Serious unrest has rocked France in recent weeks, with riots in multiple cities after a police officer fatally shot Nahel Merzouk, a French teenager of Algerian and Moroccan descent, in a Paris suburb.
This is part of a long-standing pattern, my Times colleagues Catherine Porter and Constant Méheut report. “Calls to overhaul the police go back at least four decades, when thousands of young people of color marched for months in 1983 from Marseilles to Paris, more than 400 miles, after an officer shot a young community leader of Algerian descent,” they wrote.
Since then there have been multiple cycles of police brutality and rioting. And while many politicians have promised change, many French people find meaningful change elusive.
As always, Times coverage is the best way to understand the news. Here’s an explanation of the recent unrest, and here’s a story that goes into why so many people in France identified with the young man who was shot.
Looking back a little further, “The Other France,” a 2015 New Yorker story by George Packer, offers a useful window into the long history of marginalization of poor minority areas, with a cascade of social consequences that go far beyond crime and violence.
But it may be helpful to take a more global approach to understanding why some mass protest movements struggle to achieve their goals.
My favorite academic book on police reform is “Authoritarian Policing in Democracy” by Yanilda González, which analyzes why some Latin American countries have overhauled their police force after major scandals and others have not.
She found that because the police were often politically powerful, scandals of police brutality alone were not enough to bring about change. There also had to be broad public demand for it, and strong opposition politicians with an incentive to push for it. While her book focuses on Latin America, I always find it a helpful reminder that protests are just one form of political pressure, and often need to be combined with others to make a difference.
And successful movements often exert long-term economic and political pressure in addition to public protests. In “Forging Democracy from Below: Insurgent Transitions in South Africa and El Salvador,” Elisabeth Wood looked at how the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa used strikes and labor organizing to exert economic pressure on Africa’s economic elite, who then demanded change from those in political power.
This parallels what happened with the civil rights movement in the United States. In “Racial Realignment,” Eric Schickler shows how the movement built political power over decades, first gaining influence in unions that wanted support from black workers, and then working with those unions to pressure the Democratic Party to embrace civil rights. Public marches and protests were the most visible part of that process, but they were by no means the most influential.
Reader Responses: Books you recommend
Kim Fader, a reader in Rockland County, NY, recommends “One Hundred Years of Solitude” by Gabriel García Márquez:
This is my third lecture (the English version, translated by Gregory Rabassa). The first reading (or two) I had to pay attention to get my bearings; now I am again immersed in this beautiful prose, and can enjoy slow reading. I loved Colonel Aureliano Buendía’s realization that after years of struggle in a long civil war, the Liberals (so called) had become no different from the Conservatives. The Liberals are asking him to relinquish many of the government’s objectives that he was trying to protect. He realizes, “that all we fight for is power” – this is what it is after. Hmm. Sounds familiar.
Laura Myers, a reader in Athens, Ohio, recommends “The Alchemist” by Paulo Coelho:
“The Alchemist” tells the story of a young shepherd who dreams of a life beyond the world he knows so well. He sells his sheep and goes in search of his ‘treasure’, but encounters both revelations and hard truths during his journey. He meets people who are very different from himself and who help him learn about his own strengths and challenges. I both read and listened to this book over the holidays – audiobook on the go and on paper so I could get stuck with the prose. This story came at just the right time: I’m a year into a career change and have been reflecting on my choices, both the good and the bad of a new position. My conclusion was to look for the lessons in all circumstances and embrace the uncertainty of the unknown as it can lead to a deeper understanding of what it means to fulfill one’s dreams.
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