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Minister of Education from 1997 to 2000, Claude Allègre launched several important reforms with uneven results. This article describes his policy and the reasons it led to growing opposition, ending with strikes and street demonstrations that were so serious that the Prime minister, his friend Lionel Jospin, was forced to dismiss him. He was the first minister let go by street pressure. Not only teachers, but students and parents as well were united against him. Teachers’ unions were divided, and some praised his proposals, but the tide of protest was so powerful that they finally joined it. Analyzing the forms of that mobilisation against Claude Allègre, this article shows how the rejection of neoliberal globalization and the merchandizing of knowledge has been helped by a new process of public opinion making and call for demonstrations by Internet. Hence, the mobilization against Claude Allègre would appear to be the beginning of the movement which, five years later, shot down the European Constitution.