From The New Statesman, September 13:
When demonstrators mobilised across France on Wednesday evening (10 September), the authorities made no secret of their satisfaction. The relief felt by the government, and particularly by the Home Secretary, was not only due to the fact that the “Bloquons tout” (“Let’s block everything”) movement had failed to paralyse the country, but above all to the fact that this slogan had left the vast majority of French people indifferent.
In his office on Place Beauvau, Bruno Retailleau compared the “map” of the demonstrations with those of the Yellow Vests movement in November 2018. The likeness between the two maps is clear: one is the negative version of the other. While peripheral France – small towns, mid-sized towns and rural areas – supported the Yellow Vests movement, the demonstrations on 10 September took place only in the major cities.
The government’s fears were quickly allayed, as it was the major cities – Paris, Rennes, Toulouse and Lyon – that saw the first protests in the morning. This observation immediately reassured the authorities: this was a “traditional” protest movement, led by the metropolitan left and far left.
The sociology of the participants confirmed the harmless nature of this revolt: high school pupils, university students, and an over-representation of the upper classes and intellectuals. For the police, it was “predictable”, familiar, easily manageable.
In 2018, the geography was inverted. Spread across the country and holding up roundabouts, the Yellow Vests took the authorities by surprise. Sociological analysis indicated that they represented the majority of the working and middle classes: labourers, workers, small business owners, farmers, young professionals and retirees from these backgrounds. But the most problematic aspect for the government was the total absence of political or trade union leadership.
Conversely, the movement of September 10 was very quickly taken over by La France Insoumise (“France in Revolt”), a left-wing political party, which ultimately reassured the authorities; the police are accustomed to dealing with this type of demonstration.
Here’s the truth. Today – as in all Western countries – the protest movements spurred on by the metropolitan left no longer frighten the authorities. By contrast, it is the spontaneous movements emanating from the periphery of France that are cause for concern, as they are unpredictable and driven by groups who feel dispossessed of what they have and who they are.
The conclusion is now clear: in recent decades, all serious and sustained protests have emerged in what I call “Périphéria”, i.e. in areas where the majority of the working and middle classes now live. This was the case with the 1992 Maastricht referendum, the 2005 referendum on the European Constitution, the Yellow Vests movement, but also with populist revolt, from Trumpism to the National Front vote, to Brexit.
All these movements have the same geography and the same sociology. These protests draw their strength from their cultural autonomy and their potential for majority support.
In Le capitalisme de la séduction (1981), Michel Clouscard contrasts the “frivolous” and the “serious” to analyse the transformation of capitalism. For the Marxist sociologist, the “frivolous” – which represents permissiveness, hedonistic consumption and the apparent liberation of morals – is encouraged by capitalism in order to create new markets. Meanwhile, the “serious” embodies work and industrial production.
Metropolia, as I call it, is the embodiment of the new capitalism: dependent on services, financialised, a place where the “spectacle” – the superficial imagery of mass media – is permanent. “The frivolous metropolia” can thus never produce serious social movements – and moreover, it smothers them. The Yellow Vests movement began to lose momentum and public support when demonstrations became concentrated in large cities. The logic is thus remorseless: first, the extreme left in the cities took over the movement, turning it violent. Then, opinion formers – academics and pollsters – imposed a narrative that sought to render invisible a movement actually supported by the majority. This led to a focus on minority segments and the presentation of a fragmented France – to the great benefit of those in power.
On 10 September, the metropolitan stifling effect worked even faster: the Mélenchoniste revival – the movement behind La France Insoumise – and the commentariat left no room for spontaneity.
From the point of view of the metropolia, the ordinary majority does not exist. French society is reduced to advertising panels, categories perfectly suited to the neoliberal market, and ultimately to slogans in English: “Eat the rich”, “Free Palestine”, “ACAB” “Let’s block”…
The metropolitan bubble isolates its inhabitants culturally and politically. Ultimately, it stifles politics and thought: social movements have become mere spectacles. This stifling of thought and political discourse is also evident in the world of culture, which no longer caters to the ordinary majority. Ultimately, we are left with the mediocrity of French cinema (in reality, Parisian cinema), which now plays to empty theatres. Literature is following the same path.
The intelligentsia, the politicians, the left, and the creatives are dying out in the metropolitan citadel because they are no longer connected to the soul of the ordinary majority. It is understandable that in Périphéria, the appointment of a new prime minister leaves people completely indifferent. The quintessence of metropolitan frivolity, Macronism, is incapable of seeing the world’s transition from frivolity to seriousness....
....MUCH MORE
Recently:
And possibly also of interest:
August 2023 - "Diagnosing France"
December 2024 - "France Is Living in Zemmour’s World"
....Which reminds me, now that winter is here you may want to swap-out your vest for a Louis Vuitton puffy jacket:
Perhaps over a Louis Vuitton-canvas + leather bullet-resistant vest:
