Last Saturday, protests in Paris exploded into full-blown rioting on the Champs Élysées: cars were torched, windows were smashed and the Arc de Triomphe was daubed in anti-Macron graffiti. But these violent scenes in Paris have not dented the movement’s popularity. A poll for RTL, conducted after the riots, showed that while 85 per cent of the public are uncomfortable with the violence, a whopping 72 per cent support the movement.

Other actions have contributed to the mood of insurrection. On Monday, paramedics staged a surprise protest against social-security reforms, with over 100 ambulances blocking traffic to the National Assembly. High-school students have staged blockades in over 500 schools to protest education reforms. In Pau, in the south-west of France, an extraordinary stand-off between yellow-vest protesters and police ended up with the police agreeing to remove their helmets before the crowd would disperse.

What is more, the movement has already achieved some concrete successes. Prime minister Éduoard Phillipe has agreed to suspend the rise in fuel taxes for at least six months. But it is unlikely that this will appease the protesters.

All of this raises the question: where is the left? Where is the section of politics that is supposed to agitate for political change, for the advancement of working-class people, their interests, their purchasing power and their political power?

It is telling that when the protests were organised, they bypassed France’s organised left entirely, eschewing not just the political parties, but the trade unions, too. The reaction of some on the left suggests they were right to.

As soon as the first protests emerged, Macron’s ministers immediately tried to discredit the gilets jaunes as having links to neo-fascists. Many on the left initially bought into this establishment line. Former presidential candidate for the centre-left Socialist Party, Benoît Hamon, dismissed calls to join the gilets jaunes, saying he would not march side-by-side with the far right.

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