France ignites against the cost of living: Are the 'yellow vests' returning?

ParisThe day of mobilization in France to protest against the rising cost of living has left images of authentic chaos, violence, and clashes between protesters and police in Paris and other cities such as Marseille, Lyon, Bordeaux, Rennes, and Limoges. According to the organizers, 800,000 people have taken to the streets, a figure that the French authorities lower to 550,000. Across the country, more than 90 demonstrations and 500 protests were called, and many have ended in riots –especially serious in Paris–, on a day in which the police have arrested hundreds of people. Just in the metropolitan area of the French capital, there have been 855 arrests. Nationwide, the toll of detainees rises to 1,800 people, and there are 500 injured police officers.

The Paris police prefecture reported this Sunday morning that one person has died due to cardiorespiratory arrest during the riots in the French capital. In Paris, the clashes between the police and the protesters have been a constant throughout the day, with the Place de la République as the epicenter. Violent groups have also looted shops, set fire to urban furniture, vehicles, and public buildings, and have thrown all kinds of objects at the police. In Limoges, the demonstrators burned down the City Hall, and in Lyon, a group of protesters set fire to a tourist office.

During the day, the workers and students who took to the streets also did so to protest against police action, which has been highly questioned in recent weeks, during the repression of high school student protests. Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez attributed the scenes of violence by protesters to individuals "from the far-left and far-right" with a "clear desire" to attack public buildings, and French President Emmanuel Macron remarked that in France "there is no place for violence".

Revolt on social media

The call began with a TikTok video posted by a young person at the beginning of September in which they appealed for a demonstration on October 17th due to the rise in fuel prices and with a series of messages on different social networks calling for the return of the yellow vests, the protest movement that in 2018 brought thousands of exasperated French people to the streets over the loss of purchasing power. Eight years ago, the trigger was precisely the high price of gasoline and diesel. A few days after the video was published, students from secondary schools in the banlieue of Paris began a revolt against the shortage of teachers, overcrowding in classrooms, class schedules, and the deteriorated situation of many centers. The protest, still unresolved, ended up spreading to the rest of the high schools across the country, hundreds of which have been blocked for weeks.

During the last few weeks, the unions have also called for two days of strikes in the public sector in protest against the wage freeze and the cuts that the government plans to make in the 2027 budget. With a debt that stands at 119% of GDP (a record since 1946), a public deficit that this year will far exceed 5%, and an economy that is in danger of recession, the executive led by Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu has announced austerity measures – such as the freezing of the highest pensions – which have caused social unrest to increase.

Given the climate of social tension that France is experiencing, the call made by that young person on TikTok has had a huge echo this Saturday. According to the French press, behind the call there were no leaders of the yellow vests, although many of them have ended up joining. Former members of the movement have tried to structure the movement in recent days and this Saturday's mobilization has recalled, in a certain way, the modus operandi of 2018. Scenes of enormous violence have been repeated.

New social crisis

The demonstrations this Saturday are no longer led only by students, but various movements and collectives have also converged there –from students to workers– that could trigger a new social crisis. Will there be a new mobilization of the yellow vests like the one in 2018? "Everything is possible, because the anger is there," assured Priscillia Ludosky, one of the leaders of the movement from six years ago, to Le Parisien this week. On the street, the unrest is palpable. "It is true that this call of October 17th did not have a structuring framework or spokespeople [...], but what we see repeating constantly is the issue of purchasing power and the price of gasoline. With the mobilization of high school students and the cost of energy, people have real reasons to mobilize," defended Ludosky in the same newspaper.

With a government that, most likely, has its days numbered, with presidential elections in sight, and with a complicated economic situation in the country, the president, Emmanuel Macron, and the prime minister have little room for maneuver to make concessions. The probabilities that street protests will continue are real. "I don't know if it's a crisis of the Republic, but it is certainly a political crisis. Because all these protests lead to social tensions that do not find a political framework to be resolved," points out sociologist François Dubet, former director of studies at the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences.

Police repression

Secondary school students, supported by university students, also mobilized this Saturday to protest against police repression, which they say is very violent. The images of shocking police charges during the last few weeks and this Saturday, as well as the massive use of tear gas and stun grenades –one of them tore off the hand of a 15-year-old youth– against underage protesters, has caused a flood of criticism, especially from the radical left party, La France Insoumise, without the Minister of the Interior, Laurent Nuñez, having engaged in self-criticism. In four weeks of student protests, the police have detained nearly 8,000 youths, most of whom are minors. There has also been significant damage to schools and dozens of police officers and students have been injured.

"We are seeing that the students' protest is becoming entrenched without being resolved. It is a situation similar to what we have seen in other recent protests in France. For this reason, all of this could end up fostering a kind of systemic crisis –maintains Dubet–. In the case of the high schools, there is a certain use of the crisis by political parties, but without any prospect that anything will change", he concludes.