While I doubt we are yet near moments as critical as those of 1968 when the old general had to travel to Baden-Baden to check if the Army was still with him, the effort of workers north of the administrative border is finally putting some clear pressure on the conservative President, Nicholas Sarkozy and his EU-patterned draconian measures.
This is great news, which reminds us all that it can be done and how it can be done. A powerful real-life lesson of the might of the Working Class when at least minimally organized and self-conscious.
Theory? This is the theory: organized and conscious of our collective power we can win... we can dictate the terms. After all ,we are the ones who made it all possible to begin with. That is the immense power of the Working Class.
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| First page of L'Humanité |
We do not know yet how far this struggle will reach or how much will it achieve but we do know that it has reached so far and already has an impact: the whole French economy (with ramifications for the rest of Europe) is set to stop. Gas stations are running out of fuel as I write this...
Ministers explain desperately: the Government is in control, France has enough reserves. They entrench into a discourse of military intervention: There will be no blockade for companies, no blockade for transport and no blockade for road users.
Meanwhile airports see up to 50% of flights canceled, same for train services, roads are being slow down... and students have gone wild, blockading schools and setting up barricades. France is a key route for trans-European goods, places like the Iberian peninsula are strongly dependent on French road access. A mere dock workers strike could now get Spain and Portugal totally paralyzed.
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| Ships waiting for Marseille port to re-open... some day |
The key vote is on Wednesday at the Senate and it looks like the government plans to resist by means of force, hoping that the struggle will weaken once the law is approved.
Whatever happens, reaching to this stage is already a victory: a victory for organization, a victory for consciousness and a victory for the democratic collective willpower that is the force that drives our freedom. Thanks for that.
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