When I began this project, as I talked about it with people, I discovered that many take “1968” very personally. They have strong feelings about what I should be researching, what was important about the year, and what a potential course should look like. They would say, “Oh, you have to deal with Vietnam,” or they would tell me exactly where they were. Other years may be blurry for them, but 1968 sticks in the memory.
And, in France, it continues to resonate and ripple through the culture. During the presidential elections, Nicholas Sarkozy said “il faut liquidier 1968.” (It’s necessary to do away with 1968.) During the World Cup, when France’s poorly-performing team refused to practice and didn’t make it out of the first round, the captain Thierry Henry met with Sarkozy. European Parliament member, Daniel Cohn-Bendit, one of the leaders of the ’68 protests, offered the comment that the French president would meet with striking soccer players, but not striking teachers.
Now, as Sarkozy attempts to raise the retirement age, the streets again are full of protesters in places like Paris and Nanterre. Once again the garbage is going uncollected, gas deliveries have been disrupted, and the business of the country has ground to a halt Sounding at least a little like DeGaulle. Sarkozy has pledged “to guarantee order,” and punish “troublemakers.”
Although some have been surprised at the number of students joining the protests, the political analyst Jerome Sainte-Marie, notes that “young people have built a general abhorrence at all levels toward Sarkozy” and “there is also the idea in France that you must participate at least once in your life in a social movement.”
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