France's protest wave shows signs of spreading across Europe
Nearly two months after French students first walked out over crumbling classrooms, demonstrations over living costs, wages and public services have been recorded in 30 other European countries, data shows.
By Amir Navarro ·
France's protest movement is showing little sign of easing, nearly two months after high school students first walked out of class over deteriorating school buildings.
On Saturday, 146,000 people rallied across the country, including 46,000 in Paris, according to the Ministry of the Interior, while unions estimated the turnout at 250,000 nationwide and 75,000 in the capital. Although participation was down from previous weeks, police used tear gas and batons against protesters in Paris and fired tear gas canisters at hundreds of people blocking a road in central Lyon, the country's third-largest city. Roughly 70,000 security personnel were deployed, only days after an estimated 575,000 people joined a union-organised rally.
What began as a student movement has expanded to cover a wide range of grievances, from high fuel prices to wages and social housing. Some demonstrations have been marred by looting and violence, while police have faced accusations of using excessive force, including barricades, tear gas and batons against protesters.
An analysis of data from Armed Conflict Location & Event Data (ACLED) found that between September 15 and October 30, more than 1,200 protests and riots of 100 or more people took place across France over education, public services and the cost of living. The movement started in mid-September in high schools, where students complained of overcrowded classrooms, a lack of teachers and crumbling buildings, before broadening into protests against the rising cost of living that drew in trade unions and the yellow vests movement. On October 17 alone, more than 500,000 people protested nationwide, according to government estimates.
ACLED CEO Clionadh Raleigh said on October 19 that the organisation had recorded an average of 20.5 demonstrations a day in France over the past five years. "During the current protest cycle, that has jumped to almost 66 a day, more than three times the usual rate," she said. Protest cycles typically last about 20 days, or 36 for major movements, yet by ACLED's count this one had reached 45 days and was still going.
"But the most striking difference is the level of confrontation," Raleigh said. "Almost a quarter of events, 24.2 percent, have been classified as riots, compared to a median of just 1.9 percent in previous cycles. Only the unrest following the death of Nahel Merzouk in 2023 recorded a higher proportion."
The police response has also drawn international scrutiny. On October 28, four United Nations experts mandated by the Human Rights Council expressed alarm at the "excessive use of force" by French authorities in dispersing the student protests, saying the scale of arrests and detention, affecting several thousand people, mainly minors, appeared disproportionate. In the northern city of Lille, a teenager lost a hand when a grenade exploded as school protesters clashed with police.
France is not protesting alone. Since mid-September, demonstrations over rising living costs, low wages and a lack of public services have broken out in 30 other European countries, from Portugal to Poland. Between September 15 and October 30, more than 1,700 protests and riots of 100 or more people took place across Europe, according to the ACLED analysis. Alberto Alemanno, professor of European Union law and policy at HEC Paris Business School, told Al Jazeera last month: "France is the epicentre of this movement … and there are signs now that this is spreading beyond France."
According to the analysis, France saw more than 1,200 protests and riots during the period, followed by Spain with 173, Italy with 160, Germany with 70 and Portugal with 33. In Spain, tens of thousands rallied in early October after parliament rejected two emergency housing decrees on October 2, dealing a blow to Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez's minority government. In Italy, demonstrations over the cost-of-living crisis and unaffordable housing have led to clashes with police, while in Portugal, tens of thousands marched against the cost-of-living crisis, low wages and limited access to housing in major cities.
