If you’ve ever taken a train through the less glamorous fringes of Paris, you’ve seen another side of the city, one that is a far departure from Hollywood fantasies. There’s a palpable gulf. Before reaching the glamorous eighth arrondissement and scenes that look straight out of Emily in Paris, one must traverse what the French delicately refer to as banlieues.
The banlieues are more than just suburbs. They are isolated, long-neglected slums to which Paris relegates its most impoverished immigrants. While the country as a whole has indeed become more diverse, the banlieues have become markedly less mixed, poorer, and more withdrawn. Out of sight, out of mind. And what the French won’t admit is that the banlieues are overwhelmingly Black, mostly populated by immigrants from France’s former colonies.
Colorblindness is the bedrock of French society, enshrined in the French Constitution. Article 1 guarantees “the equality of all citizens before the law, without distinction of origin, race, or religion.” In a republic built on egalité and universalism, we’re all to remain very hush-hush about race and ethnicity. France has even gone as far as to remove the word “race” from its constitution. In theory, at least, Frenchness transcends race. This idealism is almost admirable, but when the reality of race is so blatant, what colorblindness actually amounts to is collective delusion and a national refusal to own up to institutional racism.
The constant dance around race and ethnicity only entrenches inequalities, particularly in the realm of education, which is in desperate need of reform. The structure of the French education system effectively sorts students into two piles: the haves and the have-nots. And by extension, white French students and immigrants. It starts at the primary school level, with the state spending significantly less on public schools in the banlieues than in wealthier areas, to the effect that immigrant populations receive a lower-quality education than their white counterparts.
Then there’s secondary school, where the division only deepens. To put things into perspective, every year, around 830,000 French students start secondary school. Only the cream of the crop—less than five percent—get into the prépas, two-year-long boot camps to prepare for admission to the grandes écoles, or the most elite, specialized universities. Naturally, however, the prépas are concentrated in Paris proper and posh suburbs, effectively creating a barricade between the banlieues and the grandes écoles.
Elite universities are usually exclusive, of course, but a diploma from a grande école isn’t just impressive, it is a prerequisite for success. The path to a career in French politics, for example, is clear-cut. You complete your baccalaureat at a prépa, gunning for a spot at the Institut d’Études Politiques de Paris, better known as Sciences Po. After completing your bachelor’s degree at Sciences Po, you (hopefully) end up at the École Nationale d’Administration (ENA)—up until its recent closure, at least.
Sciences Po and ENA, although little-known on this side of the Atlantic, have quite a reputation in France. These grandes écoles are prestigious, churning out French presidents and prime ministers like clockwork. But they are also known for being snooty, elitist, and emblematic of wealthy white privilege. They illustrate the chasm between France’s universal ideals and its reality.
So, in a 2021 bid to diversify the French public service, President Emmanuel Macron—who himself studied at Sciences Po and ENA— announced the closure of ENA. The Institut du Service Public (ISP) would take its place. While ENA systematically funneled its graduates into top administrative jobs, ISP alumni instead have to prove their worth in lower bureaucratic positions.
Such a measure, although a step in the right direction, was just an elaborate renaming ritual. While it chipped away at ENA’s monopoly of the public service, it was not the “total revolution” that Macron claimed it was. Those who study at ISP are the same crowd that would have attended ENA. Insofar as the prépas, Sciences Po, and ISP remain perpetually out of reach for working-class immigrants, the French government will look the same as it always has: poorly representative of modern France.
In 2001, less than one percent of Sciences Po’s student body came from working-class backgrounds—a figure that presumably overlapped with the banlieues. The university then adopted a modest form of affirmative action, partnering with high schools in “educational priority zones” to open its doors to students from the banlieues. Given the concentration of African immigrants in these areas, this measure had the (unspoken) intention of diversifying the student body, racially and economically.
What of the effects, then? At some point, the best litmus test is using your own eyes. I could tell, looking around my Sciences Po lecture hall, that the policy had done little in the way of diversifying the student body. A mere train ride through Paris’s suburbs, a glance at a grande école’s graduating class, or a photo of the Constitutional Council would point to the same glaring truth: the corridors of power remain starkly white and wealthy.
But officially speaking, we can’t really be sure. Supposedly in the spirit of universalism and colorblindness, a 1978 law prohibits the collection of ethnoracial data, such that systemic racism is rendered invisible and impossible to prove, but no less real. When you collect no data whatsoever on how many people of color are excluded by the education system, how many are unemployed, how many live in poverty, how many are underserved by housing and healthcare services, and how many are victims of racial profiling, it is easy to deny that such discrimination exists.
Statistics are by no means a magical solution, but data bridges the gap between privileged policymakers and the lived reality of the majority. A university that is a mere one percent working-class is unlikely to produce legislators who understand the plights of the banlieues. Statistics would buttress the grievances that most French people know to be true. And they would at least allow French voters to point to numbers to validate their experiences, quantify the injustices they face, and hold their representatives accountable.
This is especially true when race is so entangled with French politics. As much as France has tried to dust off its hands, its very recent colonial history continues to shape the country. Immigration from France’s (mostly African) former colonies has become a hot-button issue, evident in the rise of the National Rally. While the left insists that all social discontent boils down to class, Marine Le Pen’s right asserts that all of France’s problems—crime, housing shortages, etc.—are the consequences of uncontrolled immigration. Nothing to do with race, she says, her finger pointing unflinchingly at Africans.
When race drives politics—who holds power and how they cling to it—it isn’t a non-issue. When race determines where people live and the opportunities they are afforded, it is salient. And the French should be able to admit that. One cannot address race—much less racism—if policies pointedly refuse to acknowledge its existence.
This is not to say that the US’s model of racial consciousness can be simply transplanted to France. It is operating in a unique historical context and certainly has its fair share of shortcomings, but the French deal with their own swath of historical wrongs by slapping a band-aid on deep wounds. France is, despite its most earnest protests, a country marred by cross-cutting lines and deep inequalities. Simply calling a republic equal and indivisible does not make it so. If France is ever to live up to its motto of “Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité,” some reform is long overdue.
Featured Image Source: France 24
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