Paris, France – After nationwide protests turned violent, French President Emmanuel Macron on Sunday night tried to strike a balance between acknowledging the concerns of students demanding changes to the education system and criticising rioters. Those who have looted must reimburse their victims. Those who sought to bring down the republic will be held accountable,” Macron said.
But the president’s speech was not what Yanis, a 20-year-old from Ivry-sur-Seine, a suburb just southeast of Paris, wanted to hear. There will be one demonstration after another until something changes – every weekend, without a break”. As France grapples with widespread anger that bubbled over in the form of violent protests last weekend, appetite – at least among the country’s youth – for centrist politics of the kind that Macron represents appears to be rapidly shrinking.
The unrest in France comes months before the country’s 2027 presidential election and has further sharpened political divisions, with parties seeking to present themselves as the answer to the frustration visible on the streets. The populist-left leader Jean-Luc Melenchon has embraced the student movement with enthusiasm, while far-right firebrand Marine Le Pen has focused on the disorder that came with the demonstrations, framing it as a crisis of security and authority. The centrist Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu has accused the extreme left of instigating violence as a “warm-up round” for the presidential election.
Polling before the election points to a contest in which both the far left and the far right could play a central role. But while the country is demanding change, there is little consensus on what that change should look like. Macron, who has been in power for two terms, will need to step aside after the election, as the constitution bars him from running again.
That message must not be empty, but it will have to answer their demands.” Since launching their protest in mid-September, students have demanded better schools, more teachers and a more equal system. But the movement quickly spilled out of the schoolyards and into the streets, tapping into broader social and economic anxieties. The protests have brought these issues to the centre of the political debate in a way that might not otherwise have happened, given young people’s comparatively low electoral participation and the tendency of political campaigns to focus on older voters and issues such as pensions, say analysts.
Yet the party’s appeal among young voters predates the protests. Its programme addresses several of the movement’s central grievances, including investment in education, teachers’ pay and the abolition of Parcoursup, an online platform students must use for higher education applications that many say lacks transparency. According to an OpinionWay poll for Les Echos, published on Thursday, Melenchon leads among voters aged 18 to 24, with 49 percent backing him – a 10-percentage-point increase compared with 2022.
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