France is heading for a grassroots revolution

Burning cars and shops and restaurants, Molotov cocktails, armed protesters, police in riot gear. This is Paris today!! And it could get worse this weekend. It is an historic fact that within the French soul there is a revolutionary spirit, an anarchic "ingredient de caractere" which lies dormant until something sparks a chemical reaction. President Macron is one of many French leaders who have tried to reform the country, change the dominant power of the trades unions and bring sense and sensibility to the economy. All previous presidents who tried failed dismally because they came up against that rock-solid refusal to change. Past presidents have backed down in the face of nationwide protests and the blocking of major motorway routes into Paris with articulated lorries or tractors or combine harvesters. When Macron came to power, everyone thought it would be different. He had emerged from nowhere, a new political force, young and dashing and visionary and the leader of a party he created from which he had to extract suitable candidates for government. But, inevitably, he has had to confront the very same opposition to change which destroyed his predecessors. His five per cent hike on fuel prices, part of his attempt to reduce France's deficit and introduce carbon restrictions, was the litmus test for his political policies. But the working people of France erupted and, infiltrated by violent extremists, began burning the streets of Paris. Even damaging the iconic Arc de Triomphe at the top end of the Champs-Elysees. Macron backed down, something he said he would never do. First he got his prime minister to suspend the five per cent fuel price increase and then he abandoned it altogether. But the trouble with that is that the violent demonstrators, those who want to bring down the government - the real hardened revolutionary anarchists - have been given hope. If they can force Macron to back down over fuel prices what more concessions can they extract from the president? Showing weakness in the face of violence always leads to more violence. The French police will be out in force this weekend in the capital because they fear that Paris will be besieged by extremist demonstrators determined to make the city burn. It is sad and tragic and terrifying for everyone in one of the most beautiful cities in Europe.