When the poor French suburbs catch media attention, it is usually because they are up in flames.
The current conflagration is no exception. It was triggered by the killing of Nahel M, 17, after police say he failed to comply with an order to stop his car in Nanterre near Paris.
The tragedy has turned the spotlight again on the so-called “banlieues” – the suburbs of French cities – which have been hit by another wave of riots across France.
For some, the violence is the result of poverty and discrimination: entrenched social ills ensure that France’s bleak estates remain tinderboxes.
Others view the rioting as mainly a law-and-order issue: gangs and petty criminals using anger over a tragic death as an excuse to sow mayhem.
But whichever way you look at France’s banlieues, their problems have long been recognised by the authorities – and will not be resolved any time soon.
In 1977, then Prime Minister Raymond Barre launched the first plan to regenerate housing estates, expressing concern that they might turn into “ghettos”.
Over time, a “politique de la ville” (policy for the city) has developed, encompassing everything from housing to education, employment, health and culture, and aiming to reduce the gap with other parts of the country.
A welter of official bodies have been set up: the National Council for Cities, the Inter-ministerial Commission for Cities of Urban Social Development, the National Agency for Urban Renewal, to name but a few. And an alphabet soup of acronyms has been devised for various initiatives, from FNRU (Nation Programme for Urban Renovation) to ZUS (Sensitive Urban Zones).
Over the past 20 years, more than €60bn (£50bn) have been spent on a colossal drive to renovate housing blocks and build new homes, as well as improve facilities and infrastructure in the banlieues.
But the results of such government activism seem less than impressive.
The poorest neighbourhoods – now labelled “quartiers prioritaires” – are home to more than five million people. Many are either immigrants or third- or fourth- generation French.
About 57% of children living in those communities live in poverty, against 21% for the French population as a whole.
According to the Institut Montaigne, a think tank, residents of these quartiers are three times more likely to be unemployed.
Despite billions of euros spent to improve transport links, isolation is still among the main grievances voiced by residents.
New public buildings have gone up. But according to French sociologist Christian Mouhanna, cuts in public services have had a devastating effect.
“Even school is not seen for these people as a way to improve their lives,” he told the BBC. Unemployment, drugs and discrimination continue unabated, Mr Mouhanna says.
Relations with police is another big problem. Many men of immigrant origin complain of racial profiling or discrimination by officers.
The UN’s human rights office said the latest unrest was a chance for France “to address deep issues of racism in law enforcement”.
Others point out the challenges of policing high-crime areas. Between 2012 and 2020, a total of 36 members of the security forces were killed across France while on duty. At least 5,000 are wounded every year. With hundreds of officers hurt in the recent disturbances, the total for the year will be much higher.
Nahel M’s death was far from an isolated incident. According to police data, 13 people were killed by officers last year for failing to comply with an order to stop while driving.
Long-standing tensions feed a dispiriting cycle: each death triggers an explosion of violence and a police response which, though necessary, sows the seeds of further mistrust.
The first banlieue riots occurred in 1979 in Vaulx-en-Velin, a poor suburb of Lyon, when a teenager slit his veins after an arrest for stealing a car. Two years later, another attempt to deal with a car theft sparked days of rioting in nearby Vénissieux.
The deaths of two youths in the same area resulted in similar troubles in 1990 and 1993.
By far the worst unrest occurred in 2005. Two teenagers died in an electrical substation near Paris while hiding from police. Suburbs erupted up and down the country. Cars were burnt, shops looted and police attacked, triggering a three-week state of emergency.
Since then, there have been sporadic outbreaks in the banlieues. As has been the case in recent days, the main targets often include town halls, police stations and schools – any building associated with the French state.
It might be tempting to conclude that efforts to bring the suburbs into the social and economic mainstream have been an expensive, decades-long failure.
A search for news stories on “politique de la ville” yields a litany of complaints about missed targets and inconsistencies (this reporter knows, because he has written one).
France’s official auditing body, the Court of Accounts, pointed out in 2020 that despite an estimated €10bn spent by the government on banlieues every year, they remain mired in poverty, insecurity and lack of services.
But this does not mean that the spending has been in vain, or that policies have failed.
If you look at the banlieues as places, the picture remains bleak indeed. But if you focus on the people, there may be grounds for hope.
The “quartiers prioritaires” are places of high residential turnover. According to an official report from 2017, in any given year, 10-12% of residents move out of the area, typically to a nicer suburb.
This means that, at any given time, about two-thirds of a banlieue’s residents have lived there less than 10 years. In aggregate, the populations remain alarmingly poor, but the poor of today are not necessarily the poor of yesterday and may not be the poor of tomorrow.
Stars such as footballer Kylian Mpappé or actor Omar Sy are the media-friendly face of banlieue success. But much more significant is the fact that many of their childhood friends are now likely to be software engineers or shop managers.
France’s statistical body, Insee, has recently highlighted the social mobility of descendants of immigrants. The proportion of university graduates among them is close to that of the general population, its report shows.
A third of French people of foreign origin with an unskilled father achieve managerial positions, as opposed to 27% for their native counterparts.
Of course, immigrants and their descendants continue to suffer from lack of opportunity, discrimination and other barriers. And the fact that many escape the banlieues is no comfort for those who are stuck there for years.
The latter will continue to endure disproportionate levels of poverty, unemployment and violence. They will be two to three times more likely than other French people to have brushes with law enforcement. They can only hope to make it out before the next wave of riots hits.
Source : BBC
