He quickly became France’s cause celebre, receiving thousands of letters and the visits of parliamentarians. In the face of popular outrage, it took little more than a month for French officials to release Bove into a loose form of “house arrest.” From there, he helped launch a massive three-day “alter-globalization” rally that brought 200,000 activists out to a field near his home for a rock concert and speeches. The Interior minister who had him whisked off to jail in a helicopter came back to pay a visit (again in a helicopter). At the peak of his influence, the man with the famous Gallic handlebar mustache talked to NEWSWEEK’s Eric Pape and Marie Valla about the surprising inspiration he finds in the United States, the lessons of jail and upcoming battles surrounding the trade summit in Cancun. Excerpts:

Your parents were studying at Berkeley when you were between the ages of 3 and 6. Do you have any recollection of it?

I have lots of memories from that time, excellent memories. To me, the States are completely linked to my childhood. Contrary to what many people think, I love America. I loved the kindergarten, camping on the weekend, the Rocky Mountains and the three-month-long journey across the country with my parents before heading back to France. We once camped at Big Sur. I don’t remember it, but it’s such a mythical place. I only realized this later when I read Kerouac and the rest of the Beat poets.

Has the U.S. experience influenced you?

Many of my actions, like the time we took the McDonald’s restaurant apart to protest the retaliatory taxing of French importations by the U.S. government, were inspired by American history. Americans know how to carry out symbolic actions. There is one American action against Great Britain that inspired me, the Boston Tea Party. It was a very fascinating founding act because it had to do with trade laws and a corporate monopoly, and with a country that sought its independence from the colony.

In a sense, the American model is my cultural model. Forms of protest that developed in the U.S. mean a lot to me.

Had you ever tasted a Big Mac before?

I honestly don’t remember ever going to McDonald’s, but I don’t say that in bad faith. If I ate there, it didn’t mark me.

You had some time for contemplation in jail?

Jail does the same to everyone. It’s a place where you live a nonlife, where the individual doesn’t exist anymore. You are crushed. You’re just a number. It is, of course, a different experience for someone like me who was there for political reasons, but when you’re sitting behind bars you realize that you’re in a different world.

But on the whole I didn’t have that much time to think things over. I received a lot of mail, about 500 letters a day… Still, when you embrace civil disobedience, you know that one day you might end up in jail.

You got out after just five weeks?

Actually, I really didn’t expect to leave the prison that early. I learned that I would be free on Aug. 2, barely an hour before they let me go. On the 9th, I was on a stage in front of 200,000 people. The contrast was startling. You go from a silent room where the only person you can talk to is yourself, to standing in front of 200,000 supporters. It’s really a time for real exchanges, not one where you want to address people with slogans. I didn’t want to repeat something that I had already seen on television and turn it into a modern version of a French Woodstock.

You’re on probation and won’t be able to go to Cancun. What will you do instead?

On Sept. 9, I’ll be in Cancon; it is the closest I can get to Cancun. It is a rural village of 1,200 people in southwestern France [he laughs]… It’s my answer to a French government that says: “You don’t want me to go to Cancun.” Well, I’ll go to Cancon. The Mexican press picked it up, and Mexico’s first TV channel will be with us in Cancon.

From Seattle to Cancun, has the struggle against globalization made any progress?

We’ve covered some ground since I joined my first protest against the GATT in 1989. Not a lot of people were interested in these issues then. I’m not sure French journalists knew what the GATT was at the time. So yes, we’ve come a long way in 12 years.

You’re about to leave the farmer’s organization you lead. Would you consider party politics?

I don’t consider running for any political office. And I see no objective reasons for this to change any time soon.