The French Revolution brought in the concept of liberty, equality, and fraternity and gave the world its first taste of liberal democracy, where freedom of the individual is sacrosanct. Secularism and free speech sometimes come at a heavy price. The Charlie Hebdo cartoons of Prophet Mohammed that led to the death of 12 senior editors and cartoonists of the satirical magazine bears witness to this. Violence is embedded in society and spins out of control once in a while. Violent riots erupted in France more often than in other West European nations. In the last few years, President Emmanuel Macron had to deal with the Yellow Vest movement of 2019 triggered by the rise of fuel prices, the pension protests of March 2023, and now the violence that was triggered by the killing of 17-year Nahel Merzouk, a French citizen of Algerian descent by a policeman at a traffic light.
“I wonder at times if violent uprisings in France do not have some sort of a legitimacy… A violent response to wrong is perhaps accepted as the natural volatility of its people. Look at the country’s history – 1789, 1830, 1848, 1871 – as many revolutions as counter-revolutions… They all seem to be a part of a natural historical response,’’ says Vijay Singh, writer, filmmaker and journalist who lives in Paris.
Riots often take place in the suburbs of French cities, where the poor and working class live. Nahel lived in Nanterre, a Paris suburb and was an only child. He was driving on the lane reserved for buses. When the police stopped him he took fright and drove through a red light but was later caught in traffic. The officers then caught up with him and a trigger-happy cop shot the teenager dead. Initially, the police gave the usual explanation that law enforcers do to defend themselves, saying the young man was trying to drive the vehicle onto the two police officers. His car was searched for illegal drugs or guns, but nothing was found. However soon afterwards a video of the incident emerged to nail the lie.
Expectedly, anger erupted in the streets and spread to towns and cities across France. The rioters are young according to reports most are in the 14-18 age group. The police arrested over 1,000 rioters, and Justice Minister Eric Dupont-Moretti said 30 per cent of them were under 18. Mobs set fire to 2,000 cars, smashed windows of bank branches, restaurants, and looted shops and supermarkets. Street fights were reported from across major cities as protesters fought police attempts to control the crowds. Nearly 200 police officers were also injured. In Marseille, where 80 people had been arrested on Friday, police said they had detained 60 people. Reuters reported that in Lyon, France’s third largest city, armoured personnel carriers and a helicopter were brought in to manage the violence.
President Emmanuel Macron has blamed social media for playing a “considerable role” in spreading anger and violence.
Yet, what governments in countries like India should note is that despite this, the internet has not been banned to quell the riots. According to reports from Paris, the name and address of the police officer who shot Nahel were put out on social media. Snapchat, TikTok and Meta and Twitter had all been requested by the authorities to flag down any content that ignites violence.
The riots once again exposed the failure of the French government and society to integrate people from its former colonies. Like other European countries, France was a major colonial power since the 16th century. It held sway over large swathes of territory in both Africa and Asia. Algeria was a part of France and was integrated with the mother country.
When Algeria reclaimed its independence after a brutal war that claimed hundreds of thousands of lives, mainly on the Algerian side, it led to the end of French rule in 1962. The French record in Algiers is a major bloat. Like other White Christian nations of that time including Britain, the colonisers believed that they were “a civilising force” and looked down on local practices and customs. Though many of these outdated concepts are no longer relevant, there is racism, and a tendency to look down on black and brown immigrants. Not among all people, but some sections, and especially many in the police force who associate them with drugs, crime and petty thefts. Unemployment among them is much higher than in the rest of the country. Just as the US police force is suspicious of Blacks so are many within the French law and order force. According to a study, police are likely to stop Black or Arab young men 20 times more than White teenagers on the streets of French cities.
Yet, Vijay Singh says that is too pat an explanation. “Much of the French police force is manned by people whose ancestors were originally North African migrants and not an all-White force, here is the tricky problem of loyalty to the state here. But there is a sense of discrimination in this section as they are also economically depressed and have a burning rage that can easily flare up in violence.”
“These are not first-generation immigrants. Their parents arrived in the 1950s and 1960’s and these are third-generation youngsters who speak French and are educated in French schools. Most people living in these suburban ghettos are poor, and their living quarters are decrepit. There is a lot of resentment against the authorities. Unemployment rates among them are higher than the rest of the population. It needs a spark to light the angry young minds and the killing of Nahel provided just that,” says Bruno Philip, Asia Editor of the prestigious French newspaper Le Monde and a former India correspondent of the paper.
“The last couple of years the government has done a lot to improve these inner cities. One billion euros are spent each year to clean up the ghettoes with fresh office blocks and better living quarters. But the progress is not fast enough. There is much more to do. The fault is on both sides. There is racism among a section of French society and the police and the sons and grandsons former immigrants to have their loyalty to either their country of origin or to their religion, which is Islam,” Philip explains.
This has been exacerbated in the last two decades by the rise of Islamic militant groups. Islamophobia is widespread across Europe and the world since 9/11, the rise of Islamic extremists and major terrorist strikes across Europe has led to this. The growing popularity of Marine Le Pen’s far-right party is partly a result of this antipathy towards people of immigrant origin in France. In the Presidential elections, Macron will have a tough time defeating the populist Le Pen. Every riot in France helps the far right to become more popular.
The intensity of the violence has come down considerably at the time of writing, but who is to ensure that it does not happen again? Development is only one answer. As sociologist Francois Dubet, points out in an interview with Le Monde without a strong social movement to channel the anger and frustration of the people in the right direction, there can be little hope.”The riots in the suburbs are a social problem, but they do not lead to the emergence of an actor: it is therefore not surprising that they are repeated more or less identically. This political vacuum does not only concern the suburbs: the anger of the "yellow vests", very different from that of the young people of the cities, has not managed to give itself a political form. There again, after a while, everything seemed to boil down to clashes with the police: as all the spokespersons were disputed, the leaders had no "real interlocutors", Dubet explains.
