Thousands of cars were torched in the French unrest of 2005. Photograph: Thierry Bordas/EPA
The shocking events of the past week, he said, had laid bare a "profound malaise" at the heart of society, and perhaps even "a crisis of identity". But, he warned, "youths who attack … must know that they cannot break the law without being caught, judged and punished". And their parents, if they refused to "accept their responsibilities", should face sanctions too.
Authority, respect, values. David Cameron, Westminster, August 2011? Actually, it was Jacques Chirac, Paris, November 2005. Six years on, the parallels between les émeutes des banlieues de 2005 and the rioting that has rocked half a dozen Britain cities are, at the very least, striking.
"Of course they are," said Michel Fize, a sociologist at the Paris National Centre for Scientific Research who specialises in youth behaviour and urban violence. "The root causes are, essentially, the same. They may express themselves slightly differently from locality to locality, but the underlying issues are absolutely the same. Not just in France and Britain, either."
In France, the tinder was lit at 5.20pm on 27 October 2005. Police were called to a building site in Clichy-sous-Bois, a depressed suburb east of Paris, to deal with a suspected burglary. Two innocent teens heading home after a game of football decided they did not want the hassle of being questioned by the cops, and hid in an electricity substation. Half an hour later, the lights at the nearby police station flickered: Zyed Benna, 17, and Bouna Traoré, 15, had been accidentally electrocuted in the transformer.
The deaths triggered the biggest wave of civil unrest France had witnessed since 1968. That same night, 15 cars were torched in Clichy-sous-Bois, a classic French banlieue of rundown postwar high-rises that are home to 30,000 people, overwhelmingly second and third-generation immigrants whose parents arrived in France as cheap migrant labour from north Africa.
By the time the violence finally waned nearly three weeks later, 9,000 cars had been set ablaze in 250 towns and cities from Paris to Marseille, Toulouse to Rennes, Bordeaux to Strasbourg. Schools, community centres, warehouses, police stations, nurseries and even a church had been ransacked. Some 2,900 people, half of them minors, had been arrested, 126 police and firemen injured, and two more people were dead.
As in London, those who took part were, in the main, young people, from generally disadvantaged neighbourhoods, with high rates of educational failure and above-average unemployment. "There have also been very young rioters," Fize noted. "I remember in Paris six years ago, the children who were involved – as young as 10, but also many adolescents. It was the first time I'd seen that. Now London's seen it too."
The violence spread fast, first around the capital, then to other urban centres and finally to country towns. Small groups darted from the shadows, set light to a neighbour's car, and melted away. They were having a ball. Even France's feared CRS riot police were powerless: at one point, 1,400 cars across France were torched in a single night. Vigilante patrols guarded car parks and community centres.
The centre-right government responded as Britain's has: by clamping down. Police reinforcements were bussed in; courts dispensed 24-hour justice. Rioters without residence permits were deported, immigration controls tightened. After 10 nights of rioting, Chirac declared a state of emergency, allowing local officials to impose curfews and ban public gatherings. But it took heavy rain and the reopening of schools and colleges after a fortnight-long half-term break to help bring the unrest to a close.
There were, obviously, differences. France's rioters torched a lot more cars and did a lot less looting. But that was mainly because France's marginalised classes tend to live out on the far outskirts of its big cities; their equivalent in Britain live in, or close to, city centres. "The reason they didn't loot much in France," said Fize, "is because where they were rioting, there weren't any shops."
As here, the liberal left agonised as to why. Unemployment, lack of opportunity, police harrassment, and discrimination emerged as the dominant themes. Chirac subsequently acknowledged the "poison" of racial discrimination, saying it "saps the foundations of the republic", and announced a raft of measures aimed at improving the life chances of youths from disadvantaged suburbs, including 5,000 extra teachers and assistants, 10,000 scholarships, individual help with job-seeking and incentives for companies moving near to sink estates.
Not that any of these promises accomplished very much, according to Fize. "A bit of money got thrown at the problem," he said. "But this could happen again in France. The ashes are still smoldering. It just needs the spark. The political and economic systems have both failed these youths – in France, in Britain, but also in Spain, Greece. Even the Arab Spring reflects the same root problems."
For Fize, the crux lies in the lack of any real prospect of employment; the failure of education systems to prepare people for the jobs there are; the difficulties poor families experience raising children in a consumer society. "Youth has been tricked, betrayed," he said. "We tell them, get a qualification, and those qualifications are worth nothing. Families can't cope. It's hardly surprising they're revolting. It's not because you torch cars or loot that you don't have some political awareness, you know. And it's not because you're a good pupil that you won't join in."
Authority, respect, values. David Cameron, Westminster, August 2011? Actually, it was Jacques Chirac, Paris, November 2005. Six years on, the parallels between les émeutes des banlieues de 2005 and the rioting that has rocked half a dozen Britain cities are, at the very least, striking.
"Of course they are," said Michel Fize, a sociologist at the Paris National Centre for Scientific Research who specialises in youth behaviour and urban violence. "The root causes are, essentially, the same. They may express themselves slightly differently from locality to locality, but the underlying issues are absolutely the same. Not just in France and Britain, either."
In France, the tinder was lit at 5.20pm on 27 October 2005. Police were called to a building site in Clichy-sous-Bois, a depressed suburb east of Paris, to deal with a suspected burglary. Two innocent teens heading home after a game of football decided they did not want the hassle of being questioned by the cops, and hid in an electricity substation. Half an hour later, the lights at the nearby police station flickered: Zyed Benna, 17, and Bouna Traoré, 15, had been accidentally electrocuted in the transformer.
The deaths triggered the biggest wave of civil unrest France had witnessed since 1968. That same night, 15 cars were torched in Clichy-sous-Bois, a classic French banlieue of rundown postwar high-rises that are home to 30,000 people, overwhelmingly second and third-generation immigrants whose parents arrived in France as cheap migrant labour from north Africa.
By the time the violence finally waned nearly three weeks later, 9,000 cars had been set ablaze in 250 towns and cities from Paris to Marseille, Toulouse to Rennes, Bordeaux to Strasbourg. Schools, community centres, warehouses, police stations, nurseries and even a church had been ransacked. Some 2,900 people, half of them minors, had been arrested, 126 police and firemen injured, and two more people were dead.
As in London, those who took part were, in the main, young people, from generally disadvantaged neighbourhoods, with high rates of educational failure and above-average unemployment. "There have also been very young rioters," Fize noted. "I remember in Paris six years ago, the children who were involved – as young as 10, but also many adolescents. It was the first time I'd seen that. Now London's seen it too."
The violence spread fast, first around the capital, then to other urban centres and finally to country towns. Small groups darted from the shadows, set light to a neighbour's car, and melted away. They were having a ball. Even France's feared CRS riot police were powerless: at one point, 1,400 cars across France were torched in a single night. Vigilante patrols guarded car parks and community centres.
The centre-right government responded as Britain's has: by clamping down. Police reinforcements were bussed in; courts dispensed 24-hour justice. Rioters without residence permits were deported, immigration controls tightened. After 10 nights of rioting, Chirac declared a state of emergency, allowing local officials to impose curfews and ban public gatherings. But it took heavy rain and the reopening of schools and colleges after a fortnight-long half-term break to help bring the unrest to a close.
There were, obviously, differences. France's rioters torched a lot more cars and did a lot less looting. But that was mainly because France's marginalised classes tend to live out on the far outskirts of its big cities; their equivalent in Britain live in, or close to, city centres. "The reason they didn't loot much in France," said Fize, "is because where they were rioting, there weren't any shops."
As here, the liberal left agonised as to why. Unemployment, lack of opportunity, police harrassment, and discrimination emerged as the dominant themes. Chirac subsequently acknowledged the "poison" of racial discrimination, saying it "saps the foundations of the republic", and announced a raft of measures aimed at improving the life chances of youths from disadvantaged suburbs, including 5,000 extra teachers and assistants, 10,000 scholarships, individual help with job-seeking and incentives for companies moving near to sink estates.
Not that any of these promises accomplished very much, according to Fize. "A bit of money got thrown at the problem," he said. "But this could happen again in France. The ashes are still smoldering. It just needs the spark. The political and economic systems have both failed these youths – in France, in Britain, but also in Spain, Greece. Even the Arab Spring reflects the same root problems."
For Fize, the crux lies in the lack of any real prospect of employment; the failure of education systems to prepare people for the jobs there are; the difficulties poor families experience raising children in a consumer society. "Youth has been tricked, betrayed," he said. "We tell them, get a qualification, and those qualifications are worth nothing. Families can't cope. It's hardly surprising they're revolting. It's not because you torch cars or loot that you don't have some political awareness, you know. And it's not because you're a good pupil that you won't join in."
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