Archive of France

In this interview, conducted by the collective Plateforme Enquête Militante in the summer of 2019, members of the Gilets Noirs and the supporting collective La Chapelle Debout go back over the origins of the movement, its practical modes of organisation, and its horizons

On the 1st October, undocumented migrant workers at 12 companies in Paris went on strike. The strikes called for improvements to pay and the exploitative conditions of work, but the unifying call across all sites, though, was that they be given the right to live and work legally in France. Luke Butterly reports on the organising campaign, and the struggles of undocumented workers in Paris.

Protests in Algeria have been building since the start of the year. The protests, that have already forced former president Abdelaziz Bouteflika to step down after 20 years, have lately been facing increasingly hostile repression from police and security services. In this interview with imprisoned student leader Yani Aïdali, he discusses the nature of the student movement, and the possibility of its generating a national-level co-ordination.

The Hirak movement in Algeria continues to build momentum, bringing the streets of Algiers to a standstill. In this interview, Nedjib Sidi Moussa, doctor of Political Science at Université Panthéon-Sorbonne, discusses the composition of the movement, and highlights its limits and horizon.

The progression of the Algerian football team to the final of the African Cup of Nations, the first for 29 years, has sparked both wild scenes of jubilation from the Algerian diaspora across France as well as a racist backlash fuelled by right-wing theories of a ‘great replacement'. In this article, Hector Uniacke discusses the political situation in both France and Algeria, and the high stakes of tonight's final against Senegal.

This weekend the gilets noirs, a movement of France's undocumented migrants, occupied the Panthéon in Paris. In this article, Luke Butterly reports on the occupation, the police repression against the occupiers, and the aims of the movement.

With France marking six months of ‘yellow vest’ rallies and civil unrest, a new movement is making itself heard. The Gilets Noirs, the largest collective of undocumented migrants in France, have been conducting a series of high profile actions, most notbaly the recent protests at Charles De Gaulle airport calling for an end to deportation flights. In this article, Luke Butterly reports on the movement.

"There is one demand on which all the Yellow Vests unanimously agree: Macron Resign!" Alèssi Dell’Umbria reports on the Gilets Jaunes in the context of France's infamous social movements.