The Violence Sweeping France Was Never Really About Schools

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The French protest too much.

Over the past two decades, paroxysms of rage, violence, rioting, arson, and looting have regularly seized the nation, imposing enormous costs on civil society.

During the 2005 banlieue riots, the deaths of two boys evading police sparked three weeks of severe property destruction and violence.

In the years since, pandemonium has broken out over veil bans, the commemoration of NATO’s anniversary, the legalization of same-sex marriage, even the arrival of ride-sharing apps.

Today France is once again at the mercy of protesters.

Since late last month, student protests have paralyzed the nation’s school system.

They began on September 17 at a high school outside Paris, in Créteil, where teachers went on strike over unfilled posts and a lack of funding, and students promptly joined them.

This triggered a domino effect, as the sociologist Valérie Becquet called it , in which students across the country demonstrated in solidarity, calling out similar problems in their own schools.

Social media supercharged the process; demonstrators have filmed themselves constantly, creating a spectacle of revolt that spreads online and through text chats that they use to mobilize.

According to Le Monde , nearly a third of France’s 3,700 high schools had been disrupted by October 1, a number that has almost certainly grown.

The largest demonstrations so far took place yesterday, extending to 40 cities and drawing an estimated 250,000 participants.

My daughter’s junior-high school in Paris has been affected too.