Who Are France's Yellow Vest Protesters?

Violent protests continue to rock cities across France. Countrywide, hundreds of thousands of protesters have hit the streets since November, wearing vibrant yellow safety vests, leading them to become known as “Les Gilets Jaunes” or “the yellow vests.”

While many of the protests started out peaceful, the violence seems to be escalating.
On January 5th protesters wearing yellow vest, and some dressed in black, attacked a government ministry building in Paris.
A government spokesperson had to be evacuated out the back.
But why did these Yellow Vest protests start?
In this episode, we’re taking a look at French President Emmanuel Macron’s political reforms and how tensions in France reached this boiling point.
First, let's clear up what The Yellow Vests are and are not.
They are not a formal organization, and remain largely leaderless.
That fact makes it hard to determine what all of these protesters actually stand for.
On the other hand, it’s a lot easier to see what it is that they’re against — and that’s Macron’s administration.
Macron was elected to office in 2017, defeating far right leader of the National Front, Marine Le Pen.
Macron’s party, La République En Marche, won parliamentary elections in a landslide.
But here’s the catch.
This landslide happened in an election hose turnout was the lowest in French history.
So despite the victory, Macron hardly won a popular mandate to enact his proposed policies, which included reforming France’s labor laws in favor of employers, and cutting thousands of public sector jobs.
[MACRON]: I want France to be a start-up nation, meaning both a nation that works with and for the start-ups.”
[HOST]: Macron’s efforts at turning France into a quote “start-up nation” have yet to boost the country’s economy, and some reforms have had a negative impact on average workers.
For example, after his administration eased regulations on employers, several French firms announced mass layoffs.
Apparent policy failures like this helped to cut Macron’s approval rating in half before the Yellow Vest protests had even started.
Another major issue on Macron’s agenda has been climate policy.
He pledged to cut France’s carbon emissions by 40 percent before 2030.
Since 75 percent of energy emitted in France originates from fossil fuels,
Macron instituted a fuel tax in late 2017 to discourage the use of motor vehicles by French citizens.
And that tax pissed off a lot of rural and working class people.
Viral petitions targeting the fuel tax popped up online.
Some of them raking in over a million signatures.
And this is where the yellow vest movement was born.
Petitions and other viral posts began to circulate through “Anger Groups,” on Facebook.
These groups are places where average citizens could vent about local political issues.
Some of these viral posts have also helped spread fake news and misinformation.
Another one of the viral Facebook posts actually inspired the Yellow Vests worn by protesters.
In October of last year, Narbonne resident Ghislain Coutard, called on protesters to wear their safety vests, which every French driver is mandated by law to keep in their car, in case of accidents.
Yellow Vest gatherings sprang up in smaller cities throughout the country, even though Paris has traditionally been the focal point for French mass mobilization.
These regions tend to be more dependent on cars, so the fuel taxes hit their residents the hardest.
Macron’s fuel tax has also been criticized by environmental researchers.
They argue that successful climate policy shouldn’t push the costs of transitioning the economy onto poorer citizens.
The people that are the most impacted by higher fuel prices.
Some protesters opposed to the fuel tax aren’t necessarily opposed to taking action against climate change, they just believe that the transition to a clean energy economy shouldn’t burden ordinary people.
And it’s not like this hasn’t been done before.
Other countries have implemented policies to combat climate change that don’t penalize their citizens.
In Spain, where the coal industry is being outlawed, the government is providing miners with early retirement plans or clean energy job training, depending on their age.
Even carbon taxes can be successful and popular, if the financial impact on everyday people is minimized.
In 2008, British Columbia introduced a carbon tax, but funneled its revenue into a Climate Action Tax Credit, which blunted the pain of rising fuel prices.
In contrast, Macron’s fuel tax funneled portions of its revenue into a business tax credit.
And around the same time the fuel tax was passed in late 2017,
Macron’s government repealed France’s wealth tax on individuals with assets totaling over $1.5 million USD.
The ex-banker-turned-president was quickly dubbed ‘ the president of the rich’ by his political opponents.
And he still has that reputation today.
Yellow Vest protesters have consistently criticized Macron as out-of-touch and inconsiderate of the needs of average French citizens.
And after protests continued for several weekends in a row,
Macron decided to make some concessions to those unhappy with his reforms.
His administration first decided to freeze the controversial fuel tax,
then ultimately dropped it from the 2019 budget altogether.
He also announced that in 2019,
he would raise the country’s minimum wage.
But, he refused to reinstate France’s wealth tax.
Macron, whose approval rating recently hit an all time low of 23%, is currently engaged in a balancing act to salvage his presidency.
His political opposition on both the left and right are trying to gain the support of the anti-establishment Yellow Vests.
On the left, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, leader of the France Unbowed Party, has tried to win over Yellow Vests by speaking about the need to prioritize both climate justice and social justice.
On the right, Marine Le Pen’s party, now called the Rassemblement National, or National Rally, has attempted to convince Yellow Vests that
Wait for it... immigration is the source of France’s problem.
This argument has really stuck with some of the Yellow Vest protesters, who have been spotted singing anti-semitic songs and making anti-semitic chants.
A recent poll indicates that the National Rally’s approval numbers have jumped ahead of Macron’s party since protests began.
It’s important to know that France has a strong cultural tradition of street protests, even the violent kind, going all the way back to the Revolution that saw the country’s monarchy deposed from power at the end of the 1700s.
In the centuries since, street protests have become a recurring phenomenon in France, flaring up when the country reaches moments of crisis.