For the past fourteen nights, nightly riots that have now become a generalized revolt have spread across France despite emergency powers given to the police to curtail the revolt. There are a multitude of direct and indirect causes of the revolt, from the deaths of two African youth at the hands of the police that sparked the incident to France’s unresolved process of decolonization. Press accounts from participants in the revolt have shown that the predominately youthful participants are motivated by a strong sense of alienation from the French society that has systemically excluded them. In the suburbs where the revolt first erupted, many youth of African descent have been unable to find jobs due both to France’s high overall unemployment and institutional racism whereby people with African sounding names are 5 times less likely to be called back for interviews than those with French sounding names.

The revolt also has a lot to do with police racism and the harassment of Muslim and African youth, as it is the French police in the suburbs that provide the physical repression that works in concert with the institutional racism. Back in April of this year, Amnesty International issued a report criticizing the way the “generalized impunity” with which French police violently treat young African males during regular identity checks. French police regularly patrol the suburbs in riot gear and there have been numerous incidents over the past twenty years in which police used violence against innocent youth. Moreover, there has been a substantial growth in hatred towards Muslims with the association of Muslim people with terrorism and the suspicion, largely fostered by the government and the media, that all Muslims are terrorists. Faced with both physical repression and institutional racism, many youth have realized that they essentially have no future if there status is not improved.

It is also worth noting that it is not just Muslims that are revolting, but also black people, people from other parts of the world, and poor white French people, all of whom are excluded in varying capacities from French society. As the revolt spreads across France, it is likely to attract other disenfranchised populations. The large number of disenfranchised people has its origins nearly three decades ago with France’s decolonization of Algeria. France has repeatedly seen violent responses to its policy towards African immigrant, with the most recent being in 1991, and like the current revolt, the frequent revolts are almost always triggered by violent police behavior which, as happened a few days ago when police fired tear gas canisters into a mosque under the reasoning that their was an illegally parked car outside, are escalate by the state’s repressive response. Moreover, there have repeatedly been promises of more social programs designed to address unemployment and police repression, but these responses only address the symptoms of the revolts and not the underlying problems with racism in both French and European society and policy. Similarly, the recent promises by French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin to spend 30 billion euros ($35.28 billion) on helping young people in the areas affected by the revolt and a concerted effort help provide jobs for up to 1.5 million unemployed people are unlikely to address the underlying problems.

According to Professor Behzad Yaghmaian, an Iranian-born author who spent time researching and traveling with Middle Eastern immigrants in Europe, there is a good chance that similar revolts may erupt elsewhere in Europe. Speaking yesterday on Democracy Now!, Yaghmaian described how the revolts are a consequence of Europe’s outdated immigration policy that essentially views immigrants from a colonial perspective and thus views them as a population of “others” that needs to be controlled rather than a population that needs to be brought into society as equals. According to Yaghmaian, it is not just France that has such policies, but also other European countries such as Spain and Italy. Spain in particular has a high number of undocumented immigrants who are unable to obtain jobs and make their livings on what they earn from petty crimes. He believes that they may see what is happening in France as a way to be heard and a means of exerting pressure to achieve their basic goal of becoming documented. There is also a similar situation in Italy where there is a large population undocumented immigrants that function essentially as migrant workers and are criminalized by the police and the public. One author has also seen parallels with the situation in the United States and has argued that it is essentially Western economies’ dependence on cheap immigrant labor that is creating the condition for similar revolts.

Also of interest is the response of radicals and the immigrant youth’s allies in their communities, yet little information is available about their responses. From corporate media reports one is able to learn that most community groups, while sympathetic to the concerns of the rioters, are publicly discouraging the violence and engaging in a variety of preventive measures including issuing fatwas and “peace marches” aimed at stopping the violence. The CNT-AIT, an anarcho-syndicalist trade union in France, has issued a statement supporting the revolt, although their small size prevents their actions from being interpreted as indicative of organized labor’s overall response. In Toulouse, a group of anarchists has called for a variety of measures including street demonstrations and general strikes and is attempting to mobilize other radical elements in support of the rioters while the Federation Anarchiste has also issued a statement of support. A group calling itself “The Immigration and Suburbs Movement” (Mouvement de l’Immigration et des Banlieues) has issued a statement that explains some of the reasons why people are rioting and suggests an almost surprising awareness of history and makes arguments indicating that some of the riot participants have had their fill of empty promises and are choosing to fight to the end this time. Moreover, while the targets were initially selected randomly, there are growing indications that state buildings and corporate property are being targeted, suggesting that the revolt may be moving in a direction that will allow it to make substantive gains.