Boy, do the French love their strikes!

It’s a Tuesday, and I’m sitting in my afternoon translation class from English to French. About 15 minutes before the end of class, scraping sounds are starting to be heard out in the hallway. They continue for the next 10 or so minutes, and more and more students in my class (there are about 50 or so in all) start to whisper more furiously and are clearly distracted, yet the professor pushes on. Suddenly, the door to the class opens, and a male college student enters through the door and yells “Il y a un blocage!”, which means “There’s a blockage!”. I’m still confused by everything that’s happening. I don’t understand what “blockage” means. Then, as the student is leaving our classroom, my teacher practically forces the door to close on him and tells him, “No! We have 5 minutes of class left!” (But in French, of course :))The whole class is obviously agitated and excited, whispers now audible conversations, jumping around the room like electric current. My persistent teacher continues to read aloud the text we’re working on translating, despite the growing sounds of heavy metal things being pushed along the hallway floor outside. After what seems like an eternity, those five minutes finish and as students rush out of the classroom, my teacher yells after them “Send the homework to my e-mail address even if there is a blockage!!!”. I don’t have to wait long to find out what’s going on. As I exit the classroom, I look to my left and voilà!!!!

Then I turn around to look in the other direction, which is the way I normally exit the building (not like I could go out the door to my left anyways!), and see this:

I’m still wondering what a “blockage” exactly is, as I’ve never heard of anything like this is the US, but with the new desks, tables, and chairs all around me, I’m starting to get the picture. I don’t know why it’s happening, but I soon run into a few of the French monitors who specifically work with the international students at CIREFE (the program for foreign students not yet fluent in French at University Rennes II). They begin to explain to me that there was an General Assembly meeting in front of one of the key buildings, “Bâtiment B” or “Building B”, and that when the students voted whether or not to block the University, the majority had been in favor of the blockage. Thus, what was happening…

The main entrance to a building blocked from the inside with desk, chairs, etc.

Now let me backtrack just a little bit to explain this whole General Assembly thing really quickly. I’m still unclear on many details myself, but it’s kind of like student government, thus comprised of only students, but it has way more power that our student governments in the US, and it seems to have strong politically “left” tendencies. The General Assemblies always happen outside of one of the buildings, “Building B”, and the speakers (or whoever wants to speak at all) get up on the stairs and speak to the crowds below through a microphone/sound system. A picture of one of these going on is below.

General Assembly meeting going on outside of Building B

Food raid(?) of the cafeteria in Building B after the blockage began

Sooo… basically the story behind the whole blockage begins last August, when the French government in Paris voted to give the public university system in all of France autonomy. Usually this sounds like a good deal, but basically that means that they’re withdrawing major financial support from the public university system, which most of the students attend. Since the French Revolution, the French have been concerned with equality among their citizens, thus the words they hold so dear: “Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité”. I believe it was after World War II when the French government took on full responsibility to provide health care to all of the French people, as well as provide the payment of public education. Many French students have told me that this is a French ideal that is based on the notion that it’s a basic human right to have access to health care and education, among other things, and that no one should be deprived of that because of money. That being said, going to a public French university costs little to nothing, and also the system is uniform in the sense that this is practically no order of competition among the public universities like in the US. Of course there are exceptions here and there, but it’s nothing like, “Oh, I go to UCLA”, “Yeah, I go to UC Merced” (a very new public UC school in CA that’s near Yosemite and very small!!). Those are both public California schools, but everyone knows that it’s much more difficult to get into UCLA than it is to get into UC Merced (not to mention UCLA’s reputation), and that even though they both receive money from the state of California, it’s a given that UCLA gets a lot more money in private donations, etc., especially due to its location. In France, there’s no real difference in competition among the public schools like that. You can’t say, “Oh, I go to Rennes II” and feel smarter or more accomplished than the other student who’s going to the University in Lille instead. It’s just not like that. The government gives each public university the same money, there is a fixed income for the professors nation-wide, so one school can’t pay their professors more money and thus become a more desireable school. Also, as far as I know, French students can apply to any public university and go there if they desire. There’s nothing like the SAT to stop you. Of course, there are exceptions to everything I’m saying. For instance, I’ve been told that “La Sorbonne”, which is familiar even among most Americans, is evidently a school that is an exception to all this, among others. Because of its location in a rich part of Paris, it is able to receive more funding, and not just any student can choose to go there. What this “Loi d’Autonomie (LRU)” “Law of Autonomy” does is it makes universities instead depend in part on private companies, etc. etc. because they need to get further funding from somewhere if the government is going to no longer be paying the bill. As unemployment is a huge problem facing France right now, as well as national debt (though I don’t think it’s anywhere close to that of the US’s), the government thinks it would be good for French companies to get involved with the colleges so that it’d be easier for French students to find a job upon graduating. They say that this will decrease unemployment in France and in the long run (short run?), be a benefit for French students. However, it appears to me like the majority of students are extremely opposed to this law, as it increases the tuition fee (only a little at the beginning, but many tell me it is certain to increase little by little each year- just like the tuition fees at the US schools), and makes the universities in some ways precariously dependant on private companies since they will be the ones controlling the funds. Also, I guess something similar to this has happened before at some city in south France where a big company that was located near one of the universities started having students literally get their degree in a specialized field specific to their company. I guess things went sour somehow, the company moved away (or disbanded or something), and what was left were hundreds of students with a useless degree for anything else. This is another of the fears of the students. Interestingly enough, the law is to make the French university system more like that of the US’s, but from my impressions gathered from the French students, they don’t seem to want it at all. Actually, one of the big arguments I’ve heard against the law is that the students don’t want a system like that of the US’s. I’ve talked with other American students studying abroad with me about it, and they are split on the issue. Some think it will be a good thing to help solve the unemployment issue inFrance, as well as release the government of a good share of money that has traditionally gone to funding the public universities. I have mixed feelings myself about the whole issue, but it doesn’t seem to be a very “French” decision (traditionally, at least).France is not the United States, and the United States is not France. They have different systems that work in different ways, don’t work in other ways, and there are always new things being modified and changed to make improvements, etc. etc. But of course with the new government since Sarkozy’s election, France is changing!!! And many French don’t seem to be crazy about it. Mind you, some do (which is why he was elected, I guess). Have I mentioned yet how much the majority of students strongly dislike Sarkozy? My host mom thinks he’s great, but then again, I suppose that’s going to forever be a stereotype that is often proven true about political differences/ideologies/preferences between the older and the younger.

Picture of a group of students protesting against the blockage the day it first happened

“Call from Rouen” (French city where a university is located) flyer posted around campus asking the students at Rennes II to join them in the blockage as an act against the government.

Poster in the infamous “Bâtiment B” listing other French Universities on strike with a blockage.

So, the blockage started 3 weeks ago, and it’s officially stopped and started since then… let’s see… at least a half dozen times. It’s complicated, you see. Basically, there’s a growing group of students that are against the blockage and want classes to resume (whoops, I seem to have forgotten to mention that the blockage is intended to prevent students, professors, etc. from entering the building, so basically it’s a strike and there are no classes). The majority of these students are against the Law of Autonomy, yet they still don’t want classes to stop. One of the big reasons why is because there was a 13 week strike (pretty much 3 months! That’s practically the entirety of the semester!!) just a year and a half ago or so. I’m unclear as to the cause of the strike (it was another law having to do with education most certainly), but basically the students were on strike for most of the semester, and then still had to take their finals and all at the very end of the semester. Can you imagine? I would most certainly fail, and I’m sure there were more students than normal that did. Unfortunately (or fortunately), there are still many students still getting their degree who were in school when the strike happened a year and a half ago, and they are [what I assume to be] at their wits end with strikes, especially if it concerns their education/getting their degree on time/doing well on their finals. I don’t blame them in the least. Also, in the strike that happened 1.5 years ago, even the classes for the foreign students at CIREFE (where I take the majority of my classes) were not allowed to continue, despite their not being French and having nothing to do with the French political problem. Consequently, hundreds of foreign students went home mid-semester, not having earned any credits, and having lost their money. It was a big flop. I am very fortunate because despite the strike happening at the actual school, the CIREFE professors and staff have found locations for us to have class off-campus. Go them!!! They’re really dedicated and quite honestly great people. So, I’m still having class minus my two translation classes I normally have at the school (luckily my CIEE program director corresponded with some of the English professors at the University, and it looks like we’re still going to be able to have our papers graded and have finals even if the strike persists for some time!). Unfortunately, the French students aren’t. Every Tuesday since Tuesday November 6, classes have been supposed to resume, so every Tuesday I’ve gone to the actual University (CIREFE has planned for them to be held on-campus those days since the President of the University has literally announced himself that classes would be resuming) to have class beginning at 8am, only to find the buildings blocked again.

“Checkpoint” in front of one of the entrances to one of the buildings to see if the “blockers” feel you have a worthy reason to enter the building (i.e. being a foreign student, etc.)

For the first week of the strike, foreign students were allowed to resume classes- just not the French students- but after the first week, the French students in favor of the blockage decided that all the students were going to be “blocked” from their classes, including the foreign students (I guess they want this to put more pressure on the government??? That’s all I can figure at least). However, the first week of the strike when I was still going to class on campus, I had to go past this “check point” type thing. It was so weird. I had to tell a group of “blockers” (students who are enforcing the “block”) that I was a foreign student, and that I was allowed to pass. It’s evident to them who’s a foreign student and who’s not. They can easily tell by our language abilities/funny accents, but sheesh! I couldn’t believe it. It was kind of unreal. The picture above is a picture I took from a window of one of the buildings of the “check point” below (pretty laid back check point, wouldn’t you say?).

Assembly General meeting going on.

So you may be wondering (like I still am), how the students are allowed to continue like this. I mean, shouldn’t this have all been stopped within the first hour it started? Police arrive, administration enters, “blockers” get kicked out of the buildings, classes resume….??? Well, it’s not nearly as easy as that at all. I’ve been told that it’s kind of an “unspoken truth” that the only two places where the French police are forbidden are churches and French Universities. I find the latter example pretty hilarious, but it’s true! Ever since the 1960s when there were the infamous riots in Paris with the French students and the French police, it’s a rare thing to ever seen any police on campus. Now, I still don’t really understand this, and am still shocked by this, but I guess French students are known for despising the police and not being afraid to “push back” if you catch my drift. Thus, the police try and stay as far away from and as far as they can out of French student life at the universities. Mostly for safety reasons, the President of the Rennes II has closed down the University several times when classes were supposed to resume these past three weeks. The first time they were supposed to resume, “blockers” with iron rods were waiting in front of the doors of the buildings when the school security guards came to unlock the buildings in the early morning, so the President decided to play it safe and closed down the University for a few days. There have also been some votes to see what the students really want instead of doing the traditional and extremely faulty voting system of raising your two hands and having the people look out at the crowd and take the vote like that. The first one was held by the administration in one of the buildings, and students were allowed to come and vote between a period of several hours. You had to present your student ID (because many people that come to the General Assembly meetings to vote by the “raising your two hands” method aren’t actually students of the University, but friends of the “blockers”, thus giving their vote to the blockage unfairly) to be able to vote. In the end, it was something like 60% of students against the blockage, 40% for the blockage. Thus, classes were supposed to resume. However, the blockers accused the administration of manipulating the vote. That will forever be one of the problems with democracies, no? Then, just last Thursday and Friday, there was another vote online, and this time there were around 70% of students against the blockage, 25% for the blockage, and about 5% who chose to abstain. Again, classes were supposed to resume on Monday or Tuesday, and again the blockers accused the administration of manipulating the vote. At this point, I would have to say that it’s the blockers who are being extremely forceful and undemocratic, and that that is one of the reasons for the growing number of students against the blockage.

There’s still so much to say about the blockage and all the rest of the other strikes (yes, there have been many more!) going on in France right now, but I’m afraid this post is getting long to the point of warding off readers, so I’ll stop here, but I will continue with this whole topic in my next post in the next few days.

I guess something I’m learning from this is to not take advantage of going to class. I mean, this is just a minor example in being deprived of your education, but there really are so many students out there in other countries (or even in the US!) who do want to go to school- want to get an education- but can’t for some reason or another. So at least appreciate that you can go to class today! Also, it’s a pretty “hands on” lesson in French culture. Boy do they love their strikes! Pretty interesting to witness this all first hand!

I’ll update you all on the situation soon! Au revoir!