By Yves Coleman
In France, the Black Blocs [see Theodora Polenta’s article on Greece, Solidarity 222] are a very broad current.
This current groups together, or in it can be grouped, people who participated in the squatting movement in the 80s and 90s, Italian refugees in France who have contact with Italian insurrectionists, radical youth who want immediate action and are impatient to fight the police, and some supporters of late-period Toni Negri (called “garantistes” because they are for a guaranteed basic income for all).
In short, these are people who in general do not vote, and who are very hostile to the unions and the left parties, so never willing to ally with them even when they are victims of repression and could benefit from support from this or that CP and SP member of parliament. It is difficult to have useful political discussions with them.
There is a lot of discussion on this current on the web, much of it around the book by Francis Dupuis-Déri.
