May 1968

May 9th, 2018

This month marks the 50th anniversary of a month of massive and sometimes violent protests and strikes throughout France under Charles de Gaulle.  The strikers and protesters occupied universities and factories and virtually shut down the French economy for some weeks.  The occupations and demonstrations were met with a forceful police response, even escalating into battles between police and students in the Quartier Latin, just a few minutes' walk from where we live.  The director of the theater across the street from us, the Odéon, sympathetic to the students' demands, opened the theater to them for speeches and protests and received a badly looted and damaged theater in return.  (Apparently, among other things, priceless costumes from the 18th and 19th centuries were destroyed.)  De Gaulle even, shockingly, fled France briefly, when it appeared as if civil war or revolution might break out.  

Makeshift mosaic tribute to a communist journalist and writer from the 19th Century
---it decorates a building near the Quartier Latin

The political and intellectual undercurrents of these events are complicated, and certainly not a topic I understand well.  The Sartre-inspired students' agenda was largely pro-communist, anti-authority, and anti-capitalist.  They also were studying in appalling conditions, with something like 70,000 students at the Sorbonne, which was designed for one-tenth as many.  The workers could probably be described as more socialist, striking for higher wages and better benefits but not necessarily for cultural or political revolution.  Even though there was some concurrence of their goals, the two groups apparently did not do much to bridge the huge cultural divide between them, even during the protests and strikes.  Even efforts by an aging Jean Paul Sartre to bring his ideas to the working classes amounted to little.  Perhaps this failure led to the eventual outcome of May 1968:  no real policy changes and a strong affirmation of de Gaulle's government in elections in June.  

Recently made graffiti near our apartment.  You can see the reference to 1968-2018 in the bottom left.
I think the bottom right is making a joke about being a Marxist like Groucho.  But I don't really understand it all.

The tricolore flying over the Sénat yesterday

We see echos of May 1968 all around us, some of them due to the anniversary and the proximity of our apartment to the epicenter of the protests, some of them due to a coincidence of factors similar to those in 1968.  There have been some peaceful protests as well as posters and graffiti recalling 1968.  We have noticed a very strong police presence in our neighborhood over the past week or two, just in case, I suppose.  Communism and anti-Americanism is still evident in many ways, especially in French intellectual circles.  And, of course, strikes have intensified this month, not out of nostalgia, but to protest Macron's plans to reform labor practices for transportation workers.  
  

Just a few of the books on May 68 display at our local bookstore---on the right you can see a book
about the taking of the Odéon Theater

(Update:  We were invited by our friends Thomas and Julia to a party celebrating, among other things, the 50th anniversary of 1968.  The invitation promised a "revolutionary dance floor."  Kate was very impressed that it was scheduled to last until dawn but less impressed that Glenn and I had no intention of staying until dawn.  Thomas, by the way, is a politically important economist who has written extensively on inequality and Julia is also an excellent economist, focusing on political economy and the media.  So perhaps not so surprising that they would host a party with that theme.)