Wieviorka Michel – sociologist, director of studies at the School of Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences (EHESS)
Through the prism of the concept of social movements, the evolution of protest activity in France over the past more than half a century is analyzed. The starting point of the analysis is the events of May 1968, when students took to the streets of Paris, joined by workers. It was a protest move-ment that arose at the intersection of the industrial and post-industrial eras. The May events laid the foundation for new social protest movements – environmental, anti-nuclear, women's, regionalist. Some of these social movements died out over time (anti-nuclear), others received a new development and sig-nificantly changed French society. The women's movement has achieved the expansion of women's rights, their representation in political institutions and government bodies. The environmental movement plays a big role in France. Since the mid-1970 s, environmentalists, together with local residents and oth-er representatives of civil society, have been opposing the construction of water intakes, dams and other structures that violate the ecological balance and the familiar natural environment. Along with the environmental movement be-longing to the post-industrial era, in France there are performances typical of the industrial society. However, attempts to bring these two types of movements closer were unsuccessful. In modern France, new movements are also emerging, they are focused on the expansion of individual freedoms, the right of a person to dispose of his own body and life (issues of sex change, the right to euthanasia). New social actors are emerging in the country, but they are still weak.
social movements, protest movements, labor movement, industrial and post-industrial society, France, historicity, A. Touraine.
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