Social protests in France: With fanfares and trumpets

Social protests in France reached a new peak on Thursday with a general strike by unions. The reason for the massive mobilization is a declining purchasing power among almost the entire population and the savings in public spending announced in the draft state budget for 2027. This government draft budget - with savings of 54 billion euros - was also rejected with surprising unanimity by members of the National Assembly on Wednesday evening.

Several hundred thousand people, probably close to a million, took part in around 250 rallies across France. The pupils and students who have been fighting with strikes, blockades and rallies for better study conditions and against the current selection process called Parcoursup, which President Emmanuel Macron had introduced, also demonstrated with the unions.

Also taking part in the street protests is a Gilets jaunes (yellow vests) movement, which has been reignited by rising energy costs and which already made the state tremble in 2018/2019. The abbreviation Gen Z was also new to be seen on the demonstrators' posters and signs. And in several cities, hundreds of musicians from the “Orchestra of the New World” sang a new revolutionary anthem of the movement: “Nous avons deux passions: la fanfare et la révolution”, in German: “We have two passions: the trumpet signal and the revolution.”

All of the demonstrators are primarily concerned with their purchasing power, which is falling due to annual inflation of 3.4 percent and, above all, due to massive increases in energy costs. They are demanding wage increases beyond the cost-of-living adjustment. The government believes that France's enormous public debt does not allow for salary increases for civil servants and could only further drive the spiral of inflation in the private sector. The unions, however, are of the opinion that wage earners have done their part and that it is now up to the “ultra-rich” to fill the state coffers with additional solidarity contributions.

The state leadership is now confronted with a “convergence” of anger from different directions. The fact that it could come to this is less the result of a political strategy from “ultra-left” circles or Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s left-wing party LFI. Rather, it is the result of a manifest inability of the government of Sébastien Lecornu to conduct a serious and promising dialogue with the various movements. The Prime Minister had hoped in vain that the protesting young people would calm down over time and return to class or would be intimidated by the repression.

The authorities in many cities actually no longer wanted to allow demonstrations in the center - citing the risk that looting and violent clashes with the police could occur on the sidelines of rallies, as happened on October 17th in Paris, Marseille, Limoges and Lyon. The protests were allowed to take place on Thursday, but dissatisfaction with these restrictions further unites unions, young people and yellow vests.

“What kind of game is the government playing?” asked the union leader of the CGT trade union federation, Sophie Binet, in a television interview. She protested against the "poker" of the authorities, who often respond negatively to requests for demonstration routes and especially at the last minute: Because it is not possible to protect the shopping streets from the "casseurs", the rallies should only take place on the outskirts of the city - if at all. The state leadership is slipping dangerously towards an authoritarian regime, criticized not only Bidet, but also the French Human Rights League and lawyers' associations.

The yellow vests are already calling on the networks for the protests to continue on Friday and Saturday - with or without official approval. Emboldened by Thursday's mass demonstrations, they are challenging the state's authority in a showdown on the streets.