Protests spread across France

Teenagers have blockaded high schools and joined marches for almost a month, and some demonstrations have turned violent. Protesters want better-resourced schools, particularly in poorer Paris suburbs and other towns. President Emmanuel Macron, who leaves office in May, faces the unrest after a decade in power and a run of protest movements. Police say rioters use the crowds as cover to pelt officers with rocks and fireworks and to set fires. Walid Hrar, a police officer and union representative in the northern Paris suburbs, linked the clashes to France's revolutionary tradition.

“This is the country of the French Revolution. Everyone boasts about it, in fact.”

Arrests and allegations of police violence

A justice ministry figure puts the number of people taken into police custody since mid-September at about 7,900, nearly 90 percent of them minors, while AP reports 8,000 arrests in recent weeks. Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez told the Senate that police opened internal investigations into 36 allegations of violence by officers against demonstrators. Four of those cases involve children allegedly "mutilated" by explosive weapons, and six involve serious injuries. A 15-year-old vocational student lost his left hand and several fingers on his right after a police grenade exploded in front of a school in Lens on 5 October. His lawyer says the injuries resemble war wounds and disputes a prosecutor's claim that the boy picked up the grenade from the ground. The family has filed a criminal complaint. The UN human rights office has called for proportionate force and respect for the right to assemble.

Officers and the government's count

AP reports more than 900 officers wounded according to the government's count, while BFMTV reports the interior ministry cites nearly 1,000. The police union Alliance has sued the state, accusing it of failing to protect officers and of using them as cannon fodder. BFMTV recounts a policewoman who, on the morning of 1 October, was sent to a lycée in southern Paris, where she and 13 colleagues were confronted by rioters throwing objects. A police officer with 30 years on the job says violence has risen steadily over his career and that events are increasingly hard to manage. Reported figures put injured students at more than 250.

Spread to Germany and Italy

About 150 students at the French lycée in Berlin blocked its entrance on Monday, 12 October, in solidarity with French classmates. On Friday, 16 October, pupils at a Friedrichshain lycée in Berlin blocked their building to demand more education funding, and a solidarity demonstration is planned for Saturday, 17 October, at Kleistpark in Schöneberg. In Turin, many schools have been blocked by pupils protesting unsanitary buildings, and some chanted "Facciamo come in Francia" ("Let's do it like in France"). On Friday, 16 October, thousands marched in Rome, Milan, Turin and Verona, also opposing a new education law from Giorgia Meloni's coalition that would limit, from the coming school year, the number of foreign pupils with weak Italian. Greta Thunberg appeared outside the Paul Éluard lycée in Saint-Denis on Tuesday, 13 October, which La Vanguardia read as a sign the movement is internationalising. Left-wing youth and student groups in Brazil, England and Spain have backed the protests online.

School budgets and pension payments

Teachers in France have been spotting a line labelled "Contrib PC" on their payslips, a pension contribution that can exceed their take-home pay. Gabriel Lattanzio, an associate professor at Panthéon-Sorbonne University, has posted his payslips online to show the issue. The French system pays current workers' contributions straight to today's retirees, and the education ministry's transfer is booked as education spending. In August, Lattanzio's take-home pay was €2,662.27, his employer's direct pension contribution was €2,896.08, and a further €351.63 was deducted for pensions. He summed up the problem this way:

“We think we're paying for schools, but we're paying for pensions.”

Todor Tochev, a senior economist at the Institut des Politiques Publiques, has argued that France appears to spend more on education than it actually does, because each new teacher also adds pension costs for retired civil servants.

Take-home pay2,662.27

Direct pension contribution2,896.08

Additional pension deduction351.63

Take-home pay

2662.27 EUR

Direct pension contribution

2896.08 EUR

Additional pension deduction

351.63 EUR

Data from the article text