French elections 2017: completing the hat-trick?

So the Gilets Jaunes are the new 5 Stars Movement or what?

Je suis fuckin tired of populism.

It's not that easy. It's not really a movement, it's more like every French person who is unhappy with the governement got together to protest for different reasons (even though it was sparked by the rise of gas prices), some of these reasons being completely uncompatible with the reasons of others. It's just a big fucking mess that covers a lot of ground, mixing anti-taxes entrepreneurs with struggling people who just want their kids to have a decent life with people who are fed up with capitalism and corruption of the elites and people who just like to stir shit. But you're right that it definitely overlaps with populist movements.

For instance for poor people who live in rural places and who have bought diesel cars because for decades they've been highly encouraged to buy them by their very own government, and who have been forced to drive even more because lots of local public services like hospitals or post stations have been moved to to the next "big" town that might be 50 kms away and trains have been cut down too, I understand that the rise in gas prices feels leaves a very bad taste in their mouth, coupled with painting them as the nost awful people because they pollute too much (even though wealthy people are in fact responsible for much more pollution than then), all the while giving tax cuts to the wealthiest 1% and letting big companies pollute as much as they want.

Unfortunately that's not all there is to this "movement" but some of the anger is totally understandable. If you want people to drive less you can't afford not to give them alternatives. Most of the country isn't like Paris where a car isn't needed at all, in some places if you don't have a car you don't have a job and you don't have anything.

in *most* places

the rural population of France as a percentage is small, despite the size of rural France, and it's going to be hard to keep those areas up to urban standards with transport and healthcare. I can see why they'd come to Paris and trash things! what else can they do? Cities are always going to be the future, and sometimes the future needs to be tagged. nb I lived in la France profonde without a car for a while but everyone there thought we were nuts. but it was fine, we just walked a lot. note it was not a tiny village but rather a town of 10k and it was on the boundary of the Île de France so there were more or less hourly trains to Paris (that took 1.25 hours each way)

Yeah, the 5 Star Movement actually has representatives, a hierarchy, organisation. Gilets Jaunes have none of that. To view it as a populist movement is missing the mark imo, it's closer to the London riots.

I fail to see how that makes it un-populist?

think the contrast is with "movement" rather than "populist"

Ah, that makes sense, thanks.

An organic, leaderless protest movement with no clear ideology has emerged in France. I've been waiting for this since 2011. Let me explain the French Spring to you.

— Karl Sharro (@KarlreMarks) December 1, 2018

lolll

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/02/world/europe/france-macron-yellow-vest-protests.html

A third weekend of nationwide protests by the movement, largely made up of working-class people angry about a planned increase in fuel taxes and their dwindling purchasing power, left burned cars and smashed store windows in several of the wealthiest neighborhoods of Paris. The movement is named for the high-visibility safety vests that motorists are supposed to wear when they have roadside breakdowns.

guess the nyt has been busy w/ other stuff, this is the first peep i've heard of this

It's spread to Brussels too now!

Driving from the Basque Country to the Netherlands last week, all through France, it was astonishing to see just how many French drivers have put a 'gillet jaune' in front of their car window, or in between a closed car window. The scale of it is huge, even with those who aren't taking it to the streets.
At our Campanile just above Paris we caught a half our long reportage about some 'gillet jaunes' from Normandy. Working class people feeling they can finally make themselves heard. In their trail though, a potpourri of trouble makers: extreme right, football hooligans, youths looking for a nice riot. It has gotten diffuse and unclear as fast as the protests emerged.

The true question is whether the disobedience can be constructive, what comes the day after, can the progressives in France, and all over the world, use this energy so instead of violence we have images of constructing equal and egalitarian societies?

— Pamela Anderson (@pamfoundation) December 3, 2018

i’m in avignon right now and same story pretty much, tons of yellow vests on car dashes. there was a pretty big march through town on saturday afternoon that seemed peaceful enough, just chanting and whatnot. later on somebody started what looked/smelled like a tire fire on the main road. we were walking back to our hotel when another small fire broke out near us and sent people scurrying down the side streets. looks like some windows were smashed as well.

things have been normal for the past two days. we’re going to be in paris this coming saturday which will be interesting.

I'm just talking to an Italian guy in my work who's going there this weekend too.

unless you're going to the Champs-Elysées (which, why), you'll probably not notice anything in Paris. I live like 2 miles away and haven't seen a thing.

tomorrow may be loltastic as a bunch of lycées (including my son's) are going to have blocuses vaguely associated with this + Parcoursup + it's December and we don't wanna go to class, so there'll be more stuff on fire with that

yeah we’re staying on the left bank so i suspect we’ll just limit our wandering on saturday.

Here is a thread of the texts we've translated in collaboration with comrades in France & elsewhere. Images of cop cars on fire are cool but getting a direct, street-level understanding of the situation is also necessary if we want to learn from this insurrectionary unfolding. https://t.co/H4ejC326sG

— e̳d̳i̳c̳i̳o̳n̳e̳s̳ ̳i̳n̳éd̳i̳t̳o̳s̳ (@edcns_ineditos) December 3, 2018

So the eco fuel tax, which set this whole thing off, is going to be suspended as per the Guardian. Interesting to see if this is going to make the gilets jaunes thing fizzle out or not.

I doubt it. We've reached the 'soyez réalistes, demandez l'impossible' stage. Unlike in May 1968, however, there are more than a few fascists mixed in, unfortunately, such as the bunch who brandished the Celtic Cross on Saturday, reclaiming 'justice' for Esteban Morillo, who murdered the antifa protester Clément Méric. Or the 'gilets jaunes' spokesperson who requested that the government be dissolved and redeployed under a new prime minister: the general Pierre de Villiers, 'un véritable commandant'. Civilisation and its discontents…

Yeah, but this is the thing, it's such a heterogeneous crowd that I think it'll be quite difficult for either the left or the far right to co-opt it. As seen by the fact that every "spokesperson" immediately gets denounced.

Yeah, as it stands, it's as heterogenous as it gets, but there are ways to shape shapelessness, for better or worse. We'll see, I suppose.

When I read stuff like this, from Le Monde's live feed –

"Il y a eu tant de mépris et tant de choses qui ne vont pas que cela ne change rien. On ressent une accumulation de ras-le-bol qui fait qu’on veut bien plus", renchérit Elodie Renault, une esthéticienne en congé parental. "Il faut une augmentation du pouvoir d’achat ça veut dire une hausse des salaires, des retraites, des indemnités chômage", ajoute-t-elle.

– I have no idea what to say. More purchasing power, higher wages, better retirement plans and unemployment benefits? These all sound amazing, but technically speaking, how is the French government supposed to achieve that overnight?

Oh yeah, and less taxes. I guess you could further increase them on top earners, but Hollande's 75% tax experiment was a tragic failure, and France is the country that 'produces' the most exiled millionaires, which – however misguidedly – is the reality that Macron is trying to curb by reforming the ISF or wealth tax. I don't see an 'intra-national' or even a European solution here, unless one believes ideology trumps every other consideration.

I'm also systematically bemused by the belief that the State is some kind of demiurgic, omnipotent entity that can solve all of your problems if you make your request forceful enough.

In no small part because the countries that should actually be taking that approach (most English-speaking ones tbf) aren't. It feels like a comedy of errors sometimes.

what has Melenchon's position been relative to this movement? I haven't seen much mention of him/his party outside of those recent raids. (I've been paying v little attention to French politics of late.)

He wants the government to either give in to the gilets jaunes's demands (but which ones?) or leave. Both him and Le Pen call for early elections.

*Both he and Le Pen, rather…

Mélenchon and Le Pen are fools of a feather, who cares what they think.

The reason that the term of the French presidency was until not so long ago 7 years, was exactly to have a strong presidency that can do basically whatever it wants without electoral pressure. This one will be no exception. There's not a permanent electoral campaign here.

Haha à Elodie Renault, who wants the government to give her a pony, the most French attitude. I love it.

I get rioting when you voted for one thing and got another. I get vandalism when the powers-that-be are actively conspiring to destroy democracy. But when the government is consistently applying the program for which it got elected in the first place, I'm at a loss. I guess no one was paying attention and just voted based on impressions? Yeah, Macron is totally to blame for that.

As for the pony thing, I tend to think that too, Euler, but it's devolving into self-parody at this point. Self-sabotage, even.

Do we know that the rioters voted? It's not such a big group of people anyway. French people are complaining. There's a blocus at a lycée somewhere pretty much every day, people start early in this way of life. What's different is that rather than trashing the facs, they trashed a place of rich people. Don't get me wrong, I'm not "on their side": but this is continuous with how French people act all the time, even if an advancement. It portends no sea change, unless the Macron government wants that.

Oh, I'm well aware that it's cultural, I just have less patience for it than I used to. 'We want everything to change, yet nothing must change' gets tiresome after a while. And not voting is no excuse, as far as I'm concerned.

I do agree that trashing the 16ème is a massive step up from the arson of libraries en banlieue, for instance.

what % of the population actually voted for Macron

Mélenchon and Le Pen are fools of a feather

hmmm

I could be persuaded if Melenchon is a real dummy but "the far left and the far right are the same, actually" galaxy brain shit has a high burden of proof

If we go by the runoff, 20.7 million people, i.e. 43.6% of registered voters. That's about as much as Sarkozy in 2007 and Mitterrand in 1981; slightly more than Hollande in 2012 (39%). The only time a president got an absolute majority in terms of registered voters was in 2002, when Jacques Chirac beat Jean-Marie Le Pen. So there's nothing unusual about Macron's victory in this regard.

I get rioting when you voted for one thing and got another. I get vandalism when the powers-that-be are actively conspiring to destroy democracy. But when the government is consistently applying the program for which it got elected in the first place, I'm at a loss. I guess no one was paying attention and just voted based on impressions? Yeah, Macron is totally to blame for that.

We'd still be paying the poll tax in the UK with that attitude.

I could be persuaded if Melenchon is a real dummy but "the far left and the far right are the same, actually" galaxy brain shit has a high burden of proof

I can't speak for Euler, but I think Mélenchon is a dangerous demagogue (although not quite as much as Le Pen) who is greatly harming the French left at the moment. La France insoumise would be much better off without him. None of which implies that the far left and the far right are the same – not in my book, at least.

Is it fair to guess that many, if not most, Macron voters were primarily voting against Le Pen?

At any rate, physically mass-mobilizing is a fine method of influencing government, though I'd personally like to have seen a little more directed leadership to help curb the fashy elements. And of course any situation that ends with "socialism in one country" (if that is indeed where they wind up in a year or two) is doomed to failure. xxp

Macron's approval rating was fairly high last year (above 50%), so it's not as simple as that.

any situation that ends with "socialism in one country" (if that is indeed where they wind up in a year or two) is doomed to failure

This is sadly otm, though.

Yeah I don’t think that the far left and the far right are identical, but just that Mélenchon and Le Pen are similar in their conneries.

Is it fair to guess that many, if not most, Macron voters were primarily voting against Le Pen?

It's certainly what every French person I know did. First round votes are a different topic of course.

All of you OTM. Stunned by the level of general support to such a confused and often ugly movement. But I guess that's its strength, this viscosity where divergent and contradictory opinions will just coalesce behind a general "we're fed up with it" feeling.

Sigh.

Is it fair to guess that many, if not most, Macron voters were primarily voting against Le Pen?

Only 16% of the people who voted for him did so because of his ideas. 43% voted against Le Pen. Among major candidates he his the one with the lowest percentage of people who cast their vote because they agree with the candidate's program. First round was no different. Every media kept telling everyone he was the most likely to beat Le Pen. You even had politicians on the left publicly stating they would vote for Macron in the first round in order to avoid a Le Pen / Fillon duel.

I’m aware the north american twitter left and jacobin readers have a hard-on over Mélenchon because old grumpy socialists are very fashionable (collection hiver automne 2020) but Mélenchon is just a fucking idiot, like watching Brexit happening in real time and still thinking France should get out of the EU kind of fuckin idiot.

otm