The march against high prices and climate inaction has given rise to the traditional war of numbers. The organizers represented 140,000 people, while the “Occurrence” company counted around 29,500 protesters. How can this huge discrepancy be explained? Can we assess the level of scientific rigor of the two methods?
Faced with recurring character wars between protesters and police, the media collective (including Le Figaro) from 2018 commissioned Occurrence, a private company, to establish an independent count of demonstrations. However, its method and conclusions are regularly questioned by the organizers of the respective rallies.
Computer method
To provide a number of protesters, Occurrence uses a computerized instrument installed above the march that counts all the people who cross a virtual line placed in the middle of the street where the demonstration passes, including sidewalks. The method has its limits…
Source: Le Figaro
