Familiar images of teargas clouds drifting across Paris squares, police baton charges against masked protesters and terrified teenagers floored – and worse – by stun grenades have once again focused the world’s attention on France’s policing methods.
While most of its western European neighbours generally favour police tactics that prioritise crowd containment and de-escalation, France has long responded to social movements that take to the streets with, at times, shocking physical force.
The reasons why are a complex mix of history, politics, state organisation and a particular security culture that has become deeply ingrained over decades, if not centuries, and whose limits continue to be pushed today.
French policing policy is rooted in Napoleon’s ultra-centralised state and in the political philosophy of the Republic. In France, the police are an instrument of the state. Their core task is to protect it, enforce its laws, and maintain public order.
Conceptually, that is a far cry from, for example, the UK, where since the early 1800s the police have been considered servants of the public, whose authority derives from public consent and whose chief responsibility is to keep the peace.
French police officers are agents of state authority. That means protests, blockades and mass disorder are not just civil nuisances, but direct challenges to the authority of the republic. The police’s priority is to reclaim the streets, not to negotiate.
That explains the aggressive tactics, such as systematically encircling and trapping crowds, and their continued use of “intermediate” or less-than-lethal weapons, many of which are banned or heavily restricted elsewhere in Europe.
Defence ball launchers, for example, fire rubber projectiles at 185mph (300kph). The explosive grenades that injured gilets jaunes protesters in the late 2010s and killed an environmental protester in 2014 have been phased out, but been replaced by pyrotechnic stun grenades.
Designed to disperse crowds through both impact and a 160dB acoustic shock, these have caused multiple injuries in recent years, including lost eyes and teeth, fractured jaws and several amputated limbs. They also frequently instil mass panic.
Violent policing methods are also fostered by France’s almost unique culture of street protest. A legacy of insurrection dating back to the 1789 revolution means protesters know the street can, and generally does, force governments to back down.
Unlike in Germany or the Netherlands, French unions, while they may strike often, are not formal government negotiating partners. The top-heavy, presidential structure of the Fifth Republic marginalises institutional consultation.
That means a heavily centralised state often passes laws with little popular agreement, making the “power of the street” one of citizens’ few viable means of forcing concessions. Protest here is regarded as a civic duty and a legitimate democratic tool.
That creates a vicious circle. French authorities see large crowds as an existential threat, so send in the police. Their military-style tactics entrench the aggression and alienate peaceful demonstrators. This prompts the more radical groups to opt for more violent tactics. But rather than isolating those elements, police respond with baton charges and munitions. And that turns protests into battles.
Data from conflict monitoring organisations, such as Acled, consistently shows that France, perhaps surprisingly, does not always record western Europe’s highest number of demonstrations (Germany and Italy also vie for that title).
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But it does show that France consistently records the highest rates of escalated, high-intensity unrest, including street barricades, widespread vandalism and looting, arson attacks and direct confrontations between protesters and police.
France’s approach to policing and crowd management has for decades drawn condemnation from international human rights monitors and civil society groups, including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the Council of Europe.
Reports have documented instances of excessive force, misuse of grenades and rubber bullets, arbitrary mass arrests and routine teargas deployment against largely non-violent protesters. But the model persists, and is even expanding.
Last month, thousands marched in protest at a proposed “licence to kill” law seeking to establish a legal “presumption of self-defence” for police officers and gendarmes using firearms in the line of duty.
The law, opposed by civil rights groups, leftwing politicians, the magistrates’ union and the UN, would in effect shift the burden of proof on to victims and their families to demonstrate that a police shooting was disproportionate.
In essence, critics argue, it would institutionalise police impunity; reinforcing, once more, a security culture that treats public dissent and social tension not as democratic realities to be managed, but as insurrections to be repressed. The battle for France’s streets is far from over.
