France braces for fresh mass protests as officials strain to keep order

PARIS (CN) — On Friday morning near the Place de la Bastille, a contractor boarded up the facade of a toy store carrying stuffed animals and Barbie-themed lunchboxes. Pharmacies and retail stores were already shuttered.Numerous groups with collective grievances — from purchasing power to fuel prices and class-based punishments — are calling for mass protests in France again on Saturday, a week after public unrest flared during what began as a student demonstration but has evolved into a nationwide movement.Though marches were largely peaceful, some agitators stoked violence along the sidelines.The government has vowed it is better prepared.Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez authorized the use of surveillance drones in Paris and said 70,000 officers, bolstered by elite units, will be deployed nationwide. Certain transport stations will be closed and some areas will remain under curfew.But wary shopkeepers and observers aren’t sure what to expect.On Thursday, authorities had banned a Paris student march before reversing course at the last minute, ultimately deciding to keep the protest static. It had been set to end on the Bastille, where rows of police vans were stationed with sirens flashing.“Oh, fuck,” Sasha Msika, a pharmacist working just off the traffic circle, said under her breath as she craned her neck to look outside. An antiriot police unit was stationed just beyond the drugstore’s glass door. On Oct. 17, she had closed the shop out of fear; when she returned, Msika saw the rolling gate was cracked open.“Luckily my neighbor from the Italian restaurant across the street fought them off,” she said. “Now I’m asking myself the question if I should close on Saturday or not … . I don’t know what to do.”In a clothing store nearby, Ying Luo estimated she lost 80% of her usual revenue on Oct. 17 compared to a normal Saturday. Another shopkeeper who sells specialty technological equipment — who asked to go by the pseudonym Guillaume — gave the same number.“It’s not the demonstration itself that’s scary, it’s the sidelines; I understand everyone’s struggles very well and I feel them myself,” he said. “I marked my solidarity with the strikers [on the door] … . It’s not a way of defending [the shop], it’s a way of showing understanding.”A Société Générale bank boarded up in Paris on Oct. 22, 2026. (Lily Radziemski/Courthouse News)Ash, a student who works in a flower boutique near Bastille and asked to go by his first name, said the owner hadn’t decided if the shop would remain open Saturday. If it’s closed, he’ll be at the demonstration.“The media wants to put agitators and violence forward,” he said. “I think it responds to a grief and violence in the system … but I don’t understand the point of breaking things for the sake of it.”Looting, fires, clashes with policeThe government is in crisis mode after authorities lost control during nationwide protests. Over 2,500 people were arrested; some people peeled off from largely peaceful demonstrations and looted roughly 3,000 stores, from neighborhood tobacco shops to luxury stores like Hermès. The 19th century town hall of Limoges, known for its porcelain, was burned. Clouds of tear gas wafted through cities across the country.Throughout the week, President Emmanuel Macron scrambled to reestablish a sense of public order — various crisis meetings gave way to curfews and bans on public gatherings. There were meetings with student union representatives, ministers and security officials ahead of Saturday, when the military will support police officers.“For the time being, the movement is still gaining momentum,” Danielle Tartakowsky, a historian specialized in social movements and demonstrations, said. “And the government has failed to formulate any response capable of satisfying the forces mobilized at the core of the situation — namely the unions, the high school students and even the Yellow Vests.”A looted tobacco shop near Place de la Bastille in Paris, where "CLOSED it's empty" was written on the door on Oct. 22, 2026. (Lily Radziemski/Courthouse News)Roots of the movementHigh schoolers are denouncing overcrowded classrooms in crumbling buildings; viral videos have shown rats and roaches running through school hallways. Roughly 4,000 teaching jobs were cut in 2026, with another 1,588 planned for 2027, as students are already suffering from understaffing. Parcoursup, the country’s higher-education admissions platform, has been criticized as opaque and discriminatory.But the student movement has evolved into something bigger. Multiple groups are converging to challenge the state of French society as a whole.“These movements express difficulties, problems of purchasing power, problems of strongly felt social injustice, problems of democratic absence, which also apply to most European countries,” Tartakowsky said. “We’re dealing with a society that is ailing; ailing from social injustice and the dismantling of the social protections that had been in place for decades.”The Yellow Vests — which emerged in 2018 to fight rising fuel taxes, but evolved into a wider movement against inequality — called for peaceful demonstrations and applauded the different groups taking part.“What unites us is a shared anger: ever-increasing gas prices, groceries and rent; the deterioration of schools and universities; frozen wages and benefits; while we’re constantly told there’s no money left,” it said in a statement. “End of the world, end of the month: same culprits, same fight.”Michel Pigenet, a historian specializing in contemporary work and social movements, said he does not justify looting or violence but it’s worth examining societally what has pushed people to this point.“When it becomes so systematic and massive, it’s not because there was a slogan, it’s because socially there is something that is no longer right,” he said. “There is a social situation that has become unbearable and that pushes transgression, and the transgression in this case is theft, obviously.”Government responseJustice Minister Gérald Darmanin has called for a swift, firm judicial response to the Oct. 17 rioters ahead of Saturday’s demonstration, including expedited trials with immediate prison sentences. On Thursday, he requested additional penalties, like stripping perpetrators of voting rights or their right to protest.Trials began Monday and quickly stoked controversy. On Tuesday, a man was sentenced to six months in prison for receiving stolen goods, when he said he picked up baby formula outside a looted pharmacy in the Paris suburbs.Critics immediately condemned a class-based punishment, drawing comparisons to extreme-right National Rally leader Le Pen, who was convicted in a multimillion-dollar embezzlement scheme. She is appealing her conviction and leads polls in France’s 2027 presidential race.Far-right leader Marine Le Pen leaves the courtroom after the verdict of her appeal trial, in Paris, France, Tuesday, July. 7, 2026. (AP Photo/Aurelien Morissard)Some politicians were quick to push anti-immigration rhetoric; Le Pen said the country was paying the price for “decades of inaction” on “uncontrolled immigration” in a televised address Sunday.Foreign leaders facing elections echoed the sentiment. On Tuesday, U.S. President Donald Trump attributed the violence to “migrants, jihadists, and Communists” and blamed “Globalist Leftwing Politicians” who “imported millions of Third World Migrants who are totally incompatible with Western Values” in a social media post.Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said France was facing “an invasion of extremist Islam” on Tuesday.Without naming names, Macron on Wednesday denounced the “foreign manipulation of information which led to unacceptable and even stupid comments by many, including foreign leaders.”Darmanin said the perpetrators of violence were both French and foreign-born, and many had no criminal record.Subscribe to our free newslettersOur weekly newsletter Closing Arguments offers the latest about ongoing trials, major litigation and rulings in courthouses around the U.S. and the world, while the monthly Under the Lights dishes the legal dirt from Hollywood, sports, Big Tech and the arts.Additional Reads