When students take to the streets again today, France is experiencing Act V of a revolt the likes of which has not been seen since the legendary May '68; a revolt that reveals the deep political divisions and acts as a catalyst for the relentless presidential election campaign.
These student protests are extraordinary in every way. On the one hand, because here young people from poor banlieues characterized by immigration experience unprecedented solidarity. After students set up the first blockade in Créteil, south of Paris, in mid-September, the spark spread to other banlieues in the north of the city and finally spread to the better-equipped lycées in the city centers.
The mobilization of many students as well as the teachers' unions and parents who recently took to the streets also shows the enormous solidarity with the demand for better educational opportunities for the banlieues and youth in general.
Unprecedented violence
On the other hand, the violence in protest-prone France has also reached extreme levels: masked people are attacking police officers with stones, fireworks and iron bars and, according to the Interior Ministry, are said to have injured more than 700 officers.
Lecturers, principals and teachers were attacked. Fires destroyed school entrances, an entrance hall in Nantes went up in flames, bus shelters were smashed and garbage cans were set on fire.
More people in custody than ever before
The police, in turn, reacted with extreme severity, having received a directive from Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez to use "all non-lethal weapons" if necessary to put an end to the riot.
Some students were seriously injured during this attack using stun and tear gas grenades; a 15-year-old had to have his hand amputated, another student lost an eye, and another suffered a double broken jaw.
Almost 7,000 people have been taken into police custody since the protests began - an unprecedented number that was not even close to being reached during the months-long yellow vest protests.
How divided society is in the face of the protests and harsh police operations is shown by the recent reaction to the Interior Minister temporarily suspending the use of a certain type of grenade by the police after the dramatic injury of a 15-year-old student.
Some demanded that all grenades and rubber bullets should be banned in connection with the student protests; the others criticized Laurent Nuñez for giving in to the left-wing mainstream of opinion.
Harsh accusations from all sides
The violent clashes are accompanied by verbal escalation. Right-wing nationalists, the government and left-wing radicals blame each other for this.
The government claims it has intelligence that the radical left-wing party La France Insoumise (LFI) is behind the protests. This rejects the allegations as an infamous conspiracy theory to suppress the movement.
At the same time, it is clear that LFI, which gets around 40 percent of the vote among those under 24 in surveys, is using the protests to make itself even more popular among young people. Their elected officials not only took part in the demonstrations, but were also present at the school blockades in many places.
Incitement against Muslim French people
The extreme right-wing politician Eric Zemmour from the Reconquête party, who appears more radical than Marine Le Pen from the Rassemblement National, is using the opportunity to once again incite against Muslim French people. The rioters are always the same, explained Zemmour.
There are two Frances - one whose Christian youth welcomed the Pope with jubilation and the other, the "Arab-Muslim France" of the banlieues. “We are dealing here with the battle of the two Frances,” Zemmour explained, the battle between the “new France” and the “eternal France.”
On the one hand, Zemmour takes up the slogan of the LFI presidential candidate Jean-Luc Mélenchon "La Nouvelle France", with which he describes France as a multicultural immigration country and wants to specifically address people in the banlieue.
The concept of "eternal France", in turn, is a myth often used by the political right, which is based on an original French identity beyond all historical development, to which immigrants have nothing to contribute.
Fakes against mayors
In addition to this verbal escalation comes the war of images. The LFI mayor of Saint-Denis, Bally Bagayoko, in the immigration-heavy 93rd department north of Paris, was accused by right-wing politicians as well as government representatives of colluding with the violent demonstrators after he said in an interview in front of a lycée, surrounded by journalists, that violence could be "legitimate," "but if you can avoid it, it's better."
Shortly afterwards, a video appeared on Instagram showing the mayor dancing in front of a burning garbage can, as if he himself was participating in the riot. It took days for public radio station France Info to reconstruct the entire scene using other videos and prove that Bagayoko had first pulled the burning trash can away from the school gate at risk to herself and then helped activate a fire extinguisher to put out the fire.
Now that Act V of the protests is about to begin, the conflict is becoming increasingly heated: the LFI presidential candidate, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, accused one of the student representatives, who is a member of the presidential Renaissance party, of undermining the student movement. The 18-year-old then fell victim to a digital shitstorm.
The right-wing press has recently been celebrating a young woman from Bordeaux, Louise Montangon, who represents a conservative student union and massively denounces the school and university blockades.
Little scope for reforms
All this is happening against the backdrop of a deep political and financial crisis in France. Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu has announced "first decisions" for the end of October. But the minority government, which is currently trying to introduce an austerity budget to avoid a debt crisis like that in Greece, sees little financial leeway.
And it will no longer bring about real reforms to improve the school and university system. Because the presidential elections are coming up in April next year. According to surveys, Marine Le Pen from the right-wing Rassemblement National has the best chance of taking office.
