One of the first questions to ask, then, is which factors and events gave rise to the perception that economic inequality was growing in France? We focus on two such dynamics that have brought the issue of economic inequality into sharper focus in France-factors that may have enhanced the perceptions that there are two opposing groups of people in French society: the upper-class elite versus the lower-class victims of inequality.įirst, narratives about victims of inequality, originally crafted by populist far-right leaders like Front National leader Marine LePen, have been fanned by President Macron’s austerity measures and policy decisions (such as the tax on petrol, repeal of the wealth tax) that disproportionally affect the poorer segments of society and favour the wealthy. Importantly, regardless of whether economic inequality is actually on the rise, we argue that the mere perception that inequality is increasing is associated with collective discontent and subsequently, the social mobilisation of the Yellow Vest movement. That is, the Yellow Vest movement has effectively ‘rattled the French establishment’ ( Guilluy, 2019).Įven though there are many material and ideational factors that contribute to the rise of the Yellow Vest movement, here we focus on just one of those: growing levels of economic inequality. As an initially spontaneous and grassroots rural uprising without apparent organizational structures or leaders, the Yellow Vests has led to substantial policy change and concessions on the part of the French government, changing the political landscape in France.
Nevertheless, despite a scarcity of empirical research (for exceptions, see Bennani, Gandré & Monnery, 2019 Boyer at al., 2019), it is clear that the Yellow Vest movement deserves attention from social scientists. Although the movement has received attention in the news and social media, a theoretical analysis of the factors explaining the emergence and continued persistence of the movement is only slowly emerging. We conclude that a proper understanding of the way in which economic inequality might divide society creating new intergroup dynamics is essential to understand the Yellow Vest movement.Īt the time of writing, the French Yellow Vest (‘Gilet Jaunes’) movement continues to make headlines and the end of the movement is not yet in sight. To explain why the movement continues to go strong, we focus on ongoing intergroup processes (i.e., the police response, lack of support from intellectuals and the middle class) and intragroup processes (i.e., the movement brings together all those who self-categorise as victims of inequality, uniting those that may at other times be seen as ‘strange bedfellows’). Both processes enhance ‘us’ (the victims) versus ‘them’ (the elite and those that are not true to national values of equality) categorizations along wealth lines whereby, ‘us’ becomes a broad category. We focus on two dynamics in particular: (a) President Macron’s perceived alignment with the elites and disconnection from ordinary French people, and (b) historically dominant collective narratives that frame growing inequality as breaking with long-standing values and norms of equality. We highlight different psychological processes that might explain why concerns about economic inequality have become more salient.
Our analysis explores the rise of the Yellow Vest movement as a collective response to perceptions of growing levels of economic inequality in France whereby collective action is triggered by the perceived illegitimacy of the growing gap between the ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots’.
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