Supporters of this activism argued that the working class was corrupted by materialism and prosperity. Therefore they couldn’t rely on the middle class to engage in a class struggle, which is why younger people took it upon themselves to begin a movement. The generation of 1968 “was fired up by a potent blend of Marxist radicalism, anti-Americanism, antiestablishment rhetoric, alienation from the values of their parents, and a yearning to challenge what they viewed as a static, consumer-centered postwar society” (Hitchcock 247). In France, the need for educational reform was what caused the first demonstrations. Students in the University of Nanterre (Paris) saw their university as simply a product of bourgeois authoritarian society. There was a general sense that people were emerging without any real culture, being trained to fit into the economic system of a highly industrialized society. Although many countries experienced a “miracle” of postwar economic recovery under their parents, the younger generation was still morally opposed to the values that allowed it to
Supporters of this activism argued that the working class was corrupted by materialism and prosperity. Therefore they couldn’t rely on the middle class to engage in a class struggle, which is why younger people took it upon themselves to begin a movement. The generation of 1968 “was fired up by a potent blend of Marxist radicalism, anti-Americanism, antiestablishment rhetoric, alienation from the values of their parents, and a yearning to challenge what they viewed as a static, consumer-centered postwar society” (Hitchcock 247). In France, the need for educational reform was what caused the first demonstrations. Students in the University of Nanterre (Paris) saw their university as simply a product of bourgeois authoritarian society. There was a general sense that people were emerging without any real culture, being trained to fit into the economic system of a highly industrialized society. Although many countries experienced a “miracle” of postwar economic recovery under their parents, the younger generation was still morally opposed to the values that allowed it to