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Opinion | What France’s ‘yellow vests’ can teach Hong Kong activists about political protests and the use of violence
- Jason Y. Ng says the French president’s concessions to the violent protesters have reignited debate in Hong Kong about whether peaceful resistance is an effective route towards political change
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Shots of tear gas ring out on a major thoroughfare. Protesters roar as they disperse from a phalanx of riot police. Waves of yellow ripple from the front lines. A city is under siege.
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For the fourth weekend, angry protesters have overrun Paris and other parts of France, demanding a proposed fuel tax be scrapped and other complaints – high taxes, stagnant wages and a yawning wealth gap – be heard.
Demonstrators wear a yellow reflective vest, safety gear that all motorists in France are required to put on after getting out of their vehicle in an emergency. The brightly coloured vest has become a symbol of despair and a defiant call for change.
The similarities between Hong Kong’s 2014 Occupy movement in Hong Kong and the “yellow vest” protests in France are striking, not only because their insignia share a colour, but also because of how and why they happened.
Like Occupy, the French protests have been spontaneous, leaderless and self-organised via social media. Neither was tied to a political party, although the threat of it being “hijacked” by politicians was ever-present.
Four years after Occupy, whether violence is a necessary evil in protest movements remains one of the most divisive questions facing activists in Hong Kong
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