This project seeks to explore the revolutionary strategies and theories of agency that underlie the actions of the student revolutionaries of May 1968. I explore these themes through an overview of theoretical innovations among the student left in the leadup to May, an analysis of the structures of social organization that made up the strategy of May’s radicals, and a brief look at how the tactics of the French left after May sought new ways to address the revolt’s central problematic. On the first matter, the student left of May broke with established left-wing organizations by taking a stronger anti-imperialist line, centering a philosophy of action, and by presenting a critique of the totality of life under capitalism rather than focusing their efforts entirely on production. The student left unified the struggle for the transformation of society with the quest for the liberation of the individual. To understand this, I analyzed the committee as a way of organizing social life beyond capitalism. For May's radicals, the committee was both a means and an end — it was the means to transcend the capitalist system, as well as an end in itself, as it allowed individuals to take part in the common management of their society.  The organizational structures of the May revolt were useful for keeping life moving during the widespread disorder, but also, radicals hoped, for proving to the masses that a different organization of social and economic power was both possible and desirable as an alternative to the lack of freedom offered by capitalist life. While for students, councils were both a means and an end, the role of occupation committees for most workers was simply as a means to improve conditions within the framework of the capitalist system. This posed a major challenge to student groups who emphasized revolutionary action over revolutionary theory. For many of these theorists, the development of anti-capitalist sentiment among the working class was simply an organizational problem — if the masses were put in a situation where they could hold power and manage their own affairs, they would naturally come to understand that capitalist life deprived them of that power. The question of ideology proved to be far more complicated when the strike wave collapsed in the face of concessions and wage increases from the Gaullist French government. Despite the failure of the revolt, the events of ‘68 demonstrated the possibility of a different mode of social organization and brought a formidable challenge to the postwar capitalist order on both material and social grounds.