The high school mobilisation that began in the Paris suburbs in September 2026 fits into a series of back-to-school mobilisations that secondary education has seen cyclically since the late 1970s, in response to conditions deemed to have deteriorated (teacher shortages, overcrowded classes, dilapidated buildings, and so on). It stands in contrast to the “spring” movements that characterised the “68 years”.
As early as 1978, it was noted that what had until then characterised technical high schools and technical teaching colleges (LT and CET) had become the problem of high schools in general.
“The 1978 school year is proving calamitous: overcrowded classes, a shortage of teachers and staff. In Seine-Saint-Denis, one may even doubt that the school year has begun. From 15 September, the teachers at the Saint-Denis lycée and the Noisy-le-Sec lycée went on strike, with the active support of parents’ associations and many local elected officials, to demand new posts and additional classes. (…) For the first time since May-June 1968, schools are being occupied day and night, notably in the 93, in Saint-Denis, Aubervilliers and Montreuil.”
An extract from Quand les lycéens prenaient la parole. Les années 68 by Didier Leschi and Robi Morder (Syllepse, 2018).
These recurring issues also prompted major high school mobilisations in 1990 and 1998, which led to significant measures that were seen as victories. Autumn movements have also involved high school students, but over other issues, for example the movement against pension reform in 2010.
What is unprecedented about the autumn 2026 mobilisation is, first of all, the global context: a war in Eastern Europe accompanied by rising military budgets that contrast with chronic underfunding of education, a climate crisis that affects poorly insulated schools where students suffer from the heat, and the risk of the far right winning the presidency in 2027. Many students in the working-class suburbs, where the movement began, may have felt this last stake as an existential threat.
How can students make themselves heard?
To press their demands, the means of action open to them are limited. High school representation exists in law (students sit on school boards and on national bodies attached to the ministry), but it carries little weight.
Besides not being a right for high school students, a strike, as a mere work stoppage, is no means of pressure at all: a student strike inconveniences no one and halts no production. So for a high school movement to be effective, it is not enough to skip class; students must also be visible, audible and newsworthy.
The vocabulary has changed over recent decades. “Strike picket” has given way to “blockage” or “blockade”, especially since the high school movement against the Fillon law in 2005. The general assemblies once held in schools, which decided on strike pickets (“filtering” or “blocking” pickets), have become harder to organise, particularly when administrations refuse permission, sometimes simply for lack of rooms. Nowadays, student organisations and administrations alike no longer speak of schools on strike but count blocked schools.
To be visible, then, they need spectacular actions. Like any social group, students use what they have to hand: bins to block, or slow down, entry to the school; demonstrations in the neighbourhood or town (harder now, given the bans); appeals to figures such as elected officials who may draw media attention; placards, and so on.
This is where the question of violence arises. We must wait for more precise information on the profiles of the young people arrested. What we do know is that the great majority are minors. But are they high school students, or young people who have left or been excluded from the school system? The circumstances and the alleged offences may differ from one individual to another.
In the meantime, it is worth recalling that in the early days of May 1968 in the Latin Quarter, a significant number of young workers joined the students in order, in a way, to avenge the humiliations the police had inflicted on them in their housing estates and neighbourhoods, as the sociologist Gérard Mauger has reminded us.
The current crisis combines features of high school mobilisations with those of the “proto-political riots” that occurred in the suburbs, notably in 2005. Note that “suburban youth” are not only suburban youth: they are also high school and university students, sometimes unemployed or in precarious situations. They act and react just as much where they study, work and live. High school demonstrations are also places of convergence at the local level.
An unprecedented police response to teenagers
What is also striking is how the authorities ignored the situation, even though shortages of resources and staff are regularly reported by teachers’ unions, as again this autumn.
Governments since 2017 have faced unprecedented conflicts, such as the Yellow Vests, Sainte-Soline and urban riots, but high school and student movements are recurrent and can usually be resolved through negotiation. Yet since 2016 (the loi Travail), a reaction of “firmness” seems to have become the norm, at the risk of violent clashes that make attending even legal demonstrations perilous. Applied to teenagers, it appears manifestly disproportionate and dangerous.
It seems that, after ignoring the scale of the problems, the authorities opted for repression. The Interior Ministry was put in the foreground, favouring mass closures of schools. Past movements had seen a few exceptional closures, but never on this scale.
After talking of an “instrumentalisation” of the movement by La France insoumise (LFI), on account of its declared support and the presence of its elected representatives outside schools (as other parties also did), the government’s line finally conceded that the demands were legitimate. No doubt public opinion, which considers the students’ demands legitimate, strengthened the movement, as well as the scale and good conduct of the 6 October demonstrations. The unions put the turnout at 450,000; the ministry counted 250,000 across France.
But negotiation means a balance of forces. What might have been enough before the movement to “calm things down” is now insufficient, as the mobilisation has continued and the threat of its spreading to university students and joining up with other grievances weighs on the government. On the social media young people use, many refer not only to demonstrations with other unions but also to the call to mobilise against the cost of living on 17 October, as a return of the “Yellow Vests”. In a way, the stakes are rising.
Robi Morder is an associate researcher at the Printemps laboratory (Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines/Université Paris-Saclay, France) and co-president of the Groupe d’études et de recherches sur les mouvements étudiants (Germe, the Study and Research Group on Student Movements).
The French original of this article first appeared in The Conversation. This English translation is based on the one that first appeared in The Conversation.
Published under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International licence (CC BY-ND 4.0).
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