blocking the growth of Marine Le Pen's far right.
by
Aurélie Dianara
Part
1
The last
two weekends have seen mass mobilizations across France by the
“gilets jaunes” protesting against the increase in fuel prices.
On Saturday, November 17, 282,000 of these “yellow vests” (so
named after their distinctive high-visibility vests, which all
motorists have to carry by law) mobilized around the country,
mounting roadblocks of road intersections and roundabouts, “snail
operations” to slow traffic, and actions to defy tolls. There were
more than two thousand actions across the country, almost four
hundred arrests, several hundred injured, and one dead. That day saw
clashes with the police, and the movement continued over subsequent
days without respite, despite repression.
On
November 24, according to the Interior Ministry estimate, 106,000
people took part in the protests, including the eight hundred who
made it to Paris for the self-proclaimed “Act II” of the
movement. While the police prefecture banned protesters from
approaching the Élysée (the presidential palace) in fact
demonstrators did take over the central Avenue des Champs Elysées,
sparking violent clashes with police that continued throughout the
day. Some gilets jaunes have already announced their intention to
return to Paris next Saturday.
But also
notable is the media coverage of these protests: indeed, no other
recent social movement in France has had similar visibility. For ten
days, the whole French press has been busy figuring out who these
unlikely protesters actually are. Many of them tell journalists that
they have never previously demonstrated: it proclaims itself an
apolitical citizens’ movement, and indeed, emerged outside of the
political and trade-union frameworks that usually dominate large
mobilizations.
This is,
indeed, a composite, embryonic movement with many faces: men and
women, employees, precarious workers, those on unemployment benefits,
the economically inactive, retirees, teachers, businessmen, and
workers. Some party members and trade unionists are there, too, mixed
in among the mass. They come from both right and left. But they do
have one point in common: this is the France that struggles to make
it to the end of the month. Simply put, a movement of the people. But
not all of them.
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