May 1968 militants deliberately provoked state repression to fuel mass legal demonstrations.

Evidence

A “hard core” engaged in a cycle of intentional “escalation-provocation,” in which committed militants would fight cops or fascists and invite spectacular repression, “immediately followed by a large and legal demonstration.” … Students took over campus facilities and elected leaders to an ad hoc Sorbonne “occupation committee.” … Participants felt their assigned functions in capitalist society—students, workers, farmers—fall away, as human beings interacted directly as human beings. — Vincent Bevins, If We Burn, 93

Categorization

• XREF: The escalation-provocation cycle echoes the provocation dynamics discussed in protest literature and Russian revolutionary ‘Black Bloc’ debates. — connects to: Indiscriminate repression by weak militarized states breeds revolutionary movements.; Brutal state repression of a peasant revolt fueled regional nationalism — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 40; Repression drives nonviolent movements to armed rebellion — Michael A. Sells, The Bridge Betrayed: Religion and…, 32 (+3 more)

Broader Connections

• Provoking state repression is the core mechanism of modern revolutionary terrorism #expands (0.93) — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 368
• Terrorism aims to provoke state repression that radicalizes the population. #expands (0.92)
• Repression drives nonviolent movements to armed rebellion #corroborates (0.80) — Michael A. Sells, The Bridge Betrayed, 32
• Brutal state repression of a peasant revolt fueled regional nationalism #exemplifies (0.78) — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 40
• Indiscriminate repression by weak militarized states breeds revolutionary movements. #complicates (0.75)
• Escalating resistance met with legalized repression entrenches rather than contains mobilization. #qualifies (0.75) — Charles Tilly, Regimes and Repertoires, 577