French students have been the front fighters in a struggle that resulted in the the first big extraparliamentary victory for the working class in years. The government has waved the white flag and withdrawn the controversial law reducing employment rights for young workers This is a retreat from the government's initial answer to the students, as GABRIEL ROSENMAN from JCR/LCR makes clear in this interview. NINA TRIGE ANDERSEN explores how the victory happened, and what the CPE-movement will mean for future anti-capitalist struggles. SINCE the Right wing government came to power in 2002 there has been permanent mobilisation in France, Gabriel explains. The past two mondas ormatensive calmpaign has cost him 26 pounds of bodyweight but he is riding high on the energy from the overwhelming success:
"It started with the big antıracıst movement against le Pen. A few months later we had the big workers strike against the pension retorm, then the art workers went out against decreasing wages, and after this the first movement against the Bologna-process arose.
After a calmer year, the high school students went on strike, and later the social movement became mavolved in the No to the EU-constitution. The victory there really escalated the political crisis.
ous al we saw stakes l the fuel industries that developed into mass struggle and was heavily repressed by the authorities. In November came the "revolt of the suburbs."
Gabriel holds it for moment to catch his breath and continues:
"The current movemeni has managed to link all struggles. It has created coherence between the different parts of the high schools, people from Banlieux (the revolting suburbs, ed.) and casualized workers. The polls say that more than 82 per cent of the population support us.
It is thanks to the struggles of the past 3 years, that this political climax has been possible. Crackdown
The CPE-repression has in some ways been riding a wave of 3 or 4 years of activist resistance in progress. But having this kind of explosively growing mobilisation still takes a lot of hard work. The authorities did their best to block the way for the
"The police have had a very repressive strategy towards the movement especially against the youth. They reason that if they hit hard enough it will scare people from joining in. But this movement was big enough to handle the confrontation.
"We didn't fight back, but we didn't retreat either. We went as far as we could, and took the consequences. We're still fighting for the release of those welc arrested during the demonstrations."
Even the students' own official organisations were in the way. The movement would have been strangled at birth if the national student organisations had had it their way:
"What made the movement spread so quickly was buildnational Col alalil between the universities already on strike. This was our (JCR's) initiative because UNEF (the biggest student union in France.) didn't want to do it. They didn't believe in the movement."
But fortunatelv the students managed to build a national coordination without UNEF ana lne orner "bureaucratic leaders" Gabriel calls them. Then, when they saw how the movement developed, the bureaucrats jumped back on the train and did their best to take credit for the movement.
From the first day the students wanted to join forces will une workers, our le answer from the union bosses wasn't exactly enthusiastic.:
"They said they supported the movement. They agreed in two or three national days of action. But they never accepted a call for general strike. They want to appear as radical to build a legitimacy that they don't really have. We have bureaucracy in the leadership."
But the student strikers managed to link with the workers on several occasions on a local level, and without leadership involvement. One example was the students of Nanterre blockading a central post office and several train stations, together with the postal and rail workers.
And the workers profited from the revolutionary atmosphere to put forward their own campaigns:
"The workers used the activist enthusiasm to raise their own demands on wages, unemployment, working conditions etc. Everybody agreed that the CPE was bullshit, but they weren't ready to loose several days of wage on just the CPE." Mr Repression
This is how Gabriel describes Sarkozy, minister of interior, who was the first in government to realise the impact of the movement, and thus he was the first to appeal for political withdrawal:
"He tried to appear as the legitimate leader of the right wing, and as the big moderator of the people. But the movement wasn't fooled one minute. Sarkozy was against the CPE from the beginning. But not because the law was too hard on the workers, but because 1t wasn't hard enough.
"He wanted the same law for every worker, regardless of age. He's Mister Repression in the role as minister of interior, very violent - you heard what he said and did against the Banlieux... (where he led the "zero tolerance" strategy).
When asked if the government's hard line rejection of the protests helped strengthen the Gabriel answers both yes and no:
"It helped because it forced the union leaderships to stand firm. Otherwise they would have negotiated from the first day as they always do. But there was nothing to negotiate. Nevertheless we would have liked to win faster on the CPE. After two months of movement it is very hard to keep going against the other attacks. People are tired." Future challenges
To Gabriel and his political comrades the big challenge will be to accumulate the generation of activists who by now already have much experience with strikes, blockades, demonstrations and police repression, and who are rapidly developing a radical political consciousness. The JCR has a strategy that they will defend in working with the other organisations:
"We will try to combine political organisation for the most advanced activists and to build mass structures that can replace existing bureaucratic student organ sallulls.
"The challenge will be to create something that doesn't divide the movement but at the same time appears new enough for people, who would never join UNEF and the like, to join it."
Even though it won't be easy, Gabriel is optimistic. He is convinced that the struggle of the French students will impinge on the rest ot Europe:
"It shows to all European countries that resistance is possible and that the best weapons we nave are our hands and feet, not voting. I think this is an even bigger political event than the NO to the Constitution because that was still a parliamentary victory, while this is an activist mass social movement that all young people in Europe sympathised with."
A concrete result of the French student struggle was that the German government withdrew a similar proposal:
"They saw what happened here and didn't want the same at home." Gabriel states.
The massive activist resistance for the past three months did not come out of nowhere, and it does not mark an end either. On the contrary:
"This victory means a huge confidence in the ability to change things, it's a new generation. It might be a little quick to do the comparison, but I think it's something like the generation of the 70s." •Gabriel Rosenman is a 25 years old English student at Nanterre, Paris, militant of JCR/LCR and activist in the struggle against CPE. •Nina Trige Andersen did the interview for the monly paper of the SAP (Socialist Worker's Party), Danish secof the Fourth