France’s latest way of expressing anger at the pension law: saucepans

Spreading out on a highway so no cars could pass, about 100 demonstrators banged pans in a deafening din that last month echoed through this remote valley in eastern France. They marched to a nearby chateau where the French president was to arrive, determined to get in his way and create cacophony around the visit.

Suddenly a helicopter carrying President Emmanuel Macron appeared overhead, the sound of the blades briefly drowning out the noise. While the rambunctious protesters did not stop the French leader’s visit, the scene was a deafening reminder of the anger that has dogged his government since it passed a highly unpopular pension reform this spring that raised the statutory retirement age from 62 to 64.

For weeks, opponents of the change have been harassing Macron and his cabinet members by banging pots and pans during their official trips. In a country devoid of kitchen utensils, the protests, known as “casserolades”, from the French word for saucepan, have disrupted or halted dozens of ministers’ visits to schools and factories.

Like the 2018-2019 ‘Yellow Vests’ protest movement that began over fuel prices and then expanded to include multiple grievances, the beating has also come to symbolize wider discontent in France after months of large street demonstrations failed to appease the government. force to reconsider the pension changes.

“The desire to deafen and react with noise reflects a kind of discredit of the political discourse,” Christian Salmon, a French essayist and columnist for the online publication Slate, said in an interview. “We are not being listened to, we are not being listened to after weeks of protests. So now we only have one option, and that is not to listen to you.”

Mr Macron’s decision to raise the statutory retirement age is based on his belief that the country’s current pension system, based on payroll taxes, is financially unsustainable. As retirees supported by active workers live longer, people also have to work longer, he says.

The pension law was pushed through using a constitutional provision that avoided a full parliamentary vote. Mr Macron defended the move in a interview on television on Monday as an act of responsibility, pointing out that important government decisions in the past, such as the build-up of France’s nuclear weapons force, had used the same mechanism.

The casserolades began a month ago during a televised speech by Mr Macron intended as a way to move forward with the pension upheaval. Determined to continue the fight, protesters gathered outside town halls across France to bang pots and pans. In Paris, many residents joined in from the windows of their apartments, filling entire neighborhoods with metallic tones.

The culinary rallying cry quickly spread. Before long, members of the government were greeted by a cacophony of cookware on official tours of the country.

“We want to show them that we are not giving up,” said Nicole Draganovic, a protester who smashed a pan on the highway near La Cluse-et-Mijoux in eastern France last month.

Around her, amidst the red flags of unions, the sounds of countless utensils of a typical French kitchen rang out: sieves, lids and frying pans beat rhythmically with metal and wooden spoons. Potless demonstrators clattered onto metal fences along the highway.

“It’s like a symphony,” Mrs. Draganovic said.

Several people involved in the weeks of protests said the main message was anger at the government’s decision to push through the pension reform without the support of a majority of voters or unions.

“It’s a total denial of democracy,” said 55-year-old Stéphanie Allume, who hit a stainless steel pan during a May Day demonstration in Paris. “If it is no longer possible to enter into a dialogue with our government, we will drown out their voices with the sound of our pots.”

The casserolades – the latest phase of a protest movement that began with peaceful marches that drew millions of people into the streets and then led to some “wild protests” marked by heavy vandalism – also reflect a centuries-long tradition of protest in France.

According to Emmanuel Fureix, a historian at the University of Paris-Est Créteil, pan-slapping dates back to the Middle Ages in a custom called “charivari” that was intended to shame mismatched couples. The tradition then took a political turn in the 1830s, under King Louis Philippe I, with people banging pots and pans under the windows of judges and politicians’ houses at night to demand more freedoms.

Those pans, Mr. Fureix said, were “an everyday object, an instrument that embodied the voice of the people” in a time of poor political representation – a theme that echoes in today’s stews. “The revival of gestures that belonged to an undemocratic era, the 19th century, is precisely the symptom of a democratic crisis,” he said.

Mr Macron was visibly annoyed by the pan knocking, saying that “it’s not the pans that will move France forward” – to which French cookware manufacturer Cristel, responded on Twitter: “Monsieur le Président, at @cristelfrance we make pans that help France move forward!!!”

The French leader has also strongly rejected the idea that the country has reached a democratic crisis, noting that the pension law was passed in accordance with the country’s constitution. In Monday’s televised interview, he tried to get past the controversial reform by announcing tax cuts worth $2 billion before the end of his term, about $2.2 billion for the middle class.

“The country is moving forward,” Macron said.

But unions have called for another nationwide day of protest early next month, and the government’s response to the stews is a testament to its uneasiness.

Many ministers are now announcing their travel plans at the last minute for fear of being surprised by pancakes. And police have used anti-terrorism laws to ban several protests, and on one occasion seized jars from protesters after local authorities banned “the use of portable sound equipment”.

Mr Fureix said the government had been “trapped” by the stews, much like Louis Philippe I in his day.

“When they oppress, they fool themselves,” he said. “That is the case today, just as it was in the 19th century when processes were transformed into political platforms for opponents. If they do nothing, the phenomenon will grow.”

And grow it has.

a website created by a union of tech workers is now in the ranking French regions for casseroles based on the level of cacophony and the importance of the government official involved. At a recent protest in Paris, protesters held up a giant cardboard pot and spoon, instantly giving the surrounding crowds a mascot to rally.

Such was the ubiquity of the pots and pans that Mr. Salmon, the essayist, drew a parallel with the “yellow vest” protests. Both, he said, are objects “upon which everyone can project their own meanings” and demands.

During the May Day protest, Ms Allume said she saw broad meaning behind the pans, including the struggle to put food on the table and the desire to vent one’s anger. She said her own pot she was banging was once used to boil pasta and then melt depilatory wax.

“It’s had several lives and now it’s ending in a protest,” she said.