Late 1998 and early 1999 have seen a series of strike and protest movements among workers in the French public education system, sparked off by the government's wide-ranging programme of educational reforms.
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Late 1998 and early 1999 have seen a series of strike and protest movements among workers in the French public education system, sparked off by the government's wide-ranging programme of educational reforms.
Since 1997, the French public education system has been undergoing a shake-up, with a series of initiatives including: the "Charter for schools in the 21st century" (Charte du XXIe siècle pour les écoles); the "Charter for secondary schools" (Charte pour les lycées); the "Charter for vocational secondary schools" (Charte pour les lycées professionnels); and a restructuring of higher education (FR9805109N). The process has been punctuated by a number of industrial disputes (FR9802197N).
Most recently, a string of protest movements in public education has developed since September 1998. These protests have ranged from expressions of anger at the Minister for Education, Claude Allègre, who made a number of statements that were considered provocative, to pure and simple rejection of the proposed reforms. Cuts in pay rates for overtime, which many employees are forced to work either because of regulations or because of timetable problems in schools, was a factor in igniting the protest movements.
The reforms in progress affect a huge number of different areas of education. For example, the Ministry has set up a new system for managing secondary school teachers, under which the responsibility for teacher posting is devolved to regional education authorities (académies) (FR9711178N). In addition, the plan for relaunching "priority education zones" (zones d'éducation prioritaires, ZEP) - a programme designed to strengthen the social component of education policy, which consists of allocating supplementary resources to primary and secondary schools in disadvantaged areas (FR9707159N) - has been slow to get off the ground because of budget restrictions. Finally, access to training courses during working hours is likely to be reduced.
The government policy of job freezes in the public sector accompanied by the creation of large numbers of subsidised jobs for young people in public education (FR9707159N) demonstrates, in the eyes of the unions, the Ministry's desire to introduce reform "on the cheap".
The unions are divided on the importance and content of the reforms themselves. While CGT-FO, and a few minority unions (the independent CSEN, CFTC and CFE-CGC) have ostensibly rejected these reforms, FSU, CGT, CFDT and FEN accept the need for reforms but are demanding the resources to implement them, while at the same time differing on the changes to be made.
Unionisation in public education remains high compared with the French average, despite growing membership dispersion, brought about by the split in the Federatiom of National Education (Fédération nationale de l'Education, FEN), which led to the formation of the Unitary Trade Union Federation (Fédération syndicale unitaire, FSU) in 1992 and the creation of SUD-Education following the strikes of 1995. The period since September 1998, has seen the creation of groupings - either general assemblies or improvised "coordinations" - whose radical nature conceals major differences in general and category-specific demands. These forms of mobilisation have challenged the representative tarde union organisations, but the latter remain the only parties that can legitimately negotiate with the government. The terms of such negotiations remain undefined for the time being.
Eurofound recommends citing this publication in the following way.
Eurofound (1999), Industrial action hits public education, article.
