[DoctorDeryOne]

November 13, 2005

A Very French Message From the Disaffected

By MARK LANDLER

PARIS, Nov. 11 - The last time France was convulsed by rioting as serious as the current bout - the student revolts of 1968 - the symbol of the insurrection was a paving stone, which the protesters dug out of the streets by the hundreds to hurl at the truncheon-wielding police officers.

This time around, it is a burning car, going up like a brandy-doused flambé or smoldering like a crushed cigarette.

More than 7,000 vehicles have been set ablaze since the civil unrest began in the suburbs of Paris on Oct. 27. The daily damage report posted by the French police is a car owner's nightmare: 502 burned on Friday night, 463 the previous night, 482 the night before that, and so on.

No other country in Europe immolates cars with the gusto and single-minded efficiency of France. Even during tranquil periods, an average of 80 vehicles per day are set alight somewhere in the country.

"Burning cars is rather typically French," said Michel Wieviorka, a French sociologist who has studied the phenomenon. "The last two weeks have been unusual, but it is more common than people realize."

The practice, he said, goes back to the end of the 1970's, when the suburbs began to seethe. Empty, parked cars made an inviting target for gangs of young men, nursing a grudge and hungry for attention.

"It is very easy and quite spectacular," Mr. Wieviorka said. "Set a fire and the whole world watches you. It calls the attention of the media, and when the media comes, the politicians follow."

Though it is difficult to pinpoint the incident that set off the trend, the city where it first became an urban sport is Strasbourg, the Alsatian capital and home of the European Parliament. Since the 1980's, gangs there have marked New Year's Eve by hunting cars with lighters and cans of gasoline.

Today, the image of a car in flames is emblematic of France's restive suburbs, with their disaffected populations, predominantly French of African descent. Far-right political groups use the pictures to dramatize the supposed dangers of immigration.

But wrecking cars speaks to more than a simple urge to deface property or demand attention. Cars offer - and symbolize - mobility, Mr. Wieviorka said, something the residents of these projects lack in French society.

In Grigny, a working-class suburb south of Paris where the clashes between residents and the police turned violent, the sense of confinement is not only psychological but physical. The housing project is set off from other neighborhoods, with buildings that encircle windswept inner courtyards.

Last Sunday night, youths used blazing cars to form a barrier against the police. Several of them said they only singled out vehicles that belonged to people who they believed had connections to the police. Besides, said a 26-year-old man of Senegalese descent who gave his name as Djibri, "What else are you going to burn?" It is less harmful than attacking people, he noted.

In truth, burned cars are a fraction of the cost of the mayhem. The French insurance industry estimates the total damage so far at $235 million, of which only $23 million was damage to vehicles. As Anne Morrier, a spokeswoman for the French insurers' federation, pointed out,

"There aren't the most beautiful cars in these neighborhoods."

With Renaults and Peugeots being turned into blackened carcasses every night, the French auto industry cannot be thrilled. But the carmakers have said little.

"This is a complicated social issue," said Isabelle Cros, a spokeswoman for PSA Peugeot Citroën. "The car is merely an object."

• Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company