POLITICS - PARIS IS BURNING, AGAIN - Newspaper

7/13/23, 3:12 PM POLITICS: PARIS IS BURNING, AGAIN - Newspaper - DAWN.
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TODAY'S PAPER | JULY 13, 2023
POLITICS: PARIS IS BURNING, AGAIN

François Dubet | Published July 9, 2023
Riots in Nanterre on the evening of 28 June | AFP
A lthough they never fail to take us aback, French riots have followed the same distinct pattern ever since
protests broke out in the Eastern suburbs of Lyon in 1981, an episode known as the “summer of
Minguettes”: a young person is killed or seriously injured by the police, triggering an outpouring of
violence in the affected neighbourhood and nearby. Sometimes, as in the case of the 2005 riots and of
today’s, it is every rough neighbourhood that flares up.
Throughout the past 40 years in France, urban revolts have been dominated by the rage of young people who attack the
symbols of order and the state: town halls, social centres, schools and shops.
An institutional and political vacuum
That rage is the kind that leads one to destroy one’s own neighbourhood, for all to see. Residents condemn these acts, but can
also understand the motivation. Elected representatives, associations, churches and mosques, social workers and teachers
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7/13/23, 3:12 PM POLITICS: PARIS IS BURNING, AGAIN - Newspaper - DAWN.COM
admit their powerlessness, revealing an institutional and political vacuum.
Of all the revolts, the summer of the Minguettes was the only one to pave the way to a social movement: the March for
Equality and Against Racism in December 1983.
Numbering more than 100,000 people and prominently covered by the media, it was France’s first demonstration of its kind.
Left-leaning paper Libération nicknamed it “La Marche des Beurs”, a colloquial term that refers to Europeans whose parents
or grandparents are from the Maghreb. In the demonstrations that followed, no similar movement appears to have emerged
from the ashes.
French riots follow a decades-old pattern of urban violence dominated by the

rage of young people who attack state symbols. There seems to be no
resolution in sight
At each riot, politicians are quick to play well-worn roles: the right denounces the violence and goes on to stigmatise
neighbourhoods and police victims; the left denounces injustice and promises social policies in the neighbourhoods. In 2005,
then interior minister Nicolas Sarkozy sided with the police. France’s current president, Emmanuel Macron, has
expressed compassion for the young man killed by the police in Nanterre, but politicians and presidents are hardly heard in
the neighbourhoods concerned.
We then wait for silence to set in until the next time the problems of the banlieues (French suburbs) and its police are
rediscovered by society at large.
Lessons to be learned
The recurrence of urban riots in France and their scenarios yield some relatively simple lessons.
First, the country’s urban policies miss their targets. Over the last 40 years, considerable efforts have been made to improve
housing and facilities. Apartments are of better quality, there are social centres, schools, colleges and public transportation.
It would be wrong to say that these neighbourhoods have been abandoned.
On the other hand, the social and cultural diversity of disadvantaged suburbs has deteriorated. More often than not, the
residents are poor or financially insecure and are either descendants of immigrants or immigrants themselves.
Above all, when given the opportunity and the resources, those who can leave the banlieues soon do, only to be replaced by
even poorer residents from further afield. Thus while the built environment is improving, the social environment is
unravelling.
However reluctant people may be to talk about France’s disadvantaged neighbourhoods, the social process at work here is
indeed one of ghettoisation — a growing divide between neighbourhoods and their environment, a self-containment
reinforced from within. You go to the same school, the same social centre, you socialise with the same individuals and you
participate in the same more or less legal economy.
In spite of the cash and local representatives’ goodwill, people still feel excluded from society because of their origins, culture
or religion. In spite of social policies and councillors’ work, the neighbourhoods have no institutional or political resources of
their own.
Whereas the often communist-led “banlieues rouges” (“red suburbs”) benefited from the strong support of left-leaning
political parties, trade unions and popular education movements, today’s banlieues hardly have any spokespeople. Social
workers and teachers are full of goodwill, but many don’t live in the neighbourhoods where they work.
This disconnect works both ways, and the past days’ riots revealed that elected representatives and associations don’t have
any hold on neighbourhoods where residents feel ignored and abandoned. Appeals for calm are going unheeded. The rift is
not just social, it’s also political.
A constant face-off
With this in mind, we are increasingly seeing young people face off with the police. The two groups function like “gangs”,
complete with their own hatreds and territories.
In this landscape, the state is reduced to legal violence and young people to their actual or potential delinquency. The police
are judged to be “mechanically” racist on the grounds that any young person is a priori a suspect. Young people feel hatred
for the police, fuelling further police racism and youth violence. Older residents would like to see more police officers to
uphold order, but also support their own children and the frustrations and anger they feel.
This “war” is usually played out at a low level. When a young person dies, however, everything explodes and it’s back to the
drawing board until the next uprising, which will surprise us just as much as the previous ones.
But there is something new in this tragic repetition. The first element is the rise of the far right — and not just on that side of
the political spectrum. Racist accounts of the uprisings are taking hold, one that speaks of “barbarians” and immigration and
there’s fear that this could lead to success at the ballot box.
The second is the political and intellectual paralysis of the political left. While it denounces injustice and sometimes supports
the riots, it does not appear to have put forward any political solution other than police reform.
So long as the process of ghettoisation continues, as France’s young people and security forces face off time and time again, it
is hard to see how the next police blunder and the riots that follow won’t be just around the corner.
The writer is a Professor at the University of Bordeaux in France.
Republished from The Conversation
Published in Dawn, EOS, July 9th, 2023
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7/13/23, 3:12 PM POLITICS: PARIS IS BURNING, AGAIN - Newspaper - DAWN.

TODAY'S PAPER | JULY 13, 2023

POLITICS: PARIS IS BURNING, AGAIN

Riots in Nanterre on the evening of 28 June | AFP

An institutional and political vacuum

admit their powerlessness, revealing an institutional and political vacuum.

French riots follow a decades-old pattern of urban violence dominated by the

The writer is a Professor at the University of Bordeaux in France.

Republished from The Conversation

Published in Dawn, EOS, July 9th, 2023

RIGHTS: PAKISTANIS AND THEIR RIGHT TO KNOW

CYCLING: TRIUMPH OF THE WILL

DAWN NEWS ENGLISH YouTube 960K

Seized luxury car to be handed over to Bulgarian embassy

Cartoon: 12 July, 2023

Cartoon: 11 July, 2023

KP govt asks for army help to end Kurram conflict

Pakistan receives $2 billion from Saudi Arabia: Ishaq Dar

Is the Supreme Judicial Council a tool of accountability or a dictatorial remnant?

Cracks papered over, but Fazl-Sharif gulf not fully bridged

Emerging climate risks & IMF

Updated 13 Jul, 2023

Stories and guesswork

Updated 12 Jul, 2023

Worsening poll uncertainty

Updated 12 Jul, 2023

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