The images from France are striking: high-school students blocking schools, members of trade unions joining them in the streets, and hundreds of thousands demanding better classrooms, more teachers, and relief from the rising cost of living.
Some observers may conclude that such a movement could never happen among Filipino youths.
That conclusion is too easy — and historically wrong. Filipino young people have repeatedly helped change the country’s political destiny.
What differs is not courage or love of country, but the structures that turn anger into sustained collective action.
France’s current protests began with high-school students complaining about teacher shortages, dilapidated buildings, overcrowded canteens, and a university admissions system many consider unfair. The movement quickly expanded beyond campuses. University students, teachers, unions, and activists joined demonstrations, citing the cost of living and declining public services.
On one recent national day of action, officials counted more than 160,000 participants, while unions claimed nearly half a million.
The protests subsequently became a confrontation over policing. French authorities deployed riot police and tear gas and made mass arrests; human-rights groups criticized the force used against young demonstrators. The result was a movement that began with school conditions and grew into a wider challenge to government priorities.
Could Filipino students mount a similar wave? The answer is yes — they have before.
Student activists were central to the First Quarter Storm of 1970, which challenged the Marcos regime before martial law.
The First Quarter Storm was a wave of mass protests in the Philippines from January 26 to March 1970, directed mainly against President Ferdinand Marcos. It was led especially by students and youth, with support from workers, peasants, and urban poor groups. The First Quarter Storm then became a major precursor to later anti-Marcos opposition and the 1986 EDSA uprising.
The EDSA People Power Revolution was a largely nonviolent popular uprising in the Philippines from February 22 to 25, 1986, centered on Epifanio de los Santos Avenue (EDSA) in Metro Manila. It ended Ferdinand Marcos’s long authoritarian rule and restored democratic government under Corazon Aquino.
Subsequently, students helped push Joseph Estrada from power in 2001.
More recently, youth groups have marched against corruption, political dynasties, and the misuse of public funds. University walkouts over flood-control controversies showed that Filipino students remain capable of public dissent.
The issue is not whether young Filipinos can protest. It’s whether protests become broad and organized and durable.
Any differences lie largely in institutions. In France, student unions and national trade unions can transform a local grievance into a coordinated national action. A school blockade in one city can quickly become a movement across the country. French protest is embedded in a long political culture in which taking to the streets is a normal — sometimes disruptive — way of demanding accountability.
In the Philippines, student organizations and activist groups exist, but national coordination is weaker. Decades after martial law, campus activism has lost some of the dense organizational infrastructure that once connected schools, communities, churches, labor groups, and political movements.
Without that machinery, outrage can flare online but struggle to become a sustained national campaign.
Risk also matters. Filipino activists face red-tagging, surveillance fears, and accusations that dissent equals subversion. The Anti-Terrorism Act expanded state powers in ways that worry Philippine civil-liberties advocates.
Parents, teachers, and school administrators may discourage students from joining marches because the personal and academic consequences are uncertain. In France, police violence is a real danger, but protest itself remains a familiar civic language.
Philippine politics also channels discontent differently. Patronage, political dynasties, local bosses, celebrity culture, religion, and social media often absorb public anger. Citizens may support a candidate, attack an official online, or wait for the next election rather than build a movement.
This does not make Filipinos apathetic; it reflects a political system in which collective power is frequently mediated by personalities rather than institutions.
Economic pressure adds another constraint. Many Filipino students work while studying, commute long distances, and carry family responsibilities. A walkout may cost income, class standing, or family harmony. For many young people, survival competes directly with activism.
The lesson from France is not that Filipino youth lack values. It is that values need vehicles. A society produces mass protest when young people can organize safely, connect local grievances to national issues, and see that collective action can actually move power.
Filipino youth have shown that capacity in the past. Whether they can do so again depends less on their character than on whether Philippine society gives them the space, protection, and organization to act together.
Bryce McIntyre, PhD, resides in San Andres. He holds a doctoral degree from Stanford University, Palo Alto, California, USA.
Perplexity AI aided in the research for this article.