The following post was originally
posted by Ed, Sep 8, 2006 at the link listed below:
"May 68 was the most advanced movement
of an exceptional year of struggle that remains a high-point of the post-WWII
era. Revolt flared in many places; across
Europe, in France and Italy particularly - and in the East, the Prague Spring.
In Mexico there was a massacre of demonstrators to ensure social peace prior to
the Olympics of that year. Yet May 68 in Paris remains the iconic image associated
with the year.
Hopes and possibilities were raised high - yet the revolution never came,
even though the idea of revolution (though often limited and confused) was a
part of the general ferment and atmosphere in a way that seems extraordinary
now, looking back from where we are. Our times are in many ways the era of
counter-revolution that followed - the outcome of the defeat of the struggles
of the 1960s and 70s, when 'the social question' dominated life to varying
degrees.
There was something in the air that year -
the events that led up to May were all part of it. But if the student
disruptions at Strasbourg in December 1966 and Nanterre in March 68 and their
Situationist inspirers cannot claim to have been the spark that led to
the huge upheaval of May, they can claim a contribution; and the SituationistInternational can claim that they foresaw more clearly than others that such a
revolt was becoming possible. The SI can also claim to have written most of the
best leaflets and texts during and after the events, as well as many of the
grafittied slogans.

For more on this and a chronology of events surrounding the Disturbances of 1968, click on the following link:
http://libcom.org/history/1968-chronology-events-France-%2526-internationally
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