WEBVTT 00:01.250 --> 00:03.240 Professor John Merriman: All right, 00:03.240 --> 00:06.060 I want to today talk about 1968, which I can even remember, 00:06.055 --> 00:07.895 though I wasn't in France in 1968. 00:07.900 --> 00:17.080 First of all 1968 has to be put in the context of mobilization 00:17.078 --> 00:23.578 across Western Europe, and indeed in some places in 00:23.580 --> 00:28.430 the United States, that had more to do with than 00:28.433 --> 00:34.073 simply reform in universities, but had a lot to do with the 00:34.067 --> 00:37.327 world, as people like me saw it in 1968. 00:37.330 --> 00:45.070 It was a time when the Americans were at war in Vietnam 00:45.073 --> 00:51.243 and student protests had begun to expand. 00:51.240 --> 00:56.580 The first teach-in against the War in Vietnam was in the 00:56.584 --> 01:00.184 University of Michigan, in Haven Hall, 01:00.180 --> 01:03.970 in about 1966, or maybe '65 or '66. 01:03.969 --> 01:09.219 And the movement spread in the United States, 01:09.224 --> 01:16.274 and of course you've read about 1970 at Yale when people, 01:16.269 --> 01:20.309 the exams never happened, and it was the time of the 01:20.306 --> 01:21.886 Bobby Seale trial. 01:21.890 --> 01:25.580 And, so, this sort of generation, this sort of baby 01:25.580 --> 01:28.680 boom generation, whether it was in Rome, 01:28.680 --> 01:31.270 or in Athens, or in Berlin, 01:31.270 --> 01:34.360 or Bruxelles, or in even Munich, 01:34.360 --> 01:38.410 though less so in Munich, or in Madison, 01:38.408 --> 01:42.628 Wisconsin or in Berkeley, California, where the Free 01:42.629 --> 01:47.599 Speech Movement had started a couple of years before that--it 01:47.595 --> 01:52.805 was all sort of linked together as people thought about what the 01:52.810 --> 01:57.610 downsides of the new prosperity that had come in France and 01:57.610 --> 02:02.040 other countries, and the expansion of the 02:02.040 --> 02:06.170 university system to include more people. 02:06.170 --> 02:13.040 And, so, the sort of waves of protest were linked. 02:13.039 --> 02:15.829 And in the case of France, which is what we're talking 02:15.830 --> 02:18.200 about, there were really two aspects of it. 02:18.199 --> 02:22.769 There were the strikes-- more about that in a minute--and then 02:22.771 --> 02:25.771 there were the student demonstrations, 02:25.770 --> 02:29.510 the riots, the aggressive reaction by the so-called 02:29.513 --> 02:34.383 "forces of order," which is what they liked to call themselves, 02:34.379 --> 02:40.319 and leading eventually to the resignation of Charles de 02:40.319 --> 02:43.249 Gaulle. So, it was at a time, 02:43.250 --> 02:47.690 rather like 1936, when everything seemed possible 02:47.686 --> 02:51.286 and it was a time of great optimism. 02:51.289 --> 02:55.489 And there are all sorts of books published of the graffiti 02:55.493 --> 02:58.763 of 1968, as students, most of whom smoked in those 03:01.967 --> 03:03.747 burned, with their cigarettes, 03:06.420 --> 03:09.310 and when speeches went on and on in the Sorbonne. 03:09.310 --> 03:14.830 The war of words was written on the walls of the subways, 03:14.825 --> 03:19.055 as I guess Simon and Garfunkle once sang, 03:23.808 --> 03:26.988 Quartier Latin. "Long live communication, 03:26.991 --> 03:31.511 down with telecommunication," reflected the great uncertainty 03:31.506 --> 03:36.166 that technology and push-button remote controls and all of this 03:36.172 --> 03:38.282 was not enough in life. 03:38.280 --> 03:42.380 "The more I make love the more I make the revolution; 03:42.379 --> 03:46.059 the more I make the revolution the more I make love." 03:46.060 --> 03:51.420 "Every view of things which is not strange is false." 03:51.419 --> 03:55.209 "Amnesty, an act through which sovereigns forgive the 03:55.214 --> 03:58.724 injustices they have committed"--that's not a bad 03:58.716 --> 04:01.226 one. "Mankind will not live free 04:01.229 --> 04:05.439 until the last capitalist has been hanged in the entrails of 04:05.444 --> 04:08.664 the last bureaucrat"--not a very nice one, 04:08.659 --> 04:12.199 that, nor very original because that came from the French 04:12.203 --> 04:15.813 Revolution, the radical phase of the French Revolution, 04:15.810 --> 04:20.470 that "we all be safe only when the last priest has been hung in 04:20.474 --> 04:25.294 the entrails--or strangled in the entrails of the last noble." 04:25.290 --> 04:29.710 So, there was--as they quarreled, and they debated, 04:29.710 --> 04:33.420 and they battled, everybody didn't agree on 04:33.423 --> 04:36.373 everything, and it was like the Paris 04:36.371 --> 04:40.071 Commune, and there were a lot of childish aspects to it. 04:40.070 --> 04:45.080 It was a youthful resonance; people my age, 04:45.077 --> 04:49.787 though most of them were older than me, that in those days, 04:49.791 --> 04:52.881 "Professors, you are old," was one. 04:52.879 --> 04:56.619 And one I can remember, and I believed it at the time, 04:56.619 --> 04:59.159 "Never trust anybody over thirty." 04:59.160 --> 05:04.420 Thirty seems awfully young to me now. 05:04.420 --> 05:08.170 It was in the wake of the consumer revolution, 05:08.165 --> 05:12.575 it was in the wake of the thirty glorious years of the 05:12.576 --> 05:16.616 French economy expanding; and the same thing happened, 05:16.617 --> 05:19.057 the West German economic miracle as well. 05:19.060 --> 05:24.070 It was a reaction to the kind of technocratic society that 05:24.074 --> 05:27.764 seemed unfulfilling, that seemed to have turned 05:27.762 --> 05:30.592 capitalism and the State, that dynamic duo, 05:30.592 --> 05:32.482 loose on ordinary people. 05:32.480 --> 05:38.410 And here it was tied to the war in Vietnam and a verbally, 05:38.412 --> 05:44.662 rhetorically violent reaction against an American way of sort 05:44.657 --> 05:50.067 of splitting up the world with the Soviet Union; 05:50.069 --> 05:53.309 and it has to be seen in all of that. 05:53.310 --> 05:55.370 And it generated resistance. 05:55.370 --> 05:59.880 At the end--we'll come into this in while--but there was a 06:03.120 --> 06:05.730 and of the prosperous people. 06:05.730 --> 06:08.980 And you could see them from the 16th arrondissement and 06:08.976 --> 06:11.956 there were ladies in their fur coats and they're flashing 06:11.957 --> 06:14.417 rings, and they were there to express 06:14.416 --> 06:17.816 their solidarity with the General, to whom all of this 06:17.820 --> 06:20.930 seemed something just strange, from another planet, 06:20.929 --> 06:23.649 that he couldn't comprehend, didn't want to deal with, 06:23.649 --> 06:27.999 just wished it was all going to go away. 06:28.000 --> 06:36.070 In terms of--also you have to put it--it is linked to America. 06:36.069 --> 06:38.009 Because you have to remember--and you weren't even 06:38.005 --> 06:40.515 born then; one of you was in this room, 06:40.522 --> 06:44.542 besides me--Martin Luther King had just been murdered in 06:44.535 --> 06:46.135 Memphis, Tennessee. 06:46.139 --> 06:52.549 And that was an enormous, enormous event for people of my 06:52.551 --> 06:56.341 generation. And it seemed that if you--the 06:56.343 --> 07:00.573 harder you worked for social justice--people believed in 07:00.567 --> 07:04.327 social justice and we believed in associations and 07:04.330 --> 07:07.460 organizations, and then when people went out, 07:07.464 --> 07:10.094 down to Mississippi, to work on the civil rights 07:10.087 --> 07:11.797 march, and then they got murdered. 07:11.800 --> 07:14.970 And I remember going with a couple of friends of mine from 07:14.973 --> 07:17.763 Jesuit High School and we joined--went out to North 07:17.757 --> 07:22.477 Portland and joined the NAACP, and we were sixteen-years-old, 07:22.480 --> 07:25.500 we'd just learned how to drive. 07:25.500 --> 07:29.610 And if you believed in social justice-- and we weren't big 07:29.613 --> 07:33.223 militants, though certainly during the war we were, 07:33.221 --> 07:35.821 we all were, or many of us were. 07:35.819 --> 07:39.019 But then every time you took a big step forward, 07:39.021 --> 07:42.971 then it just seemed like we were confronted with the Lyndon 07:42.972 --> 07:46.312 Johnsons and the Richard Nixons of the world; 07:46.310 --> 07:51.130 and with the murder of Martin Luther King. 07:51.129 --> 07:54.149 And, so, these things did reflect a globalization, 07:54.145 --> 07:57.895 just as the Algerian War--one of the arguments that I made, 07:57.899 --> 08:00.959 which is Matt Connolly's argument, is that the Algerian 08:00.959 --> 08:04.529 War reflected the globalization of technology and newspapers, 08:04.529 --> 08:08.239 and the rebels getting the newspapers on their side about 08:08.242 --> 08:12.082 French torture. Well, the globalization of news 08:12.080 --> 08:17.330 with "Got Live from Vietnam" and all this business meant that 08:17.325 --> 08:20.105 issues, the murder of Martin Luther 08:20.113 --> 08:24.583 King and the Americans plunging more and more money and more and 08:24.578 --> 08:27.518 more bodies into wars, in other places, 08:27.521 --> 08:31.401 had ramifications from Nanterre--which I'll talk about 08:31.401 --> 08:34.331 in a minute--which is the university, 08:34.330 --> 08:36.530 one of them, to the west of Paris, 08:36.530 --> 08:40.130 and the Sorbonne which had been there for centuries and 08:40.132 --> 08:43.342 centuries and centuries, since the Medieval Period, 08:43.337 --> 08:44.467 in the Latin Quarter. 08:44.470 --> 08:48.390 So, the problems seemed, did generate simplistic answers 08:48.388 --> 08:52.658 that if you thought hard and you went out and worked that you 08:52.663 --> 08:55.873 could abolish the excesses of capitalism, 08:55.870 --> 08:58.840 you could abolish the excesses of the State. 08:58.840 --> 09:00.730 And it would be a more reasonable world, 09:00.727 --> 09:02.027 wouldn't it, that the Lyndon 09:02.033 --> 09:03.053 Johnsons…? 09:03.049 --> 09:06.929 I remember, March 31st, 1968, announced he would not 09:06.927 --> 09:09.667 run for office. And the Richard Nixons, 09:09.674 --> 09:13.534 that "people power"--that was a phrase that was used in France 09:13.533 --> 09:16.003 and in the United States in Berkley, 09:16.000 --> 09:18.210 at Columbia, in Ann Arbor and all sorts of 09:18.214 --> 09:21.144 places. But specifically in France it 09:21.142 --> 09:25.192 had to do with a crisis of education, a crisis in 09:25.185 --> 09:28.525 education, that education in a society 09:28.529 --> 09:32.859 that was still class-based, and to an extent is still 09:32.860 --> 09:36.750 class-based, had remained the privilege of 09:36.748 --> 09:41.028 the upper classes, even as the numbers of people 09:41.025 --> 09:45.295 in the university system in France had increased 09:45.302 --> 09:49.332 dramatically, as all across Europe this had 09:49.334 --> 09:52.484 happened. In 1938 there were 79,000 09:52.476 --> 09:55.346 university students in France. 09:55.350 --> 10:02.220 In 1958/59 there were 192,000, in the same buildings. 10:02.220 --> 10:09.880 In 1967/'68, there were 478,000--that is a 10:09.875 --> 10:14.095 huge number. And in 1968, 10:14.102 --> 10:19.882 just since 1967, the number had increased by 10:19.878 --> 10:23.638 50,000 more, in one year. 10:23.640 --> 10:25.280 Now, this is the baby boom. 10:25.279 --> 10:27.379 If you go back eighteen, twenty years, 10:27.380 --> 10:29.650 before that, you have the la fin de la 10:29.651 --> 10:32.491 guerre, you have the end of World War Two. 10:32.490 --> 10:37.130 So, you've got all these little babies who had grown up, 10:37.125 --> 10:40.155 like me, and were in universities. 10:40.159 --> 10:45.319 But the university structure could not possibly welcome all 10:45.318 --> 10:48.538 of these folks. I have these really good 10:48.541 --> 10:51.821 friends in Lyon, they actually now they live in 10:51.822 --> 10:54.892 Paris and they--I met a Greek professor, 10:54.889 --> 10:58.359 a long time ago, and she was teaching in one of 10:58.363 --> 11:02.743 these huge Greek universities in Athens where she had 1,000 11:02.742 --> 11:06.142 students in her class, 1,000, and no TAs. 11:06.139 --> 11:11.279 You better come up with a question that you can grade 11:11.283 --> 11:15.833 1,000 answers to--name three people, name three 11:15.832 --> 11:18.802 nineteenth-century Greeks. 11:18.800 --> 11:20.150 You better come up with... 11:20.149 --> 11:24.509 It was an impossible situation for students and for faculty. 11:24.509 --> 11:27.659 And as now, as in the issues now, there wasn't light at the 11:27.659 --> 11:30.699 end of the tunnel because compounding the fact that there 11:30.699 --> 11:33.579 weren't jobs--unless you were in one of the grandes 11:37.100 --> 11:38.700 unless you were an anarque, 11:38.697 --> 11:41.357 one of these people in the administration school who was 11:41.361 --> 11:43.541 going to just slide into some party post, 11:43.539 --> 11:47.519 in a Gaullist government, what was there at the end? 11:47.519 --> 11:50.729 And you also had this extraordinary ambiguity, 11:50.727 --> 11:53.647 in thinking about this, or ambivalence, 11:53.649 --> 11:56.709 because if you were basically against the sort of 11:56.712 --> 11:59.462 technological, super-powered society of fast 11:59.455 --> 12:02.225 cars, and the Americanization of 12:02.229 --> 12:05.699 European culture, if you believed strongly 12:05.696 --> 12:08.116 against that, what kind of job is there going 12:08.115 --> 12:09.485 to be at the end of the tunnel for you? 12:09.490 --> 12:11.900 You can't be a professional militant your entire life. 12:11.900 --> 12:13.280 What are you going to do? 12:13.279 --> 12:15.279 And the people, by the way, who were, 12:15.284 --> 12:18.184 who invested their careers, or lost their careers, 12:18.179 --> 12:23.209 in this mobilization were toast because they refused to sit for 12:23.213 --> 12:26.153 their exams, and they committed professional 12:26.149 --> 12:28.819 suicide, right on stage, because they did it. 12:28.820 --> 12:31.950 And it all starts with the latter, when Daniel Cohn-Bendit, 12:31.954 --> 12:35.614 who was a militant, when he was expelled from the 12:35.608 --> 12:39.948 University of Nanterre, because of his militancy. 12:39.950 --> 12:44.510 So, there was a lack of jobs, particularly for those people 12:44.505 --> 12:47.955 studying the life of the mind, studying arts, 12:47.960 --> 12:50.160 the literature, history. 12:50.159 --> 12:53.329 And the structure had changed very little since Napoleon 12:56.907 --> 13:00.077 knew what everybody was studying at any given time; 13:00.080 --> 13:03.230 it had not changed and to some extent it still hasn't changed 13:03.228 --> 13:05.378 now--more about that maybe in a minute. 13:05.379 --> 13:08.709 The structures of the universities were extremely 13:08.705 --> 13:12.545 rigid. In 1964 two percent of the 13:12.547 --> 13:19.627 university students were sons or daughters of workers and 13:19.627 --> 13:23.797 peasants, two percent in 1964. 13:23.799 --> 13:28.409 This is what's called a class society, and it had not changed 13:28.409 --> 13:32.479 very much by 1968--and people blamed the state for the 13:32.481 --> 13:34.551 rigidity. I have a friend, 13:34.550 --> 13:38.700 in fact a Gaullist with whom I waited in line to get into Notre 13:38.697 --> 13:41.437 Dame for the Charles de Gaulle affair, 13:41.440 --> 13:44.560 who was supposed to take--he's a lawyer and he was taking an 13:44.558 --> 13:47.228 advanced degree, and he lived in the suburbs and 13:47.231 --> 13:50.511 he stayed in--the prosperous suburbs, fairly prosperous--but 13:50.508 --> 13:53.728 he stayed in Paris one night because the metros closed, 13:53.730 --> 13:56.500 the buses closed, and if you didn't make the 13:56.502 --> 14:00.012 12:32 then you had a long walk; and I've walked back to that 14:00.012 --> 14:03.022 suburb and hitchhiked back and all of that--some funny stories 14:03.023 --> 14:04.903 about that but now is not the time. 14:04.899 --> 14:09.739 And he got back on Saturday to find a pneumatique--which 14:09.737 --> 14:13.187 was a way of communicating, these little things that shot 14:13.194 --> 14:15.714 around and then were delivered to your--in tubes and they were 14:15.705 --> 14:18.255 delivered to your house--saying that he was supposed to show up 14:18.258 --> 14:20.178 for the exam; and it had arrived on Friday, 14:20.183 --> 14:22.143 when he was at work, and was supposed to take his 14:22.143 --> 14:22.963 exam on Saturday. 14:22.960 --> 14:25.440 And of course he got it on Saturday at about noon, 14:25.439 --> 14:27.969 when he got home, after his long night in Paris; 14:27.970 --> 14:29.480 and that was the end of that. 14:29.480 --> 14:31.730 Then you'd just simply say, "well, I guess I'll take it 14:31.733 --> 14:33.573 next time around, if I happen to be here." 14:33.570 --> 14:39.370 It was a rigid system that was unforgiving and seemed to be 14:39.366 --> 14:44.756 perpetuating the kind of elitism and the kind of unfair 14:44.763 --> 14:50.363 sociopolitical world against which people struggled. 14:50.360 --> 14:53.900 And 1967, in the worst economic year of the '60s, 14:53.898 --> 14:56.998 as I've just said, de Gaulle's response was 14:56.995 --> 14:59.065 typical. He said, "well we need to have 14:59.074 --> 14:59.914 more participation." 14:59.909 --> 15:02.239 Qu'est-ce que a veut dire, what does this mean to 15:02.238 --> 15:04.438 have more participation, what do you mean by that? 15:04.440 --> 15:05.960 Well he meant nothing by that. 15:05.960 --> 15:10.910 In October 1966 his workers were getting increasingly 15:10.906 --> 15:14.136 militant and he said, "you know, 15:14.139 --> 15:18.529 the changes that we must bring to the working-class condition 15:18.527 --> 15:22.837 is the active association of work and the active association 15:22.841 --> 15:26.571 of the economy which we all want to accomplish, 15:26.570 --> 15:28.480 all of us." What does this mean? 15:28.480 --> 15:31.010 It means nothing, it means nothing. 15:31.009 --> 15:35.269 And, so, phrases like that, sentences like that are 15:35.269 --> 15:39.699 reassuring for the upper classes in Paris or Lyon, 15:39.700 --> 15:41.580 in the sixth arrondissement of Lyon, 15:41.583 --> 15:43.023 or wherever, who don't want to be 15:43.018 --> 15:46.798 bousculer, they don't want to be bothered 15:46.799 --> 15:51.059 by the militancy of students and of workers. 15:51.059 --> 15:53.589 They want the metros to run, they want the buses to run, 15:53.585 --> 15:56.335 they don't want the students building barricades and all this 15:56.340 --> 15:58.030 stuff. So it's reassuring to them but 15:58.032 --> 15:59.062 it didn't mean anything. 15:59.059 --> 16:01.519 De Gaulle was so completely out of it, he said, 16:03.929 --> 16:08.419 "I'm adrift from the French, I'm cut off from the French," 16:08.416 --> 16:11.566 because he had no understanding--that the 16:11.565 --> 16:14.945 nationalism of French should be enough, 16:14.950 --> 16:17.370 that the mystical body of himself should certainly be 16:17.370 --> 16:19.640 enough. But of course it wasn't. 16:19.639 --> 16:21.959 And the demonstrations, many of them organized by the 16:21.957 --> 16:25.777 National Union of Students, which had begun--which was 16:25.784 --> 16:30.954 militant, had begun in the 1950s, or maybe the '40s, 16:30.950 --> 16:37.330 I don't remember--its militancy had declined after the Algerian 16:37.333 --> 16:42.073 War, but then you have the students leaders, 16:42.070 --> 16:45.180 whose names you don't remember, but they were young, 16:45.182 --> 16:48.162 often young sociologists, or one was in physics, 16:48.162 --> 16:50.892 Alain Jeanmaire, names don't matter--well they 16:50.887 --> 16:54.457 did to them and they did to people of my generation but they 16:54.460 --> 16:58.090 don't necessarily to you--they were in sociology or mostly in 16:58.093 --> 17:03.403 literature and history, and they all committed together 17:03.401 --> 17:05.881 professional suicide. 17:05.880 --> 17:08.420 And, so, it begins with demonstrations in Nanterre. 17:08.420 --> 17:14.250 Now, the French university system began with the Sorbonne, 17:14.247 --> 17:18.027 and the Latin Quarter is so called, 17:18.029 --> 17:19.499 as you know, because that's what people 17:19.497 --> 17:20.537 spoke in the Middle Ages. 17:20.539 --> 17:23.729 Students conversed in Latin, Latin was a living language. 17:23.730 --> 17:27.650 And the second medical school in Europe is Montpellier; 17:27.650 --> 17:28.950 the first was Bologne. 17:28.950 --> 17:32.910 And there was already a very strong university in Lyon, 17:32.908 --> 17:36.718 and there was X and there were other universities. 17:36.720 --> 17:40.910 But the big expansion of even the Paris system and of 17:40.914 --> 17:45.194 provincial universities has come in response, in part, 17:45.190 --> 17:48.740 to these big events, in this heady time. 17:48.740 --> 17:53.330 But they haven't necessarily brought many changes, 17:53.325 --> 17:55.285 as we'll see later. 17:55.289 --> 17:59.319 And, so, there's also lack of a campus. 17:59.319 --> 18:03.449 I've taught at Lyon, at Lyon II, and I teach in 18:03.448 --> 18:06.228 Rouen sometimes, and there's, 18:06.230 --> 18:09.950 with the exception of Grenoble, which has a fairly nice campus, 18:09.950 --> 18:13.410 maybe Montpellier a little bit, most of the places, 18:13.406 --> 18:16.586 students don't, most of them don't live in 18:16.594 --> 18:19.214 dormitories, and so they're just places 18:19.214 --> 18:21.794 where they go--they're essentially all-commuter 18:21.788 --> 18:23.578 colleges. If you go to Lyon, 18:23.582 --> 18:26.702 University of Lyon, I, II or II--they're also named 18:26.701 --> 18:29.011 in such a not terribly poetic way. 18:29.009 --> 18:32.119 University of Paris has 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8, 18:32.116 --> 18:33.626 9,10,11,12,13,14. 18:33.630 --> 18:35.700 So, you say, "where are you a student?" 18:40.859 --> 18:45.039 that's Villetaneuse, and oh my god it's just 18:45.041 --> 18:47.671 unbelievable. These are buildings that were 18:47.670 --> 18:49.970 built, already falling apart and they're just out there, 18:49.970 --> 18:53.610 and they're soulless and it's a… You're privileged, 18:53.606 --> 18:56.346 you've worked very hard to be privileged. 18:56.350 --> 18:57.890 In Michigan we were privileged. 18:57.890 --> 19:01.410 But you can't--there's no sense of solidarity. 19:01.410 --> 19:02.470 There's nothing to do. 19:02.470 --> 19:04.110 There are no sports really basically; 19:04.109 --> 19:05.359 there's the equivalent of club sports. 19:05.359 --> 19:08.139 They would just sit around and smoke cigarettes. 19:08.140 --> 19:10.940 And there's just not much to do, there's no sense of 19:10.941 --> 19:13.691 esprit de corps, there's no sense of being a 19:13.687 --> 19:15.497 former student of that place. 19:15.500 --> 19:18.660 It's part of your existence for three years--unless you're one 19:21.097 --> 19:22.287 folks and all that. 19:22.289 --> 19:26.699 So, even trying to get people to mobilize against the 19:26.696 --> 19:29.066 structure isn't very easy. 19:29.069 --> 19:31.839 But the conditions, they start out with these 19:31.837 --> 19:34.477 demonstrations against these conditions. 19:34.480 --> 19:38.590 This is also tied--and this is a point I stupidly forgot to 19:38.594 --> 19:41.294 mention early--the women's movement, 19:41.289 --> 19:47.719 although not terribly dominant in France, still essentially 19:47.715 --> 19:52.585 limited--this is probably an exaggeration, 19:52.589 --> 19:56.369 but to the middle class feminists, influenced by Simone 19:56.373 --> 20:00.303 de Beauvoir, the women's movement also meant that lots of 20:00.297 --> 20:03.627 women put forth their claims; and again, as I said, 20:03.630 --> 20:06.690 that the vast majority of the students are bourgeois students, 20:06.690 --> 20:10.090 they're upper class students and so--but that still was part 20:10.089 --> 20:12.019 of it. And the way society is 20:12.015 --> 20:16.145 structured in the United States then where sexism was even more 20:16.145 --> 20:20.745 endemic then than it is now, that for militant females this 20:20.752 --> 20:23.212 was part of the problem too. 20:23.210 --> 20:26.730 There was so much that seemed to have to be changed that it 20:26.725 --> 20:28.115 was very frustrating. 20:28.120 --> 20:31.310 And, so, there are occupations. 20:31.309 --> 20:34.079 People in the United States occupied administrative 20:34.076 --> 20:36.436 buildings. Unfortunately they often 20:36.443 --> 20:39.523 destroyed books. It happened at Columbia and 20:39.516 --> 20:40.756 places like that. 20:40.759 --> 20:44.299 But there was lots of student occupations--at Yale there were 20:44.301 --> 20:46.841 too, I wasn't around, but there were too. 20:46.839 --> 20:49.669 And the National Guard, if you can imagine the National 20:49.670 --> 20:52.710 Guard tanks coming up--John Blum has told me about that, 20:52.710 --> 20:54.480 my colleague, former colleague, 20:54.479 --> 20:55.599 now long retired. 20:55.599 --> 20:58.939 But Branford College was le college rouge, 20:58.937 --> 21:03.177 and I guess they had a red flag up or something and tanks were 21:03.179 --> 21:07.629 coming down--if you can imagine tanks coming up York Street, 21:07.630 --> 21:11.290 between J.E. and Pearson or between 21:11.289 --> 21:14.499 Davenport and Branford, and they were setting up little 21:14.502 --> 21:18.012 welcome centers and possible places to treat people that are 21:18.012 --> 21:21.522 injured by the National Guard who wanted nothing of militant 21:21.523 --> 21:24.783 privileged students, and then May 4th^(,) 1970, 21:24.779 --> 21:28.079 gunned them down at Kent State with great pleasure. 21:28.080 --> 21:30.430 These were different times. 21:30.430 --> 21:33.080 But, anyway, so in France they start 21:33.079 --> 21:36.639 occupying buildings, and on May--the Sorbonne is 21:36.636 --> 21:38.676 closed down on May 2nd. 21:38.680 --> 21:42.560 And on May 3rd the police move in. 21:42.559 --> 21:46.649 Now, the police, the CRS were hated, 21:46.650 --> 21:49.820 were hated. The CRS, many of them were 21:49.818 --> 21:53.748 southerners, and the rumors--and I can remember these rumors, 21:53.750 --> 21:58.230 that they were kept in their barracks and not fed enough and 21:58.233 --> 22:02.643 given special sections on why militant workers and militant 22:02.640 --> 22:07.280 students represented the end of civilization as they had known 22:07.276 --> 22:09.636 it. And they had their big--you can 22:09.644 --> 22:12.804 still see this now because many of them feel they have free 22:12.795 --> 22:15.235 reign now with Sarkozy--their big shields, 22:15.240 --> 22:17.790 and their big helmets, and what you call in French 22:19.509 --> 22:23.029 these big trucks that have grills on them, 22:23.033 --> 22:25.873 like if you're shaking lettuce. 22:25.869 --> 22:29.109 And they would suddenly come tearing along the place; 22:29.109 --> 22:30.459 and it wasn't just circulez, 22:30.463 --> 22:32.213 like move along, move along, they'd just beat 22:32.214 --> 22:33.174 the hell out of you. 22:33.170 --> 22:35.840 And we're still not sure how many people died in all of this, 22:35.844 --> 22:37.944 how many people were battered by these folks. 22:37.940 --> 22:40.340 But you can tell--I grew up just hating these people, 22:40.342 --> 22:41.222 just hating them. 22:41.220 --> 22:43.360 You'd walk along, in the '70s even, 22:43.358 --> 22:47.068 they'd be down in their trucks on Boulevard Saint-Germain or 22:50.589 --> 22:54.009 It's just a very contentious age, and you just grew up--if 22:54.014 --> 22:56.484 you're my generation, I guess my politics, 22:56.477 --> 22:58.397 you just hated these people. 22:58.400 --> 23:00.660 And nobody hated them, had reason more to hate 23:00.661 --> 23:03.331 them--and this may be unfair but it's not unfair--than 23:03.326 --> 23:05.936 minorities, because those are the ones that 23:05.936 --> 23:08.986 these white, many of them Corsican but it's not just 23:08.991 --> 23:11.861 Corsicans, but white people from the south 23:11.858 --> 23:15.698 who were moved into northern posts and they didn't want to 23:15.698 --> 23:18.008 see North Africans, or West Africans, 23:18.014 --> 23:19.344 or folks like that around. 23:19.339 --> 23:20.919 But, anyway, they move in, 23:20.916 --> 23:24.696 they evacuate the Sorbonne and things spin out of control. 23:24.700 --> 23:27.750 And May 10th to May 11th is the night of the barricades. 23:27.750 --> 23:31.610 And the barricades go up in streets that had not had 23:31.612 --> 23:35.022 Haussmann's boulevards plowed through them. 23:35.019 --> 23:37.559 It was harder-- they do make some attempts and they do, 23:37.563 --> 23:40.153 I guess if I remember right across the--see that was the 23:40.154 --> 23:42.894 only year I wasn't there; that's sort of odd isn't it? 23:42.890 --> 23:45.600 But I first started going to France when I was a kid in 1967, 23:45.602 --> 23:48.182 and I've been there at least every four months since then, 23:48.178 --> 23:49.578 and I wasn't there in 1968. 23:49.579 --> 23:54.699 But there were barricades built between Rue Saint-Jacques and 23:54.703 --> 23:58.833 the Boulevard Saint-Michel, in that sort of now touristy, 23:58.831 --> 24:02.021 overrun with McDonald's quarter there, tourist quarter; 24:02.019 --> 24:05.559 and all around Rue Monsieur le Prince and all around the 24:08.500 --> 24:12.530 unfortunately many of them with trees that were ripped down on 24:12.529 --> 24:15.749 the Boulevard Saint-Michel, and they did a lot of damage 24:15.750 --> 24:17.390 there and they ripped up cobblestones, 24:17.390 --> 24:19.650 where streets still had cobblestones and they... 24:19.650 --> 24:23.230 Deux-Chevaux were these little, very unsafe, 24:23.225 --> 24:27.485 flimsy cars that you could-- I, with this friend of mined, 24:27.488 --> 24:30.118 picked up the front of a Deux-Chevaux to move, 24:30.117 --> 24:31.617 to park; you could just sort of 24:31.620 --> 24:33.890 literally--this guy and I--you could pick it up and kind of 24:33.890 --> 24:34.830 move the front along. 24:34.829 --> 24:38.169 And these things were easily transformed into barricades. 24:38.170 --> 24:41.680 And this was the night of the barricades and there was a lot 24:41.677 --> 24:44.077 of violence. These were real barricades. 24:44.079 --> 24:48.869 And this was rather one-sided violence, but still. 24:48.870 --> 24:52.390 So, there are 367 wounded; several killed, 24:52.386 --> 24:57.626 we still don't know how many; and about 460 arrests. 24:57.630 --> 25:02.290 Before that even, on May 6th during the fighting, 25:02.286 --> 25:07.036 there were 1,422 arrests, et cetera, et cetera. 25:07.039 --> 25:11.179 And the middle-class was shocked by the brutality of the 25:11.176 --> 25:15.686 fighting, but they were more shocked by the fact that you had 25:15.688 --> 25:20.048 workers and students who had not yet really coalesced, 25:20.050 --> 25:22.830 that were defying the State. 25:22.829 --> 25:28.319 And one of the obvious, C-R-S S-S, CRS SS, 25:28.321 --> 25:33.411 as the SS, as in Hitler's organization, 25:33.410 --> 25:37.830 and this is what was chanted. 25:37.829 --> 25:43.639 And it was all the way up to the Jardin de Luxembourg, 25:43.641 --> 25:49.021 from which they could get materials also for these 25:49.015 --> 25:53.085 barricades. How did the government react? 25:53.089 --> 25:58.449 The prime minister was Georges Pompidou, a pure kind of 25:58.448 --> 26:03.408 Gaullist whose only resistance in World War Two, 26:03.410 --> 26:06.100 incidentally--this is a bit mean to say--but he once refused 26:06.096 --> 26:07.686 to sit next to a Gestapo officer, 26:07.690 --> 26:10.630 in the opera, in a loge at the opera. 26:10.630 --> 26:14.760 But Pompidou had been in Afghanistan and he came back on 26:14.760 --> 26:18.290 May 11th and orders the university reopening, 26:18.289 --> 26:24.109 without the police, and then he went off to 26:24.114 --> 26:31.194 Rumania, as planned, and then he came back and found 26:31.187 --> 26:35.067 that strikes had spread. 26:35.069 --> 26:40.659 Now, the strikes themselves were both a separate but related 26:40.658 --> 26:43.188 movement. And the strikes came in the 26:43.186 --> 26:45.606 large industries, and there were no plants in 26:45.608 --> 26:46.928 Boulogne-Billancourt. 26:46.930 --> 26:53.020 These same kinds of occupations that had happened in 1936, 26:53.022 --> 26:58.692 in a way rather festive occupations--as Lenin had once 26:58.687 --> 27:00.997 said, with considerable reason, 27:00.998 --> 27:03.638 about the Commune, he called it a "festival of the 27:03.640 --> 27:06.930 oppressed"--and there was good humor in these occupations, 27:06.930 --> 27:09.430 again the same kind of guerrilla theater and all of 27:09.430 --> 27:11.930 this; great attention not to destroy 27:11.928 --> 27:16.008 the machinery that the workers, when this all had settled, 27:16.009 --> 27:20.739 would come back. But on May 14th^( )there an 27:20.738 --> 27:28.218 aircraft plant near Nantes was occupied and then the sit-down 27:28.222 --> 27:31.842 strike spread, as in 1936. 27:31.839 --> 27:37.189 On May 16th workers occupied the giant Renault Billancourt, 27:37.186 --> 27:41.516 Renault plant there, and then it spread to other 27:41.518 --> 27:45.148 areas. It was the largest mobilization 27:45.152 --> 27:49.532 of workers in French history, without any question, 27:49.527 --> 27:51.537 even more than 1936. 27:51.539 --> 27:54.959 And rather like 1936 it left the Communist Party confused and 27:54.962 --> 27:58.502 uncertain, because once again it seemed to be that the tail was 27:58.499 --> 28:01.169 wagging the dog. Workers are striking on their 28:01.172 --> 28:04.242 own, and they had slogans that weren't really big communist 28:04.238 --> 28:05.218 slogans. One was 28:08.650 --> 28:11.280 that workers would run their own factories. 28:11.279 --> 28:14.529 Now, in the Soviet Union, after the Russian Revolution, 28:14.531 --> 28:17.241 the Bolshevik, the Communist Party had crushed 28:17.240 --> 28:20.190 like grapes workers who attempted to run their own 28:20.190 --> 28:23.020 factories and who wanted to have strikes; 28:23.019 --> 28:27.009 and working the power of the proletariat in the Soviet Union, 28:27.014 --> 28:30.214 to an extent of Lenin but above all of Stalin, 28:30.210 --> 28:32.610 became the dictatorship of the Communist Party. 28:32.609 --> 28:36.859 Workers self-management simply didn't exist, 28:36.860 --> 28:39.430 it was run by the party. 28:39.430 --> 28:43.050 In theory it existed. 28:43.049 --> 28:45.439 The Communist Party was supposed to represent the 28:45.436 --> 28:48.366 Russian, the Soviet working class, but in fact the Communist 28:48.369 --> 28:50.109 Party had existence of its own. 28:50.109 --> 28:52.619 And, so, suddenly they're confused because here's the 28:52.618 --> 28:54.788 workers saying, "we want to run--we want to go 28:54.788 --> 28:55.848 out on strike now. 28:55.849 --> 28:56.999 And they said, "well, wait, 28:56.995 --> 28:59.415 wait"--it was the same thing as 1936--"everything is not 28:59.419 --> 29:01.269 possible, everything is not possible." 29:01.269 --> 29:04.679 But for workers occupying their plants it seemed to be--this 29:04.684 --> 29:06.714 seemed to be the moment to do it; 29:06.710 --> 29:10.070 and there was a strong link between big strike movements and 29:10.069 --> 29:12.119 political opportunity, as in 1936. 29:12.119 --> 29:15.649 So, it's a very, very good comparison to 29:15.645 --> 29:19.075 make--trent-six, '36 and '68. 29:19.079 --> 29:21.859 And the workers wanted participation in industrial 29:21.864 --> 29:24.364 decision-making, they wanted control over the 29:24.364 --> 29:26.464 pace of work. Again they were against 29:26.464 --> 29:29.374 Taylorism, that they're being measured, their performance is 29:29.374 --> 29:32.634 being measured by the number of units of whatever--car handles, 29:32.630 --> 29:35.140 whatever they're making, that they do. 29:35.140 --> 29:38.730 They want to have the right, which they eventually won, 29:38.732 --> 29:42.792 to have a union office in the factory and to collect fees from 29:42.790 --> 29:46.050 workers for the union and make--get collects, 29:46.049 --> 29:51.399 to pass the hat on behalf of the union and on behalf of 29:51.400 --> 29:59.150 workers in the union, during work. 29:59.150 --> 30:02.910 And, so, the political goals can't really be separated from 30:02.913 --> 30:06.163 the worker's movement, it was all part of this huge 30:06.157 --> 30:08.857 mobilization. And workers and students had 30:08.864 --> 30:12.194 really had a lot more in common than they did in the United 30:12.187 --> 30:14.397 States, because people of my generation 30:14.397 --> 30:17.357 can remember students at the University of Michigan going 30:17.356 --> 30:19.466 down to the Ford plants in Ypsilanti, 30:19.470 --> 30:22.220 and in other places, and up in Flint. 30:22.220 --> 30:25.930 And the workers there they didn't want to hear anything 30:25.933 --> 30:29.783 about these privileged white students opposing the war in 30:29.784 --> 30:32.144 Vietnam, they wanted to have a boat and 30:32.144 --> 30:34.144 go out on Lake Michigan or Lake Huron. 30:34.140 --> 30:35.950 And they were, "if the United States 30:35.947 --> 30:38.987 government is fighting a war in Vietnam then it must be--the 30:38.994 --> 30:41.684 United States government knows what it's doing"; 30:41.680 --> 30:43.610 and they didn't want any part of it. 30:43.609 --> 30:49.569 And, so, it was a total--talk about a failure to comprehend, 30:49.568 --> 30:53.168 it just didn't work, and to an extent--this is 30:53.173 --> 30:56.443 probably not a fair comparison-- but it would rather be like 30:56.436 --> 30:59.406 militants at Columbia, and Yale, and Harvard, 30:59.413 --> 31:01.953 and Michigan, and Madison activists, 31:01.949 --> 31:05.679 some white and some black, going down to Alabama and 31:05.681 --> 31:09.141 Mississippi and trying to talk to people down there, 31:09.140 --> 31:10.790 because it just, it didn't work. 31:10.789 --> 31:14.659 But in France because the state structure seemed to be, 31:14.655 --> 31:17.085 in a very centralized structure, 31:17.089 --> 31:21.009 not a federalized structure, so you could find common cause, 31:21.012 --> 31:24.402 because you're the factory worker who is occupying a 31:24.402 --> 31:26.982 factory. His enemy is the CRS, 31:26.976 --> 31:32.296 and the students who are afraid they're going to get gunned down 31:32.304 --> 31:37.044 by the CRS, they have things that they had in common. 31:37.039 --> 31:40.349 And they're both fighting against the brutalization, 31:40.351 --> 31:43.261 as they would have put it, of human relations, 31:43.258 --> 31:46.868 is that capitalism seemed to be simply perpetuating this favored 31:46.869 --> 31:48.989 society in which the rich do very, 31:48.990 --> 31:50.890 very well, thank you very much, and the grandes 31:52.946 --> 31:54.956 connected; basically that was always the 31:54.959 --> 31:56.479 case, the big, fancy schools. 31:56.480 --> 31:59.900 And the brutalization of human relations on the shop floor, 31:59.898 --> 32:03.138 with the bosses sort of dictating the rhythm of work. 32:03.140 --> 32:08.380 So, it seemed to be--there seemed to be this sort of moment 32:08.384 --> 32:11.644 where some progress could be made; 32:11.640 --> 32:15.490 and in a sense you're powerless within the system. 32:15.490 --> 32:17.550 In the French educational system you were, 32:17.550 --> 32:19.560 and to an extent still are, powerless. 32:19.559 --> 32:22.019 And in the factory you were powerless. 32:22.019 --> 32:26.039 And you're probably arguably more powerless now because the 32:26.039 --> 32:30.129 role of the unions has declined, in France, as in the United 32:30.127 --> 32:33.297 States. And in the end the government 32:33.296 --> 32:38.106 had to pass laws giving legal status within each factory, 32:38.109 --> 32:41.229 to the union, that they could collect funds, 32:41.234 --> 32:45.304 as I said--I guess I already said that--and could have an 32:45.304 --> 32:48.804 office there. But the education reforms 32:48.803 --> 32:51.613 basically scratch the surface. 32:51.609 --> 33:00.809 They're beginning--creating new universities all over the place. 33:03.551 --> 33:06.391 France that don't have at least branches of universities. 33:06.390 --> 33:09.990 The most recently created were La Rochelle, which is going very 33:09.986 --> 33:12.476 nicely, and the Pays-de-Calais, in Arras. 33:12.480 --> 33:15.770 But even these lead to problems because, for example, 33:15.773 --> 33:18.753 when they create a university in La Rochelle, 33:18.750 --> 33:22.440 then you are hurting an old established university, 33:22.444 --> 33:26.364 Poitiers, which becomes this sort of instant rival, 33:26.359 --> 33:28.539 La Rochelle does, for students from the area 33:28.543 --> 33:29.613 around La Rochelle. 33:29.609 --> 33:33.339 And the Pas-de-Calais, that is up in Arras, 33:33.344 --> 33:35.304 what does that hurt? 33:35.299 --> 33:39.069 Well that is resisted by Lille, obviously; 33:39.069 --> 33:40.749 in Lille there are three universities in Lille; 33:40.750 --> 33:42.380 Lille is a big student center. 33:42.380 --> 33:46.390 So, even in places that are major university towns. 33:46.390 --> 33:49.450 And Toulouse is a good example, they create more universities, 33:49.452 --> 33:52.472 they can expand the University of Toulouse, more branches and 33:52.465 --> 33:55.725 stuff like that. But does this solve the problem? 33:55.730 --> 33:59.290 It really doesn't because French universities remain 33:59.288 --> 34:02.778 woefully under-funded, and that's why this issue of 34:02.777 --> 34:06.407 this law that's been proposed, or it'd be passed, 34:09.762 --> 34:13.262 p-e-c-r-e-s-s-e, which is to make these budgets 34:13.264 --> 34:16.894 autonomous of universities, represents a kind of an 34:16.888 --> 34:21.168 Americanization of the French system where--that the favored 34:21.165 --> 34:24.825 will do even better--Paris I, Paris IV, which are very 34:24.829 --> 34:27.109 different. Paris I is associated more, 34:27.111 --> 34:29.741 a leftwing university, more progressive; 34:29.739 --> 34:35.609 Paris IV, quatre, is a more rightwing university. 34:35.610 --> 34:39.220 Lyon II, places like Lyon II, as opposed to Lyon I and Lyon 34:39.216 --> 34:41.576 III, is going to do very, very well; 34:41.579 --> 34:43.729 Toulouse is going to do very well under this system. 34:43.730 --> 34:47.420 Montpellier will do very well, maybe they'll be able to raise 34:47.420 --> 34:48.650 money from alumni. 34:48.650 --> 34:50.860 There's not even--it doesn't even exist, an alumni 34:50.855 --> 34:53.235 association for these places, they don't even exit. 34:53.240 --> 34:55.720 It's just totally different. 34:55.719 --> 34:59.349 Even a public university in the United States, 34:59.347 --> 35:02.247 like Michigan, even in hard times, 35:02.250 --> 35:03.910 just does so very, very well because the 35:03.906 --> 35:06.326 University of Michigan is so identified with--I'm a little 35:06.328 --> 35:08.578 proud but--identified with the State of Michigan; 35:08.580 --> 35:12.460 or Wisconsin or Berkley; Berkley might have hard times 35:12.455 --> 35:15.325 but the California system, it's so part of the State of 35:15.333 --> 35:17.703 California. But it doesn't do much good to 35:25.354 --> 35:27.384 them money there ain't going to be any money coming in. 35:27.380 --> 35:30.590 And, so, you have more and more people. 35:30.590 --> 35:35.600 Has anybody here been to a French university? 35:35.600 --> 35:37.670 Yes, where were you? 35:37.670 --> 35:38.880 Barkley, you were in Paris, weren't you? 35:38.880 --> 35:39.700 Student: In Paris [inaudible] 35:39.701 --> 35:40.711 Professor John Merriman: At Paris IV, 35:40.710 --> 35:41.790 and you went to the lectures and all that. 35:41.790 --> 35:42.660 Student: Yes. 35:42.659 --> 35:43.729 Professor John Merriman: Were there enormous numbers of 35:43.731 --> 35:47.681 people? Student: Lectures, so-so. 35:47.680 --> 35:50.520 I guess 100 to 200. 35:50.520 --> 35:51.660 But then we had TD as well. 35:51.659 --> 35:52.549 Professor John Merriman: Travaux 35:53.750 --> 35:57.470 But the way that these are done is you have these huge lectures. 35:57.470 --> 36:00.130 You know what? I taught in--I should get back 36:00.126 --> 36:02.076 to de Gaulle, but in a minute--but when I 36:02.082 --> 36:05.262 taught at Lyon II I was supposed to--I didn't pick my courses; 36:05.260 --> 36:07.570 here, I'm lucky enough at Yale to be able to pick my courses. 36:07.570 --> 36:10.140 They said, "well, you can do history of urban 36:10.143 --> 36:13.133 France," because I've written books on urban France, 36:13.127 --> 36:15.757 "and then you can do the 1920s and '30s." 36:15.760 --> 36:17.090 And I thought, "oh man, I don't want to do 36:17.090 --> 36:18.800 that." "And then you can do"--because 36:18.804 --> 36:21.574 we live part-time in North America--"you can do history of 36:21.567 --> 36:24.177 North America." And I don't know anything about 36:24.182 --> 36:25.542 that. And, so, I'm calling my 36:25.535 --> 36:28.095 friends, like David Davis and I'm calling my editors at OUP 36:28.095 --> 36:30.655 and Norton saying please send me all your books on American 36:30.656 --> 36:32.906 history. And, so, I'm sitting around, 36:32.909 --> 36:36.209 the night before--I did ridiculous lectures on Quebec. 36:36.210 --> 36:37.450 I don't know anything about that. 36:37.449 --> 36:39.569 I must have repeated three times about Louis XIV sending a 36:39.572 --> 36:41.942 boatload of prostitutes, because that's about all that I 36:41.940 --> 36:44.020 could remember, when I got up there in front of 36:44.017 --> 36:45.927 250 people, speaking about the history of 36:45.933 --> 36:48.193 North America--I don't know a damn thing about it; 36:48.190 --> 36:50.870 I know a little bit about it but not to teach it effectively. 36:50.870 --> 36:51.900 But that's just it. 36:51.900 --> 36:55.230 And then also because of the politics, the person--the dean 36:55.227 --> 36:58.557 was at war with my friends there, so they gave me the worst 36:58.555 --> 36:59.985 conceivable schedule. 36:59.989 --> 37:02.529 I had to go all the way up on Friday for an afternoon class 37:02.525 --> 37:04.665 and my other classes were on Monday and Wednesday, 37:04.666 --> 37:06.596 and all this. But you're teaching these 37:06.599 --> 37:08.409 people. And there were three courses on 37:08.407 --> 37:10.297 the 1920s and '30s, three lecture courses, 37:10.296 --> 37:13.286 and we would get together and say, "What are you going to do?" 37:13.289 --> 37:15.519 And we were smart enough to say, "Well I'll tell you what, 37:15.515 --> 37:17.815 you do the economy stuff and I'll do the political stuff, 37:17.820 --> 37:19.580 and we'll kind of help each other out." 37:19.579 --> 37:22.719 And you put down a reading list of books that you might hope 37:22.724 --> 37:24.724 that they would read, and maybe ten, 37:24.723 --> 37:26.993 eight books maybe, or something like that, 37:26.989 --> 37:28.259 a reasonable amount. 37:28.260 --> 37:31.630 But there are bookstores but there are no such thing as 37:31.627 --> 37:34.447 course readings. And what they used to do at the 37:34.449 --> 37:36.919 Sorbonne is they would--professors would print 37:36.916 --> 37:39.106 out their lectures and you could buy, 37:39.110 --> 37:42.470 at one of these bookstores, their lectures. 37:42.469 --> 37:43.619 So, they used to say, "well, the hell with it, 37:43.617 --> 37:45.047 I'm not going to go to the lecture if they're going to do 37:45.045 --> 37:46.665 that." But we took it more seriously 37:46.672 --> 37:48.142 and so we put out these books. 37:48.139 --> 37:50.619 And now--because students, French students don't have any 37:50.619 --> 37:52.749 money, they have no money, I mean no money, 37:52.745 --> 37:55.345 most of them--unless they're at fancy grandes 37:58.085 --> 38:01.335 Kleenex boxes--that they have no money and so they can't afford 38:01.340 --> 38:02.390 to buy the books. 38:02.389 --> 38:07.889 Now, in our three classes on the 1920s and '30s there were 38:07.892 --> 38:11.092 400 students. And you know how many copies of 38:11.088 --> 38:12.948 the books there were, available? 38:12.950 --> 38:16.710 One, in the library. 38:16.710 --> 38:20.290 And there was another one in the municipal library in Lyon. 38:20.289 --> 38:22.339 So, how are you going to read the books? 38:22.340 --> 38:24.580 You're not going to read the books. 38:24.579 --> 38:26.529 How are you going to do on the test? 38:26.530 --> 38:28.810 Not very well, because you hadn't read the 38:28.808 --> 38:31.918 books, and the whole course can't be built on lecture. 38:31.920 --> 38:35.490 But it's good, but I mean it's bad, 38:35.489 --> 38:39.689 because you had--Lyon II is very good. 38:39.690 --> 38:42.420 So, I had students who were comparable to you nice people. 38:42.420 --> 38:44.240 But then some of them were just totally clueless, 38:44.241 --> 38:46.331 and they used to do things like--there was one who would 38:46.328 --> 38:48.528 bring--a couple of them would bring these little stars that 38:48.529 --> 38:50.769 you have that you used to put on--you have in Catholic first 38:50.768 --> 38:52.648 grade, little stars you'd put on the 38:52.652 --> 38:55.312 big points you want to have, and they'd bring these little 38:55.310 --> 38:57.140 stars, and they thought they were 38:57.135 --> 38:59.075 still in high school, and they'd say, 38:59.080 --> 39:01.350 "can I borrow the glue of my neighbor?" 39:01.349 --> 39:03.719 or "can I borrow the eraser of my neighbor?" 39:03.719 --> 39:05.499 And then everything in France has to be three, 39:05.502 --> 39:07.402 so you'd have one, you'd give them a question and 39:07.404 --> 39:08.724 say one, two three, and some of them 39:08.719 --> 39:10.429 would have three points, and none of them made any sense 39:10.429 --> 39:11.939 at all, but there were always three 39:11.943 --> 39:13.183 points. But then some were just 39:13.183 --> 39:14.493 brilliant and some were terrible. 39:14.489 --> 39:16.449 But the thing that was so sad about this whole system, 39:16.449 --> 39:18.589 and this is what really got me, is that I had to do the 39:20.989 --> 39:22.869 And so somebody wouldn't be there and you'd say 39:22.872 --> 39:24.962 "Madame"--you couldn't tutoie them, 39:24.960 --> 39:28.190 though I finally ended up doing it, the hell with it--and you'd 39:28.188 --> 39:30.478 say, "whatever happened to Mademoiselle X, 39:30.480 --> 39:33.140 here's Mademoiselle X?" 39:33.140 --> 39:35.070 "Je ne sais pas." 39:35.070 --> 39:36.450 "Well, she's not here anymore." 39:36.450 --> 39:37.710 "No, I guess not." 39:37.710 --> 39:38.830 And you never know. 39:38.829 --> 39:41.669 There would be a nurse available for twenty minutes a 39:41.669 --> 39:44.669 week, and so if somebody was having serious problems you 39:44.673 --> 39:47.283 would never know; no one ever followed it up and 39:47.275 --> 39:50.035 they just would disappear into the night, and there was no 39:50.039 --> 39:52.709 structure. Here, if you get the sniffles 39:52.711 --> 39:56.091 we know about it and you're taken very care of. 39:56.090 --> 39:59.540 And even at places that aren't fancy like this that's the way 39:59.539 --> 40:01.299 it is. And so the system has never 40:01.304 --> 40:03.174 been reformed. Even for the simple task--oh 40:03.165 --> 40:05.065 here, I go, boy, this I'm getting--what happened 40:05.070 --> 40:06.530 to my lecture?--the hell with it. 40:06.530 --> 40:10.530 But waiting in line to Xerox something, have you ever waited 40:10.525 --> 40:14.955 in line behind ten geographers, all Xeroxing the fourteen 40:18.830 --> 40:21.390 It's just mind-boggling. 40:21.389 --> 40:23.819 And then you're looking at your bell, and then you sort of 40:23.822 --> 40:25.532 struggle through this cigarette smoke. 40:25.530 --> 40:30.130 Hopefully you'll see your amphitheater B will be somewhere 40:30.127 --> 40:33.597 through there, and you sort of stagger along 40:33.595 --> 40:35.365 through the smoke. 40:35.369 --> 40:37.489 And then people talk too, the other thing, 40:37.490 --> 40:39.870 people talk, and they used to drive me nuts. 40:39.869 --> 40:41.839 And they all-and they drague too, 40:41.836 --> 40:43.896 they're all, these guys are always hitting 40:43.904 --> 40:46.224 on these women, and in your class this stuff is 40:46.223 --> 40:48.273 going on. And I once got so mad, 40:48.268 --> 40:51.548 I got to kind of control myself, this was in amphitheater 40:51.547 --> 40:53.437 B, as it's called so poetically, 40:53.442 --> 40:56.322 I was talking about some damn thing about nouvelle 40:56.315 --> 40:59.295 France--I didn't know what I was talking about, 40:59.300 --> 41:01.250 zero, zero. 41:01.250 --> 41:04.250 And I was going on anyway, that doesn't stop me, 41:04.247 --> 41:07.757 and I walked up the stairs and these people are talking, 41:07.755 --> 41:09.345 they're just talking. 41:09.349 --> 41:10.999 And I stood right in front of them, and then they said, 41:10.996 --> 41:11.816 "oh, excusez-moi." 41:11.820 --> 41:13.660 And then I left and went back down and they start talking 41:13.657 --> 41:15.217 again. Or sometimes they'd be talking 41:15.216 --> 41:17.326 and you say, "Est-ce que vous voulez la parole, 41:17.334 --> 41:18.894 vous?" "Do you want to talk?" 41:18.889 --> 41:20.459 And they say, "oh no, no, excuse me," and 41:20.456 --> 41:22.846 then they go back to their email or they go back to hitting on 41:22.845 --> 41:24.055 their neighbor or whatever. 41:24.060 --> 41:25.480 It was just mind-blowing. 41:25.480 --> 41:29.490 But the very good students--but the way that you teach--and 41:29.487 --> 41:32.317 Da-ihn knows all about this system too, 41:32.320 --> 41:35.630 you should ask her, but she was in very good 41:35.628 --> 41:37.858 schools and all that there. 41:37.860 --> 41:41.120 But it just is, it's an incredible thing. 41:41.119 --> 41:43.799 So, it didn't really change very much after de Gaulle. 41:43.800 --> 41:46.200 So, what happened to old Charles de Gaulle, 41:46.201 --> 41:48.261 back to 1968, what happens to him? 41:48.260 --> 41:50.260 Well he takes a mysterious trip. 41:50.260 --> 41:52.620 He first, he goes to Colombey-les-Deux-Eglises, 41:52.621 --> 41:55.241 probably to finish those feuilles tendres, 41:55.239 --> 41:58.159 those serials on TV, that he was watching, 41:58.157 --> 42:02.637 and then he disappears and he goes to Baden-Baden in Germany. 42:02.639 --> 42:05.069 Why did he go to Baden-Baden in Germany? 42:05.070 --> 42:06.810 Well, nobody really knows. 42:06.809 --> 42:10.539 Probably the best explanation is he wanted to make sure that 42:10.540 --> 42:13.070 he had the support of the French Army. 42:13.070 --> 42:15.410 Why is the French Army in Baden-Baden? 42:15.409 --> 42:18.989 Well, the French Army is in Baden-Baden because that's part 42:22.256 --> 42:24.226 and they're still occupying. 42:24.230 --> 42:28.000 And, so, he announces that they're going to have 42:27.996 --> 42:30.796 participation, and this necessity of 42:30.800 --> 42:36.330 participation in overcoming this crisis--that's the word he uses, 42:36.330 --> 42:38.320 participation. He comes back. 42:38.320 --> 42:40.610 And so in the meantime there's this huge march down the 42:42.269 --> 42:46.299 The upper classes are clear that they will support the 42:46.297 --> 42:49.487 Gaullist response, no matter what it is; 42:49.489 --> 42:51.399 that if it's the Army just shooting down students, 42:51.403 --> 42:53.713 which they aren't ever going to do, but the brutality of the 42:53.707 --> 42:55.227 repression, they will support that. 42:55.230 --> 43:00.790 They were quite happy to see people like Cohn-Bendit and the 43:00.787 --> 43:04.927 others who committed professional suicide go, 43:04.932 --> 43:08.232 and basically things calm down. 43:08.230 --> 43:11.590 But the point is that the reforms were never 43:11.586 --> 43:15.646 really--meaningful reforms, I think it's safe to say, 43:15.645 --> 43:19.855 really don't come to the French university system. 43:19.860 --> 43:23.750 Now the French university system is more open to people 43:23.751 --> 43:28.291 who are not just following their parents along in the university 43:28.291 --> 43:31.981 structure. There are more workers' sons 43:31.978 --> 43:37.528 and daughters-- and daughters, above all now--daughters and 43:37.528 --> 43:40.588 sons of very ordinary people. 43:40.590 --> 43:45.650 We know a good number of people your age or a little older who 43:45.650 --> 43:50.460 are at university now who are the first people in the whole 43:50.462 --> 43:54.612 history of their families to go to university; 43:54.610 --> 43:57.960 and happily still at Yale and other places one can give thanks 43:57.956 --> 44:00.746 to various changes that Yale and these other places, 44:00.753 --> 44:02.183 one can find that now. 44:02.179 --> 44:06.609 This has changed, but the problem is that as long 44:06.613 --> 44:12.343 as the economy is not able to absorb all these young people, 44:12.340 --> 44:15.960 when they get done, there is no sense that they're 44:15.960 --> 44:18.990 going to be able to go anywhere anyway, 44:18.989 --> 44:21.649 particularly if they want to stay in the region where we 44:21.650 --> 44:24.360 live, in which there's not a lot of economic activity. 44:24.360 --> 44:28.520 Thus we have one friend who got her Master's at Grenoble, 44:28.521 --> 44:33.131 and the only job that she could find for the next two years was 44:33.128 --> 44:35.858 working at McDonald's, in Grenoble, 44:35.858 --> 44:38.918 or near Grenoble, and now she's working for her 44:38.918 --> 44:41.648 parents. So, to make universities more 44:41.654 --> 44:45.594 open to all kinds of people does not necessarily solve the 44:45.593 --> 44:49.813 problem of what's going to happen to them in the long run. 44:49.809 --> 44:52.689 Now, one of the things that has done that is of course the 44:52.689 --> 44:53.699 bac itself. 44:53.699 --> 44:59.039 And you know that in France you take the baccalaureate exam, 44:59.037 --> 45:03.287 you take what they call the bac blanc, 45:03.289 --> 45:06.379 after the equivalent of your junior year in high school, 45:06.379 --> 45:08.569 which includes the French bac, 45:08.570 --> 45:11.540 and then you take the real bac at the end. 45:11.539 --> 45:14.469 Now, back--I can't tell you what the percentage of the 45:14.468 --> 45:18.058 people who passed the bac in 1968 is, I don't know that. 45:18.059 --> 45:23.069 It's probably--was probably about half, or maybe even less. 45:23.070 --> 45:27.750 Of course it's steamed upwards over the last fifteen years, 45:27.751 --> 45:30.901 and it now approaches eighty percent. 45:30.900 --> 45:34.330 That is still big pressure, because it's your one exam and 45:34.333 --> 45:37.113 it's you bet your life, because you can't go to 45:37.106 --> 45:40.516 university if you don't pass the bac, and there's big, 45:40.520 --> 45:43.820 big pressure. And if you get pretty close, 45:43.820 --> 45:47.530 by a couple of points, then you can do it again, 45:47.530 --> 45:50.430 that there's a possibility of doing it again within the next 45:50.426 --> 45:52.466 couple of weeks, if you're very, very close. 45:52.469 --> 45:55.749 We had a friend whose mother died and she was obviously very 45:55.753 --> 45:58.873 upset, and she just barely missed it, and so they let her 45:58.869 --> 46:01.419 do it again. So, this puts a lot of pressure. 46:01.420 --> 46:04.700 But also, as I've said before, because of streaming there are 46:04.703 --> 46:07.773 lots of people--kids who are taken out of the line toward 46:07.768 --> 46:10.448 university and toward passing the bac, 46:10.449 --> 46:12.839 quite early on, because their teachers will 46:12.841 --> 46:16.091 convoke the parents and say, "your daughter and son has no 46:16.087 --> 46:17.907 business being in a school." 46:17.909 --> 46:20.579 Just like that, cruelty of it all. 46:20.579 --> 46:23.489 And then they go off into a different line. 46:23.489 --> 46:25.859 And there are no--and I've said this before but there are no 46:25.858 --> 46:27.058 second chances, in this system, 46:27.063 --> 46:28.793 which can be a very, very cruel system. 46:28.789 --> 46:30.689 And not everybody passes the bac. 46:30.690 --> 46:37.100 My son has a buddy who managed to get a 1 on the bac, 46:37.096 --> 46:43.466 which is very difficult, because it's graded from 0 to 46:43.466 --> 46:50.556 20, and he managed to get a 0,25 in one thing earlier on, 46:50.559 --> 46:53.109 in his brevet, which is an earlier exam. 46:53.110 --> 46:55.570 And so university life isn't cut out for everybody. 46:55.570 --> 46:59.160 But I couldn't in all honesty, as much as I love teaching in 46:59.162 --> 47:01.902 France, and I do, and it's not just because of 47:01.898 --> 47:04.658 the--I love the ambiance in French universities, 47:04.659 --> 47:06.929 I really do, and I feel useful, 47:06.926 --> 47:11.226 and it just--it's a lot of fun but it's not--and we've had 47:11.232 --> 47:14.492 chances to be there forever, teaching there, 47:14.494 --> 47:16.924 but it's just the conditions, they're tough, 47:16.915 --> 47:18.825 they're challenging conditions. 47:18.829 --> 47:22.529 And basically it wasn't enough for de Gaulle to say "we want 47:22.532 --> 47:25.672 more participation" and to announce an election, 47:25.670 --> 47:29.830 a referendum on regional decentralization; 47:29.829 --> 47:31.839 and that's how he walks off the stage. 47:31.840 --> 47:35.000 In 1969 he just goes back to--stomps of to 47:35.002 --> 47:39.172 Colombey-les-Deux-Eglises, because it's a referendum on 47:39.167 --> 47:43.407 his leadership and that participation isn't enough, 47:43.409 --> 47:46.519 that his--this big gap between talking a good game about 47:46.522 --> 47:49.922 grandeur and all that are not following through with any kind 47:49.918 --> 47:53.558 of meaningful reforms, help generate this crisis. 47:53.559 --> 47:57.479 And one cannot--it's pointless, it's silly to look back and say 48:00.319 --> 48:02.529 this was the missed revolution. 48:05.159 --> 48:07.969 "workers of the world take over your factories, 48:07.971 --> 48:11.161 all of them; peasants occupy the fields that 48:11.156 --> 48:13.286 you work." But ultimately this wasn't 48:13.292 --> 48:15.372 going to happen, and who knows if nothing 48:15.374 --> 48:18.084 probably good would have come out of that anyway. 48:18.079 --> 48:22.219 But 1968 was not a revolution that was going to be a 48:22.221 --> 48:24.171 meaningful revolution. 48:24.170 --> 48:27.980 In the end that generation was right, I would like to say, 48:27.977 --> 48:31.357 in opposing U.S. policies, in trying to create 48:31.358 --> 48:34.738 or insist on a more human world, humane world, 48:34.739 --> 48:38.419 in industrial relations and in the university. 48:38.420 --> 48:43.220 Professors and administrators learned something after all of 48:43.220 --> 48:45.260 that. But in a very centralized state 48:45.258 --> 48:47.628 where more and more people, because they passed the 48:47.626 --> 48:50.396 bac, have access to universities, 48:50.395 --> 48:54.375 that isn't necessarily going to resolve the problem, 48:54.380 --> 48:59.450 which fundamentally comes down to the fact that there are not 48:59.445 --> 49:03.915 enough--that there's a real crisis of young people, 49:03.920 --> 49:07.270 for young people now, in France, but no light at the 49:07.267 --> 49:08.577 end of the tunnel. 49:08.579 --> 49:12.619 And as I'll argue on Wednesday, that's part of what's going on 49:12.620 --> 49:14.740 in the French suburbs as well. 49:14.739 --> 49:17.189 So, if you go to Paris and you walk up the Boulevard 49:17.189 --> 49:19.059 Saint-Michel, which is my least favorite 49:19.062 --> 49:22.092 boulevard in Paris because it's been destroyed by bad zoning and 49:22.088 --> 49:24.008 has McDonald's all over the place, 49:24.010 --> 49:28.180 and just tourist hoards, that if you go up there, 49:28.178 --> 49:33.008 think about these battles, pitched battles were fought in 49:33.006 --> 49:37.076 1968 in that merry month of May and of barricades. 49:37.079 --> 49:40.029 And part of--revolution is part of French culture, 49:40.026 --> 49:41.646 the memory of revolution. 49:41.650 --> 49:44.460 But this revolution really--days of running down to 49:44.464 --> 49:47.674 the prefecture and declaring a new regime were pretty much 49:47.673 --> 49:50.443 over, and this revolution, 49:50.443 --> 49:53.953 well intentioned, full of color, 49:53.952 --> 49:58.482 full of integrity, full of character, 49:58.480 --> 50:02.540 full of wit--it was a witty revolution, full of irony and 50:02.537 --> 50:05.287 appreciation of the human condition. 50:05.289 --> 50:09.459 In the end, for better or for worse, and I think probably for 50:09.457 --> 50:11.677 worse, it didn't get very far. 50:11.679 --> 50:15.389 And to an extent one can look longingly back, 50:15.387 --> 50:18.587 as you can probably tell I still do. 50:18.590 --> 50:21.000 See you on Wednesday.