The "Block Everything" movement brought to the fore the current debates
surrounding the "managerial class," also known as the "salaried middleclass (1)," which belongs strictly neither to the proletariat nor to the
bourgeoisie. Some of the social strata it encompasses did indeed play a
significant role in the organization of September 10th. The collective
that authored a text entitled "The Debacle - Elements for a Materialist
Analysis of the September 10th Movement (2)," which we will outline
here, examined the role played by the managerial class and concluded
that it was necessary to break with it. But does it constitute a closed
bloc that is necessarily and definitively counter-revolutionary, in
whole or in part, in the class struggle?
In his seminal work, Between Bourgeoisie and Proletariat: Capitalist
Management (3), the libertarian communist theorist and sociologist Alain
Bihr defines the managerial class as composed of "all the agents who
implement, organize, design, legitimize, and control the mediations
(material, social, institutional, ideological) necessary for the
reproduction of capital (4)." This definition distinguishes it from both
the "petty bourgeoisie" (holders of small amounts of capital) and the
"middle classes" (a sociological concept based on the standard of
living), using as criteria its intermediate position in the relations of
production and its role in the overall reproduction of capital. While
the managerial class does not influence the direction of this
reproduction, it ensures the material and ideological domination of
capital over the whole of society.
Tax collection, production planning, and public services are now among
the tasks of management-although not all of its personnel hold
managerial status. In production, management is provided by engineers,
sales engineers, and managers; and in society, notably by workers in
education, the media, and culture, who have a specific function in
ideological reproduction, or by union officials and party leaders,
insofar as they regulate relations between classes. The managerial class
comprises a public sector fraction, well-organized politically and
through unions, which adheres to left-wing projects, and a private
sector fraction which, more closely aligned ideologically with capital,
leans to the right. But these two fractions share a common foundation:
skilled intellectual work embedded in a bureaucratic and highly
hierarchical system, "implying autonomy and initiative," where it is
possible to rise through the ranks. Finally, by virtue of its
intermediary role, its proximity to the state, and its social position,
the managerial class has a natural avenue for entering politics. Many of
its members are political and trade union representatives - but they
often speak on behalf of the proletariat, not their own class, and they
pride themselves on representing a modernizing and progressive project
(even if this involves a certain degree of self-deception[5]). Many are
also found in "left-wing" activist circles, where they frequently engage
in uncritical defense of "public services" based on intellectual
references and modes of organization derived from Leninism, or at least
very top-down structures (6).
In Annecy on September 10th
The evolution of the managerial class throughout history
The collective behind "The Debacle" offered a materialist perspective on
the managerial class, summarized below:
Before the 1980s, managerial roles were quite embryonic in France, and
primarily concentrated at the point of production. Management took off
during that decade, when the state became the regulator of class
relations, class reproduction, and the circulation of capital.
When the left came to power in 1981, the Keynesian-Fordist production
model was in crisis. This model was based on the centrality of the
working class in the production process and on the progressive
imposition of "scientific management" in the factory, but the elites
then focused on replacing it with a highly skilled workforce that would
produce high-value-added goods in a high-tech industry. The management
and retraining of the working class thus became crucial, and budgets
allocated to education, social work, integration, and cultural mediation
increased significantly. A managerial class outside the productive
sphere emerged-with special education teachers, professors, cultural
mediators, social workers, and the non-profit sector forming the pillar
of the nascent social order. Its task was to manage the social effects
of deindustrialization, mass unemployment, and the decline of the
working class, as well as to socialize the proletariat to make it more
docile and better equipped to meet the needs of the economy. A new
social compromise was established: workers were promised the possibility
of social advancement through education, the famous "social elevator."
However, around the turn of the millennium, capitalists needed more
unskilled, minimum-wage workers in the expanding service sector (care,
logistics, private security, retail, etc.), and fewer skilled factory
workers. Discourses on the importance of education, the need for
reindustrialization, and the promises of digital technology became
increasingly out of step with reality. As workforce management shifted
from support to coercion and control, social structures underwent
restructuring: staff reductions, budget cuts, and new working methods in
public education and cultural mediation. The state responded with
blatant indifference to the demands of teachers' unions and cultural
movements, while local authorities reduced subsidies to associations
year after year. More broadly, the political positions that artists,
teachers, and community activists had managed to achieve in the 1980s
vanished. It is in this context that citizen mobilizations emerged,
focused on the need for "democracy" (such as Nuit debout in 2016), and
pointing out the dysfunctions of the Fifth Republic or the increased
administrative severity towards associations.
A class seeking to re-establish its hegemonic political position
For the collective behind "The Debacle," the failure of the "Block
Everything" appeal, launched outside of political and union structures,
illustrated the following reality:
The managerial class is now at odds with its traditional allies, the
major union federations, which are still largely driven by the defense
of manual laborers and old industrial strongholds, and focused on their
negotiations with the state and employers. This class is therefore
trying to break free from the federations through more radical slogans
and practices (such as "leading the march" in demonstrations), but it
recognizes its inability to bring the country to a standstill without
the support of refinery workers or railway workers - and it is
constantly caught in a pendulum swing between attempts at autonomy and a
return to the constraints of union mobilization.
She expended tremendous energy structuring "Block Everything," but this
initiative led to nothing more than the union rally on the 18th, and it
had no impact whatsoever on the ongoing political crisis or the
austerity budget concocted by the government. September 10th presented
"in a condensed and, so to speak, dramatized form, the dead ends of some
recent struggles." It is therefore necessary to analyze the social and
historical context in which this initiative took place. It was the
"left-wing public" that mobilized-namely, many teachers, special
education teachers, workers in the cultural and non-profit sectors, and,
of course, students preparing for these professions. But why did they do
so? Because the awareness of their political isolation compels them to
connect with other class struggles. He is attempting to construct a new
political subject that transcends his own class boundaries, and to
produce a project of an interclass nature in order to reoccupy a
hegemonic position. He proceeded in the same way with the Yellow Vests:
he managed to "structure" the end of their movement, from a demands and
organizational point of view (by adopting a political program that
largely echoed that of the classic left-wing parties and by organizing
assemblies in city centers), and he killed it.
When the first calls for September 10th appeared on social media in
August 2025, their vague origins allowed for a misunderstanding: the
managerial class believed that somewhere there existed a people already
engaged in struggle and eager to see Bayrou fall. This people was
imaginary, but the "left-wing public" built upon it a movement
corresponding to its own aspirations, with general assemblies that, by
their formally open nature, fueled the illusion of massive, cross-class
participation in the anticipated dynamic and which, by promoting
self-organization, constituted a means of escaping the control of union
leadership. Moreover, since the managerial class could not "block the
economy" through strikes, the emphasis around September 10th was placed
on "blocking the flow of goods and services." This means of action was
therefore a default choice.
Unfortunately, the blockades of ring roads, shopping centers, logistics
warehouses, and train stations had only a symbolic effect: they were
short-lived, and their impact on economic activity was virtually nil.
Then, after several of these actions on the morning of September 10th,
gatherings took place in numerous locations in the afternoon and even
evening, often devolving into spontaneous demonstrations without a
clearly defined objective-the act of marching becoming, like the
blockades, "an end in itself." After that, all eyes were on the
inter-union day of action on the 18th.
The "Debacle" group believes, on the one hand, that due to its decline,
the managerial class will likely continue its radicalization and will
continue to issue incantatory calls for "convergence" with other class
segments that do not share its interests or aspirations. On the other
hand, he believes that the struggles of this class are incompatible with
those of "unskilled workers" - because the latter involve broader issues
than the defense of the "welfare state" - and that this observation
should encourage us to stop "trying to have our cake and eat it too by
dreaming of a hypothetical inter-class convergence".
On September 10, the "unskilled workers" refused to participate in a
mobilization whose slogans and organizational methods they did not
share: they preferred to watch the movement die out rather than invest
themselves in it, even minimally, because "their political autonomy is
increasingly, in their eyes, an essential condition for taking action."
"On occasions when political and social balances have been threatened by
class movements[such as the Yellow Vests or the riots following Nahel's
death], the managerial classes were either excluded or remained a
minority." Consequently, "the political neutralization of the managerial
classes is an unavoidable medium-term
objective[because]everywhere,[they]act as a vector of confusion and
political disintegration."
In the Pyrénées-Atlantiques on September 10th
To extend the reflection
The position defended by the "La Débâcle" group aligns with that of
Alain Bihr. Bihr concluded his work by advocating that revolutionary
activists from the managerial class "teach their peers the shame and
indignation of being who they are" in order to contribute to "cracking
the 'social bulwark' that the managerial class represents," and
potentially provoke desertions. He also hoped to see them denounce the
counter-revolutionary role of the managerial class within trade union
and revolutionary organizations and seek to strengthen the
"self-activity of the proletariat."
These analyses are interesting (and the text "La Débâcle" has the great
merit of updating the critique of the managerial class in light of
recent transformations in French capitalism); nevertheless, they raise a
series of questions or remarks:
Is it relevant to rely solely on materialistic socio-economic criteria
to define social classes? By strictly adhering to a static and
sociological definition of the proletariat, we risk falling into a
mystique of the class in itself, which would be the sole and necessary
revolutionary subject. Isn't there rather a reality of the class for
itself, which is concretely constructed in and through struggles, in
opposition to capitalist oppression and exploitation? And therefore,
wouldn't it be better to define "the" class within the dynamics of
concrete social movements (who is involved and with what objectives?)?
Furthermore, what political project underlies the desire to define the
proletariat while excluding the "managerial class" / "salaried middle
class" in its entirety? A related question: do "workers in deskilled
sectors" constitute (and are they?) for the group associated with "The
Debacle" the entirety of the proletariat today (in the same way that
Leninists reduce it to the industrial working class)?
The question of the intermediate strata has generated much discussion
because it is complex. Alain Bihr characterizes them as a "managerial
class" because, according to him, their objective is to seize power.
However, what constitutes these intermediate strata is also and above
all their place in the overall reproduction of capitalist social
relations, and the social or financial recognition they receive. Yet,
defining the intermediate strata as a "class" transforms them into an
autonomous political entity with a common objective, opposed to the
objectives of other classes. The political advantage that the existence
of a third class can represent for capitalism is clear-but does the
revolutionary struggle truly consider these social strata in their
entirety as a class enemy? While all these sectors serve capital, their
members do not all occupy the same position in maintaining social order
(artists and healthcare workers, for example, do not have the coercive
power of law enforcement), and the disparities between their salaries
are enormous (consider the income of an engineer or a professional and
that of a schoolteacher). Moreover, the so-called "lower middle class"
(to which many activists, including revolutionaries, belong) is
experiencing downward mobility-it is by discovering "suffering at work"
that it is reacting-while the bourgeoisie is intensifying its attacks on
what remains of "public services" and the "welfare state." It is certain
that "Block Everything" was primarily taken up by the activist wing of
management, this "public service left" mainly present in the education
and social care sectors, and that this left (reformist or revolutionary)
sought above all, as usual, to sell us a "more social" state. But more
and more people working in these sectors are declaring that they no
longer believe in "public service" and its political and social model,
or they are demanding "real" public services (which amounts to the same
thing); and a growing number of them are going so far as to challenge
inequality and capitalism, and to consider that it is necessary to stop
the "days of action" and sporadic blockades in order to move to the next
level. So, can we long continue to call "interclass" movements that
bring together these people experiencing downward mobility and the
"low-skilled workers" mentioned in "The Debacle" without precisely
defining them (7)? And can there really not be a bridge between the
proletariat... and these middle classes which are becoming
"proletarianized" (8)?
In France, underqualified service workers have participated in the
Parisian "front lines" of demonstrations in recent years; they were also
present at the general assemblies in many cities on September 10th, even
if it was mostly "middle class" members who spoke. Among the Yellow
Vests, nursing assistants and nurses mingled at the roundabouts. And
elsewhere in the world, this kind of "social mixing" has been observed
in massive street struggles often crystallized against the state -
particularly during the "Arab Spring." Therefore, if we perceive social
classes as attractive poles rather than as well-defined groups (9), we
should be able to intervene from a revolutionary perspective within the
struggles of the middle classes, and also to criticize everything that
tends to reproduce the existing system (practices as well as ideas[10]).
Finally, what must always be prevented, of course, is the hijacking of
social movements by self-proclaimed leaders, but this observation holds
true regardless of these leaders' social position.
To conclude on the "Block Everything" dynamic, many of the criticisms
leveled against it in "The Debacle" echo those expressed in the pages of
Courant alternatif (11). On the roundabouts, the Yellow Vests recognized
themselves as a class (even if the term "people" constantly recurred in
their discourse); however, on September 10th, the "codes of good
conduct," the values and references of the left (imposed) from the
outset, contributed to preventing mass participation in the movement. It
is important to learn from this observation, from a revolutionary
perspective. However, the failure of proletarian or wage-labor struggles
in general cannot be attributed solely to the "middle class" or
"managerial class"-this failure is rather an admission of their
weakness. Finally, the capital of sympathy enjoyed by the "Block
everything" movement in society undoubtedly extended beyond the
"management class," and its failure can be considered relative insofar
as it both shook up the social inertia of recent years and highlighted
the shortcomings of the current protest.
Vanina
Notes
1. Notably in *The Ménage à trois of Class Struggle - Wage-Earning
Middle Class, Proletariat, and Capital*, by Bruno Astarian and Robert
Ferro (L'Asymétrie, 2019). It remains to be seen whether the two
expressions completely overlap.
2. Signed "a future writing group" and posted on Sans trêve on September
21, 2025.
3. L'Harmattan, 1989.
4. A review of this work, published in CA 320 (May 2022) under the title
"Class Analysis: What to Do with Capitalist Supervision?" , can be found
at oclibertaire.lautre.net
. 5. A social worker, for example, must believe in her humanitarian
mission and behave accordingly to get marginalized families to conform
to social norms and administrative controls.
6. See Frédéric Lordon or Bernard Friot, or Extinction Rebellion.
7. His group announces it is preparing a text on this subject.
8. This question obviously doesn't arise for another segment of
management that is and always will be at odds with the emancipatory
struggles of the proletariat.
9. The desire to be categorized as part of the "middle class" (by
joining it or remaining within it) remains strong today in France and
elsewhere, particularly because their values predominate in society,
while those of the working class are devalued.
10. For example, talking about "equal opportunities" instead of
questioning the social hierarchy, not only between classes but also
between manual and intellectual workers.
11. Read the articles published in issue no. 353 of October 2025.
http://oclibertaire.lautre.net/spip.php?article4560
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