French student protests: 'Illiberal' Macron govt dismisses social movement as 'urban violence'

Well, let's get some context and analysis now so that we can bring in Eric Fassin, sociologist and professor at Université Paris VIII. Eric, a great pleasure to have you with us on the program today. Now, we're seeing a third consecutive week of protests and they don't show much sign of ending anytime soon. Are these still about specific grievances or do you think they've become a broader rejection of the political and economic system here in France? I think clearly it started as a movement from high school students in the suburbs, and then it spread to students in general. And actually today, of course, it's much more than that. On the one hand, it has to do with economic policies and their consequences. On the other hand, it has to do with the illiberal turn of the regime. We have to remember that maybe 10 or 15 years ago, when there were massive mobilizations like this, you had the government that tried to really negotiate. Now, that's changed radically. The solution that has been chosen by successive governments is just repression, hoping that people will get scared, that they will get tired if you wait long enough. But this time, it doesn't work. It doesn't work because, in fact, the government hoped that two weeks of vacation for high school kids would end the movement. Clearly, that's not what's happening. But I think the illiberal turn is becoming more and more visible, and that's, in the end, what it's about. Eric, your choice of word was very interesting. You referred to the Macron government as regime. Could you first explain what you mean by this? And secondly, what do you make of this response by the Macron government so far? I mean, have they budged at all on some key demands that are being made by protesters? Well, they start saying, we're going to change this. For example, they'll change the admissions to the university, but that would be in 2028. And more generally, they don't acknowledge that there has been violent repression. And that's part of the problem, because it used to be that it was just about the banlieue, that is, the working-class racialized young people who were the victims of the police. But what we've seen is that it has become more and more common. And the problem is that there's a refusal on the part of the government to acknowledge that there's something like police violence that is not just a few bad apples, but in fact that it's really a systemic problem. That's one thing. But more generally, what has been the reaction of the government deciding that there should be no demonstrations or very limited ones or etc.? Limits on the right to demonstrate have been... constant throughout the last weeks and of course that started years ago but it's becoming more and more visible because it used to be that for example demonstrations in support of Palestinians were forbidden but now we see that could be anything so in fact the illiberal turn that starts with specific examples such as Palestine Israel it then spreads to everything. And I think that's a real danger for the government of this regime at the moment is based on the idea that it's not worth listening to demonstrations, that the only criterion for democracy is elections. That's not true. I mean, in fact, in a democracy, elections are very important, but it's not the end of democracy. It's the beginning of democracy. Eric, what would then be an appropriate response, according to your view, an appropriate response to the violence, the looting and the riots that we've been seeing over the past two weeks? Well, it didn't start with violence and looting. What happened is that it was the demonstrations by high school students instead of being considered. As a social movement, we're considered as urban violence. So, in fact, it's the police that has encouraged and the police, of course, obeying the orders of the government that has created violence. And we have evidence of this in the fact that, for example, there's a great toleration on the part of the police for ultra-right demonstrations at the very same time under the pretext that Not the priority, or actually what they're saying is that they're protecting stores and business owners from looting, etc. So, in fact, it has been a political decision. There has been a systematic effort on the part of the government to say that it's just the left, that it's just La France Insoumise, Mélenchon's movement. But, in fact, it's a social movement. And the refusal to acknowledge... We're going to get talking about France Insoumise in a bit, Eric, but first I'd like to ask what would constitute a victory for the protesters? I mean, would it be a change in government policy or the resignation of a member of government, perhaps, or more a fundamental transformation of French society? I think, I mean, no one can speak in the name of this movement, which is actually a very complex one, with very different people. One of the issues that has been central recently is racism. Racism is not peripheral in this discussion because, in fact, when it was about high school students from working class neighborhoods, it had to do with race. That is, not everyone in our society is treated the same. And as we've seen, because some of the stores were looted, there's this man who decided that he should go around shooting people in capes and laverrières based on their skin color or the appearance of their religion. So in fact, racism is the real issue. And we haven't heard much from the government against this. Of course, in theory, everyone is against racism, including the national rally. But when you have so much open racism, so much white supremacism. I think we don't hear much of a reaction, and that's maybe a place to start. Instead of blaming those who attack, who criticize racism, blaming racists. And in fact, what is happening today is the idea that we should listen to every point of view. We have the Minister of Discriminations, Aurore Berger, who said, after all, great replacement of... Of course, that's a slogan, a theory that I disagree with, but it's just an opinion. No, it's not an opinion. So politicians in the center, the right and the far right have all blamed the hard left for this unrest. So, Eric, you're saying that there is no truth to this. You're saying that the hard left doesn't bear any responsibility for what we've been seeing. Well, there are two things. First, what do we call the hard left? If we call La France Insoumise, which is basically a social democratic party in the old tradition, hard left, that doesn't mean much because they are not advocating violence. And in fact, they have no interest in defending violence because they want to be elected. And it's not by advocating violence that you're going to be So, in fact, you can have some people who are on the far left, but also you have kids who are just seizing the opportunity to loot or to destroy or whatever. So the idea that the left, I mean, you have the president of the Senate calling for The possibility of just censoring, of banning a left-wing party, La France Insoumise, this is really dangerous. In fact, of course, La France Insoumise and other left-wing movements are saying, yes, we're on the side of this social movement, but why not? So do you see these demonstrations then deepening the political polarization that already exists in France? Well, the polarization, in fact, It's really the fact that we have the rise of the far right in a very radical way. And we keep talking about a polarization, whereas in fact, the idea is that today in France, as in many other countries, the rise of neo-fascist parties is what this is about. And the idea is, is this government really trying to resist that? And that was how Macron was elected the first time around in 2017 or not. That is, does the government want to avoid having the The far right coming to power in France, as it risks happening in many other European countries, or does the government decide that the worst problem is the left? And this is what's happening in many countries. All right, Eric, we're going to have to leave it there. But thank you so much for sharing your thoughts with us today. Thank you. Thank you.