Unrest in France

France is experiencing widespread unrest due to mass student protests and public sector strikes over crumbling education infrastructure, severe teacher shortages, and looming government budget cuts. The demonstrations have escalated into violent clashes with police and forced hundreds of school closures.

High schools across France have closed, thousands of teenagers have been arrested, and hundreds of people have suffered injuries as unrest over conditions in the lycée system has spread and erupted into violence in recent days. Roughly 3,000 people have been arrested since the protests began nearly two weeks ago outside of Paris. As demonstrations have at times escalated into violent clashes, 170 students and 65 school staff members have been injured, according to education minister Édouard Geffray. Nearly 400 police officers have also reportedly suffered injuries.

And the protests show no signs of abating, yesterday there were roughly 900 demonstrations took place around France, according to police. More than 500 French schools remained closed as students set fires, blockaded schools, and clashed with riot police around the country.

Why are students protesting? The protests have been driven by anger over a variety of issues impacting French high schools. A main complaint among demonstrators is the shortage of teachers and support staff in the country’s schools. The education ministry found that during the 2024-2025 school year, nearly 10% of teaching hours went untaught in public secondary schools. About 7.5% of those lost hours were due to a failure to find substitutes. Not sure this qualifies for reasons for burning down schools, but this seems to be the French way. Complaints about insufficient resources and funding and poor infrastructure in schools have also been raised in the student protests.

Some complains are too many students in each class, too few chairs, too hot (as they don’t use AC in France, not enough toilets, water leaks, poor teachers, the school buildings are falling apart, the cafeterias are too small, there’s zero budget, zero resources, not enough supervisors. A series of deadly heatwaves hit Europe over the summer, with Western Europe experiencing its hottest summer ever. In France, nearly 8,000 people died over the course of the summer as a result of the high temperatures. ACs recommended. Student protesters have also expressed grievances with the country’s online university application system, Parcoursup, which they have described as a source of stress and mistrust in the education system.

The protests began with students at Lycée Saint-Exupéry in Créteil outside Paris mobilizing to protest teacher shortages and a lack of adequate resources in late September. In the days that followed, protests spread throughout the Île-de-France region, which includes Paris and its surrounding metropolitan areas, as students attempted to set up blockades at dozens of schools. The demonstrations have escalated further, spreading outside of Paris’ surrounding area and into regions around the country, across western France in Rennes, Nantes, Quimper, and Brest; around the southern part of the country in Bordeaux, Toulouse, Toulon, Marseilles and Grenoble; as far east as Strasbourg; and as far north as Lille. Two student unions, the Student Union and the High School Trade Union, have jointly called for continued protests next week.

Several French officials have weighed in the student demonstrations as they have continued to escalate and expand around the country. Some have specifically addressed remarks toward protesters’ parents. Justice Minister Gerald Darmanin told RTL radio on Thursday that parents whose children have caused damage to property should pay reparations. “I hear and understand the anxieties and anger that our youth may have,” French President Emmanuel Macron said on Wednesday while speaking in Madrid. “However, none of these debates, none of these fears legitimizes violence.”

The political debate has increasingly focused on violence and the role of La France Insoumise (LFI). LFI was launched in February 2016 by veteran leftist politician Jean-Luc Mélenchon and is positioned on the radical or hard left, promoting democratic socialism, eco-socialism, and left-wing populism. LFI advocates for establishing a Sixth French Republic via a referendum, lowering the retirement age, redistributing wealth, and pursuing an independent foreign policy that includes withdrawing France from NATO. LFI has grown into one of the dominant forces on the French political left, winning dozens of seats in the National Assembly and participating in broader left-wing coalitions like the New Popular Front.

Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu says the students’ underlying grievances need to be heard, but has strongly condemned blockades accompanied by fires, fireworks, vandalism or attacks. He has characterized the escalation as a serious security problem while maintaining that peaceful protest is legitimate. Macron has criticized LFI’s involvement, arguing that elected representatives should not be encouraging confrontation or escalating fears.

Mélenchon has taken the opposite political position. He argues that the government is repressing a legitimate youth movement and rejects the government’s accusation that LFI organized the violence. At the same time, he has now explicitly called on students to use nonviolent methods, saying that setting fires doesn’t advance their cause. Presidential front-runner in the election in April 2027 Marine Le Pen said Mélenchon bears substantial responsibility because LFI MPs have been present at the protests.

The core reasons for the protests seem to be a mix of practical reasons like teachers missing, overcrowding, poor buildings, social inequality between wealthy and disadvantaged students, generational anxiety about education, university and future employment, and political distrust of government, budget pressure with broader French political polarization and extremists on both the right and left sides gaining ground. This is not a French problem, but rather seems to be a trend, but to some degree the violent French protests seem to be a French mechanism to voice frustration and deal with problems.