Massive student protests in France: causes, repercussions, and political employment

Protests led by teenagers in front of their schools shook the French street in recent days, during which students closed the entrances to their educational institutions, while security forces sometimes responded with tear gas. The government said that the demands may be legitimate, but the violence is not, and accused the radical left of fueling the movement. On the other hand, critics accused some police officers of using excessive force against minor demonstrators.

While the Ministry of Education said that the protests affected about 735 educational institutions on Friday, French Interior Minister Laurent Nunez announced that about five thousand people had been arrested since last Monday. Speaking to the French channel TF1, he said that 1,747 people were arrested on Friday and 1,954 others on Thursday. He added that about 85 percent of them are minors, most of whom are school students. He continued: "This does not necessarily mean that they study in schools near the places where they were arrested."

Calm returned over the weekend, but a new large day of protest is scheduled for Tuesday.

What are the motives for the protests?

The protests affect high schools where French teenagers spend their final years of school, between the ages of fifteen and eighteen. It is equivalent to secondary schools in the United States and upper secondary school in Britain.

Students have many complaints, the most prominent of which are the absence of teachers, study conditions in the classroom, overloaded school schedules, and the school day that extends from eight in the morning until six in the evening, which some of them consider exaggerated.

In addition to this feeling of discrimination, French sociologist Valérie Piqué said, “Secondary school students, especially those from low-income neighborhoods, feel that they are receiving an inferior education.”

France allows all students to enroll in secondary schools, but the levels of these schools vary greatly, from vocational schools to prestigious educational institutions. Despite many initiatives to promote diversity, prestigious schools still attract mostly students from well-off white families whose parents are college-educated. In this context, Pique points out that “there are huge disparities between students and different schools, and this is a real problem.”

The protests began two weeks ago, on September 17, at Saint-Exupéry High School in the suburb of Créteil (southeast of Paris), in support of teachers who went on strike to protest the lack of staff and resources. The movement gradually gained momentum, before spreading last week to various parts of the country.

Ironically, while tensions were rising in other regions of France, the situation returned to normal at Saint-Exupéry High School after the educational authorities agreed to send additional employees, including a deputy principal and a nurse.

Social media fuels protest

The striking images and videos that spread on social media platforms, especially the TikTok platform, contribute to fueling the protests. The students themselves use their phones to document scenes such as burning garbage containers or police using tear gas.

Many accounts publish these clips and collect the most exciting scenes, in an effort to increase their spread and attract more followers. Sociologist Pique said, "Social media allows them to present a narrative different from that presented by traditional media, a narrative that has not been created beforehand."

Political recruitment

The protests gained a political dimension a little more than six months before the presidential elections, as the government accused the radical leftist "Proud France" party, whose leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon is running for president, of being behind the movement.

On the other hand, party leader Manuel Bombard accused the government of "sliding into conspiracy theories." Mélenchon, the veteran candidate of the Left Party for the presidential elections, who currently enjoys the support of more than 40 percent of voters between 18 and 25 years old in opinion polls, expressed strong support for the protests while calling for the adoption of peaceful methods.

How did the police deal with the protests?

Protesters blocked school entrances, set fire to garbage containers and other objects, and threw projectiles at police. On the other hand, the police moved in some places, especially using tear gas bombs and rubber bullets, and sometimes they beat some of them with batons.

Video clips were widely circulated showing what were said to be violent practices by security forces, including a scene of a policeman putting his arm around a girl's neck while arresting her. But police officers were also subjected to attacks, as a group of young men from a school chased a policeman and beat and kicked him in the city of Belfort in eastern France. A young man lost the sight in his right eye following clashes between students and police last Wednesday in the city of Tours in central France, according to the city's public prosecutor.