France is a country with a long history of rebellions, but it has never seen anything quite like the revolt of the Gilets Jaunes (Yellow Vests), which erupted in mid-November. Disturbed by the high cost of gasoline and diesel fuel, a woman who runs an online cosmetics business in the small town of Savigny-le-Temple posted a petition on Facebook calling on authorities to cut prices at the pump. When the government instead announced that in order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions it would enact a modest increase in the tax on gasoline and a slightly higher increase in the tax on diesel, the petition began to pick up steam. Before long it had gathered 986,000 signatures.