1Overseas parts of France proper Migration of minorities inFrance (i.e.Basques) can be considered as separate (ethnically) or French migration (by nationality).
Modern French society is amelting pot.[3] From the middle of the 19th century, it experienced a high rate ofinward migration, mainly consisting ofSpaniards,Portuguese,Italians,Arab-Berbers,Jews,Sub-SaharanAfricans,Chinese, and other peoples fromAfrica, theMiddle East andEast Asia, and the government, defining France as an inclusive nation with universal values, advocatedassimilation through which immigrants were expected to adhere to French values and cultural norms. Nowadays, while the government has let newcomers retain their distinctive cultures since the mid-1980s and requires from them a mereintegration,[4] French citizens still equate theirnationality withcitizenship as does French law.[5]
To be French, according to the first article of the FrenchConstitution, is to be a citizen of France, regardless of one's origin, race, or religion (sans distinction d'origine, de race ou de religion).[5] According to its principles, France has devoted itself to the destiny of aproposition nation, a generic territory where people are bounded only by theFrench language and the assumed willingness to live together, as defined byErnest Renan's "plébiscite de tous les jours" ('everyday plebiscite') on the willingness to live together, in Renan's 1882 essay "Qu'est-ce qu'une nation?").
The debate concerning the integration of this view with the principles underlying theEuropean Community remains open.[9]
France has been historically open to immigration, although this has changed in recent years.[10] Referring to this perceived openness,Gertrude Stein, wrote: "America is my country but Paris is my home".[11] Indeed, the country has long valued itsopenness,tolerance and the quality of services available.[12] Application forFrench citizenship is often interpreted as a renunciation of previous stateallegiance unless adual citizenship agreement exists between the two countries (for instance, this is the case withSwitzerland: one can be both French and Swiss). TheEuropean treaties have formally permitted movement and European citizens enjoy formal rights to employment in the state sector (though not as trainees in reserved branches, e.g., asmagistrates).
Seeing itself as an inclusive nation with universal values, France has always valued and strongly advocatedassimilation. However, the success of such assimilation has recently been called into question. There is increasing dissatisfaction with, and within, growingethno-cultural enclaves (communautarisme). The2005 French riots in some troubled and impoverished suburbs (les quartiers sensibles) were an example of such tensions. However they should not be interpreted asethnic conflicts (as appeared before in other countries like the US and the UK) but associal conflicts born out ofsocioeconomic problems endangering proper integration.[13]
The name "France" etymologically derives from the wordFrancia, the territory of theFranks. The Franks were a Germanic tribe thatoverran Roman Gaul at the end of theRoman Empire.
In the pre-Roman era,Gaul (an area of Western Europe that encompassed all of what is known today as France, Belgium, part of Germany and Switzerland, and Northern Italy) was inhabited by a variety of peoples who were known collectively as theGaulish tribes. Their ancestors wereCelts who came from Central Europe in the 7th centuryBCE or earlier,[15] and non-Celtic peoples including theLigures,Aquitanians andBasques in Aquitaine. TheBelgae, who lived in the northern and eastern areas, may have had Germanic admixture; many of these peoples had already spokenGaulish by the time of the Roman conquest.
Gaul was militarily conquered in 58–51 BCE by theRoman legions under the command of GeneralJulius Caesar, except for the south-east which had already been conquered about one century earlier. Over the next six centuries, the two cultures intermingled, creating a hybridizedGallo-Roman culture. In the late Roman era, in addition tocolonists from elsewhere in the Empire and Gaulish natives, Gallia also became home to some immigrant populations of Germanic and Scythian origin, such as theAlans.
TheGaulish language is thought to have survived into the 6th century in France, despite considerable Romanization of the local material culture.[16] Coexisting with Latin, Gaulish helped shape theVulgar Latin dialects that developed into French, with effects including loanwords andcalques (includingoui,[17] the word for "yes"),[18][17] sound changes,[19][20] and influences in conjugation and word order.[18][17][21] Today, the last redoubt of Celtic language in France can be found in the northwestern region ofBrittany, although this is not the result of a survival ofGaulish language but of a 5th-centuryAD migration ofBrythonic speakingCelts fromBritain.
The Vulgar Latin in the region of Gallia took on a distinctly local character, some of which is attested in graffiti,[21] which evolved into theGallo-Romance dialects which include French and its closest relatives.
With the decline of the Roman Empire in Western Europe, a federation of Germanic peoples entered the picture: theFranks, from which the word "French" derives. The Franks were Germanic pagans who began to settle in northern Gaul aslaeti during the Roman era. They continued to filter across theRhine River from present-dayNetherlands andGermany between the 3rd and 7th centuries. Initially, they served in the Roman army and obtained important commands. Their language is still spoken as a kind of Dutch (French Flemish) in northern France (French Flanders). TheAlamans, another Germanic people immigrated toAlsace, hence theAlemannic German now spoken there. The Alamans were competitors of the Franks, and their name is the origin of the French word for "German":Allemand.
By the early 6th century, the Franks, led by theMerovingian kingClovis I and his sons, had consolidated their hold on much of modern-day France. The other major Germanic people to arrive in France, after theBurgundians and theVisigoths, were theNorsemen orNorthmen. Known by the shortened name "Norman" in France, these wereViking raiders from modernDenmark andNorway. They settled with Anglo-Scandinavians and Anglo-Saxons from theDanelaw in the region known today asNormandy in the 9th and 10th centuries. This later became a fiefdom of the Kingdom of France under KingCharles III. The Vikings eventually intermarried with the local people, converting toChristianity in the process. The Normans, two centuries later, went on toconquer England andSouthern Italy.
Eventually, though, the largely autonomousDuchy of Normandy was incorporated back into theroyal domain (i. e. the territory under direct control of the French king) in theMiddle Ages. In the crusaderKingdom of Jerusalem, founded in 1099, at most 120,000 Franks, who were predominantlyFrench-speaking Western Christians, ruled over 350,000 Muslims, Jews, and native Eastern Christians.[22]
Unlike elsewhere in Europe, France experienced relatively low levels of emigration to theAmericas, with the exception of theHuguenots, due to a lower birthrate than in the rest of Europe. However, significant emigration of mainlyRoman Catholic French populations led to the settlement of the Province ofAcadia,Canada (New France) andLouisiana, all (at the time) French possessions, as well as colonies in theWest Indies,Mascarene islands andAfrica.
On 30 December 1687, a community of FrenchHuguenots settled inSouth Africa. Most of these originally settled in theCape Colony, but have since been quickly absorbed into theAfrikaner population. After Champlain's founding of Quebec City in 1608, it became the capital ofNew France. Encouraging settlement was difficult, and while some immigration did occur, by 1763 New France only had a population of some 65,000.[23] From 1713 to 1787, 30,000 colonists immigrated from France to theSaint-Domingue. In 1805, when the French were forced out of Saint-Domingue (Haiti), 35,000 French settlers were given lands inCuba.[24]
By the beginning of the 17th century, some 20% of the total male population ofCatalonia was made up of French immigrants.[25]In the 18th century and early 19th century, a small migration of French emigrated by official invitation of theHabsburgs to theAustro-Hungarian Empire, now the nations ofAustria,Czech Republic,Hungary,Slovakia,Serbia, andRomania.[26] Some of them, coming from French-speaking communes inLorraine or beingFrench SwissWalsers from theValais canton inSwitzerland, maintained for some generations the French language and a specific ethnic identity, later labelled asBanat (French:Français du Banat). By 1788, there were eight villages populated by French colonists.[27]
The 1870Franco-Prussian War, which led to the short-livedParis Commune of 1871, was instrumental in bolsteringpatriotic feelings; untilWorld War I (1914–1918), French politicians never completely lost sight of the disputedAlsace-Lorraine region which played a major role in the definition of the French nation and therefore of the French people.
Successive waves of immigrants during the 19th and 20th centuries were rapidly assimilated intoFrench culture. France's population dynamics began to change in the middle of the 19th century, as France joined theIndustrial Revolution. The pace of industrial growth attracted millions of Europeanimmigrants over the next century, with especially large numbers arriving fromPoland,Belgium,Portugal,Italy, andSpain.[28]
Between 1956 and 1967, about 235,000 North AfricanJews from Algeria, Tunisia, and Morocco also immigrated to France due to the decline of the French empire and following the Six-Day War. Hence, by 1968, Jews of North African origin comprised the majority of the Jewish population of France. As these new immigrants were already culturally French they needed little time to adjust to French society.[29]
French law made it easy for thousands ofsettlers (colons in French), national French from former colonies of North and EastAfrica,India andIndochina to live in mainland France. It is estimated that 20,000 settlers were living inSaigon in 1945, and there were 68,430 European settlers living inMadagascar in 1958.[30] 1.6 million Europeanpieds noirs settlers migrated fromAlgeria,Tunisia andMorocco.[31] In just a few months in 1962, 900,000pied noir settlers leftAlgeria in the most massive relocation of population in Europe since theWorld War II.[32] In the 1970s, over 30,000 French settlers leftCambodia during theKhmer Rouge regime as thePol Pot government confiscated their farms and land properties.
In the 1960s, a second wave of immigration came to France, which was needed for reconstruction purposes and for cheaper labour after the devastation brought on byWorld War II. French entrepreneurs went toMaghreb countries looking for cheap labour, thus encouraging work-immigration to France. Their settlement was officialized withJacques Chirac's family regrouping act of 1976 (regroupement familial). Since then, immigration has become more varied, although France stopped being a major immigration country compared to other European countries. The large impact ofNorth African andArab immigration is the greatest and has broughtracial, socio-cultural andreligious questions to a country seen ashomogenously European, French andChristian for thousands of years. Nevertherless, according toJustin Vaïsse, professor atSciences Po Paris, integration of Muslim immigrants is happening as part of a background evolution[33] and recent studies confirmed the results of their assimilation, showing that "North Africans seem to be characterized by a high degree of cultural integration reflected in a relatively high propensity toexogamy" with rates ranging from 20% to 50%.[34] According toEmmanuel Todd the relatively high exogamy among French Algerians can be explained by the colonial link between France and Algeria.[35]
According to historianEric Hobsbawm, "the French language has been essential to the concept of 'France'," although in 1789, 50 percent of the French people did not speak it at all, and only 12 to 13 percent spoke it fairly well; even inoïl languages zones, it was not usually used except in cities, and even there not always in theoutlying districts.[36]
Generations of settlers have migrated over the centuries to France, creating a variegated grouping of peoples. Thus the historianJohn F. Drinkwater states, "The French are, paradoxically, strongly conscious of belonging to a single nation, but they hardly constitute a unified ethnic group by any scientific gauge."[37]
According toDominique Schnapper, "The classical conception of the nation is that of an entity which, opposed to the ethnic group, affirms itself as an open community, the will to live together expressing itself by the acceptation of the rules of a unified public domain which transcends all particularisms".[43] This conception of the nation as being composed by a "will to live together," supported bythe classic lecture ofErnest Renan in 1882, has been opposed by the Frenchfar-right, in particular thenationalistFront National ("National Front" – FN / nowRassemblement National - "National Rally" - RN) party which claims that there is such a thing as a "French ethnic group". The discourse of ethno-nationalist groups such as theFront National (FN), however, advances the concept ofFrançais de souche or "indigenous" French.
French people in Paris, August 1944
The conventional conception of French history starts with Ancient Gaul, and French national identity often views the Gauls as national precursors, either as biological ancestors (hence the refrainnos ancêtres les Gaulois), as emotional/spiritual ancestors, or both.[44]Vercingetorix, the Gaulish chieftain who tried to unite the various Gallic tribes of the land against Roman encroachment but was ultimately vanquished byJulius Caesar, is often revered as a "first national hero".[45] In the famously popular French comicAsterix, the main characters are patriotic Gauls who fight against Roman invaders[44] while in modern days the termGaulois is used in French to distinguish the "native" French from French of immigrant origins. However, despite its occasional nativist usage, the Gaulish identity has also been embraced by French of non-native origins as well: notably,Napoleon III, whose family was ultimately of Corsican and Italian roots, identified France with Gaul and Vercingetorix,[46] and declared that "New France, ancient France, Gaul are one and the same moral person."
It has been noted that the French view of having Gallic origins has evolved over history. Before the French Revolution, it divided social classes, with the peasants identifying with the native Gauls while the aristocracy identified with the Franks. During the early nineteenth century, intellectuals began using the identification with Gaul instead as a unifying force to bridge divisions within French society with a commonnational origin myth. Myriam Krepps of the University of Nebraska-Omaha argues that the view of "a unified territory (one land since the beginning of civilization) and a unified people" which de-emphasized "all disparities and the succession of waves of invaders" was first imprinted on the masses by the unified history curriculum of French textbooks in the late 1870s.[45]
Since the beginning of theThird Republic (1871–1940), the state has not categorized people according to their alleged ethnic origins. Hence, in contrast to theUnited States Census, French people are not asked to define their ethnic appartenance, whichever it may be. The usage of ethnic and racial categorization is avoided to prevent any case of discrimination; the same regulations apply to religious membership data that cannot be compiled under the French Census. This classic French republican non-essentialist conception of nationality is officialized by theFrench Constitution, according to which "French" is anationality, and not a specific ethnicity.
France sits at the edge of the European peninsula and has seen waves of migration of groups that often settled owing to the presence of physical barriers preventing onward migration.[37] This has led to language and regional cultural variegation, but the extent to which this pattern of migrations showed up in population genetics studies was unclear until the publication of a study in 2019 that used genome wide data. The study identified six different genetic clusters that could be distinguished across populations. The study concluded that the population genetic clusters correlate with linguistic and historical divisions in France and with the presence of geographic barriers such as mountains and major rivers. A population bottleneck was also identified in the fourteenth century, consistent with the timing for theBlack Death in Europe.[1]
Pierre (2020) stated that the "French genetic landscape is predominantly ofEarly European Farmer-related ancestry", which followed a north–south cline. It varies between 46.5% and 66.2%, with the lowest being found in northwest France (<50%).[47]
French nationality has not meant automatic citizenship. Some categories of French people have been excluded, throughout the years, from full citizenship:
Women: until the Liberation, they were deprived of theright to vote. Theprovisional government of Generalde Gaulle accorded them this right by 21 April 1944 prescription. However, women are still under-represented in the political class. The6 June 2000 law on parity attempted to address this question by imposing a de facto quota system for women in French politics.[48]
Military: for a long time, it was called "la grande muette" ("the great mute") in reference to its prohibition from interfering in political life. During a large part of theThird Republic (1871–1940), the Army was in its majorityanti-republican (and thuscounterrevolutionary). TheDreyfus Affair and the16 May 1877 crisis, which almost led to amonarchistcoup d'état byMacMahon, are examples of this anti-republican spirit. Therefore, they would only gain the right to vote with the 17 August 1945 prescription: the contribution of De Gaulle to the interiorFrench Resistance reconciled the Army with the Republic. Nevertheless, militaries do not benefit from the whole of public liberties, as the 13 July 1972 law on the general statute of militaries specify.
Naturalized foreigners: since the 9 January 1973 law, foreigners who have acquired French nationality do not have to wait five years after their naturalization to be able to vote anymore.
Some French people convicted by a court may be deprived of their civil rights, up to 10 years.[51]
France was one of the first countries to implementdenaturalization laws. PhilosopherGiorgio Agamben has pointed out this fact that the 1915 French law which permitted denaturalization with regard to naturalized citizens of "enemy" origins was one of the first example of such legislation, whichNazi Germany later implemented with the 1935Nuremberg Laws.[52]
Alfred-Amédée Dodds, a mixed-race French general and colonial administrator born in Senegal
In France, the conception of citizenship teeters betweenuniversalism andmulticulturalism. French citizenship has been defined for a long time by three factors: integration,individual adherence, and the primacy of the soil (jus soli). Political integration (which includes but is not limited toracial integration) is based on voluntary policies which aims at creating a common identity and the interiorization by each individual of a common cultural and historic legacy. Since in France, the state preceded the nation, voluntary policies have taken an important place in the creation of this commoncultural identity.[54]
On the other hand, the interiorization of a common legacy is a slow process, which B. Villalba compares toacculturation. According to him, "integration is therefore the result of a double will: the nation's will to create a common culture for all members of the nation, and the communities' will living in the nation to recognize the legitimacy of this common culture".[49] Villalba warns against confusing recent processes of integration (related to the so-called "second generation immigrants", who are subject todiscrimination), with older processes which have made modern France. Villalba thus shows that any democratic nation characterize itself by its project of transcending all forms of particular memberships (whether biological, ethnic, historic, economic, social, religious or cultural). The citizen thus emancipates himself from the particularisms of identity which characterize himself to attain a more "universal" dimension. He is a citizen, before being a member of a community or of asocial class.[55]
Therefore, according to Villalba, "a democratic nation is, by definition, multicultural as it gathers various populations, which differs by their regional origins (Auvergnats, Bretons, Corsicans or Lorrainers...), their national origins (immigrant, son or grandson of an immigrant), or religious origins (Catholics, Protestants, Jews, Muslims, Agnostics or Atheists...)."[49]
Ernest Renan described this republican conception in his famous 11 March 1882 conference at theSorbonne,Qu'est-ce qu'une nation? ("What is a Nation?").[56] According to him, to belong to anation is asubjective act which always has to be repeated, as it is not assured byobjective criteria. Anation-state is not composed of a single homogeneous ethnic group (a community), but of a variety of individuals willing to live together.
Renan's non-essentialist definition, which forms the basis of the French Republic, is diametrically opposed to theGerman ethnic conception of a nation, first formulated byFichte. The German conception is usually qualified in France as an "exclusive" view of nationality, as it includes only the members of the corresponding ethnic group, while the Republican conception thinks itself asuniversalist, following theEnlightenment's ideals officialized by the 1789Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen. While Ernest Renan's arguments were also concerned by the debate about the disputedAlsace-Lorraine region, he said that not only onereferendum had to be made in order to ask the opinions of the Alsatian people, but also a "daily referendum" should be made concerning all those citizens wanting to live in the French nation-state. Thisplébiscite de tous les jours ('everyday plebiscite') might be compared to asocial contract or even to the classic definition ofconsciousness as an act which repeats itself endlessly.[57]
Henceforth, contrary to the German definition of a nation based on objective criteria, such asrace orethnic group, which may be defined by the existence of a commonlanguage, among other criteria, the people of France is defined as all the people living in the French nation-state and willing to do so, i.e. by its citizenship. This definition of the French nation-state contradicts thecommon opinion, which holds that the concept of the French people identifies with one particularethnic group. This contradiction explains the seeming paradox encountered when attempting to identify a "Frenchethnic group": the French conception of the nation is radically opposed to (and was thought in opposition to) the German conception of theVolk ("ethnic group").
This universalist conception of citizenship and of the nation has influenced the French model ofcolonization. While theBritish Empire preferred anindirect rule system, which did not mix the colonized people with the colonists, the French Republic theoretically chose an integration system and considered parts of itscolonial empire as France itself and its population as French people.[58] The ruthlessconquest of Algeria thus led to the integration of the territory as aDépartement of the French territory.
This ideal also led to the ironic sentence which opened up history textbooks in France as in its colonies: "Our ancestors the Gauls...". However, this universal ideal, rooted in the 1789 French Revolution ("bringing liberty to the people"), suffered from theracism that impregnated colonialism. Thus, in Algeria, theCrémieux decrees at the end of the 19th century gave French citizenship to north African Jews, while Muslims were regulated by the 1881 Indigenous Code. Liberal authorTocqueville himself considered that the British model was better adapted than the French one and did not balk before the cruelties ofGeneral Bugeaud's conquest. He went as far as advocatingracial segregation there.[59]
This paradoxical tension between the universalist conception of the French nation and the racist attitudes intermingled into colonization is most obvious in Ernest Renan himself, who went as far as advocating a kind ofeugenics. In a 26 June 1856 letter toArthur de Gobineau, author ofAn Essay on the Inequality of the Human Races (1853–1855) and one of the first theoreticians of "scientific racism", he wrote:
You have written a remarkable book here, full of vigour and originality of mind, only it's written to be little understood in France or rather it's written to be misunderstood here. The French mind turns little to ethnographic considerations: France has little belief in race, [...] The fact of race is huge originally; but it's been continually losing its importance, and sometimes, as in France, it happens to disappear completely. Does that mean total decadence? Yes, certainly from the standpoint of the stability of institutions, the originality of character, a certain nobility that I hold to be the most important factor in the conjunction of human affairs. But also what compensations! No doubt if the noble elements mixed in the blood of a people happened to disappear completely, then there would be a demeaning equality, like that of some Eastern states and in some respects China. But it is in fact a very small amount of noble blood put into the circulation of a people that is enough to ennoble them, at least as to historical effects; this is how France, a nation so completely fallen into commonness, in practice plays on the world stage the role of a gentleman. Setting aside the quite inferior races whose intermingling with the great races would only poison the human species, I see in the future a homogeneous humanity.[60]
During theAncien Régime (before the 1789 French revolution),jus soli (or "right of territory") was predominant. Feudal law recognized personal allegiance to thesovereign, but the subjects of the sovereign were defined by their birthland. According to the 3 September 1791 Constitution, those who are born in France from a foreign father and have fixed their residency in France, or those who, after being born in a foreign country from a French father, have come to France and have sworn their civil oath, become French citizens. Because of the war, distrust toward foreigners led to the obligation on the part of this last category to swear a civil oath in order to gain French nationality.
However, theNapoleonic Code would insist onjus sanguinis ("right of blood").Paternity, against Napoléon Bonaparte's wish, became the principal criterion of nationality, and therefore broke for the first time with the ancient tradition ofjus soli, by breaking any residency condition toward children born abroad from French parents. However, according toPatrick Weil, it was not "ethnically motivated" but "only meant that family links transmitted by the pater familias had become more important than subjecthood".[61]
With the 7 February 1851 law, voted during theSecond Republic (1848–1852), "doublejus soli" was introduced in French legislation, combining birth origin with paternity. Thus, it gave French nationality to the child of a foreigner, if both are born in France, except if the year following his coming of age he reclaims a foreign nationality (thus prohibitingdual nationality). This 1851 law was in part passed because ofconscription concerns. This system more or less remained the same until the 1993 reform of the Nationality Code, created by 9 January 1973 law.
The 1993 reform, which defines theNationality law, is deemed controversial by some. It commits young people born in France to foreign parents to solicit French nationality between the ages of 16 and 21. This has been criticized, some arguing that the principle of equality before the law was not complied with, since French nationality was no longer given automatically at birth, as in the classic "doublejus soli" law, but was to be requested when approaching adulthood. Henceforth, children born in France from French parents were differentiated from children born in France from foreign parents, creating a hiatus between these two categories.
The 1993 reform was prepared by thePasqua laws. The first Pasqua law, in 1986, restricts residence conditions in France and facilitatesexpulsions. With this 1986 law, a child born in France from foreign parents can only acquire French nationality by demonstrating a will to do so, at age 16, by proving haven been schooled in France and has a sufficient command of the French language. This new policy is symbolized by the expulsion of 101Malians bycharter.[49]
The second Pasqua law on "immigration control" makes regularisation of illegal aliens more difficult and, in general, residence conditions for foreigners much harder. Charles Pasqua, who said on 11 May 1987: "Some have reproached me of having used a plane, but, if necessary, I will use trains", declared toLe Monde on 2 June 1993: "France has been a country of immigration, it doesn't want to be one anymore. Our aim, taking into account the difficulties of the economic situation, is to tend toward 'zero immigration' ("immigration zéro")".[49]
Therefore, modern French nationality law combines four factors: paternality or 'right of blood', birth origin, residency and the will expressed by a foreigner, or a person born in France to foreign parents, to become French.
By definition, a "foreigner" is someone who does not have French nationality. Therefore, it isnot a synonym of "immigrant", as a foreigner may be born in France. On the other hand, a Frenchman born abroad may be considered an immigrant (e.g. former prime ministerDominique de Villepin who lived the majority of his life abroad). In most of the cases, however, a foreigner is an immigrant, and vice versa. They either benefit from legal sojourn in France, which, after a residency of ten years, makes it possible to ask fornaturalisation.[62] If they do not, they are considered "illegal aliens". Some argue that this privation of nationality and citizenship does not square with their contribution to the national economic efforts, and thus toeconomic growth.
In any cases, rights of foreigners in France have improved over the last half-century:
1946: right to electtrade union representative (but not to be elected as a representative)
1968: right to become a trade-union delegate
1972: right to sit inworks council and to be a delegate of the workers at the condition of "knowing how to read and write French"
1975: additional condition: "to be able to express oneself in French"; they may vote atprud'hommes elections ("industrial tribunal elections") but may not be elected; foreigners may also have administrative or leadership positions in tradeunions but under various conditions
1982: those conditions are suppressed, only the function ofconseiller prud'hommal is reserved to those who have acquired French nationality. They may be elected in workers' representation functions (Auroux laws). They also may become administrators in public structures such asSocial security banks (caisses de sécurité sociale), OPAC (which administersHLMs), Ophlm...
1992: for European Union citizens, right to vote at the European elections, first exercised during the1994 European elections, and at municipal elections (first exercised during the 2001 municipal elections).
TheINSEE does not collect data about language, religion, or ethnicity – on the principle of the secular and unitary nature of the French Republic.[63]
Nevertheless, there are some sources dealing with just such distinctions:
TheCIA World Factbook defines the ethnic groups of France as being "Celtic and Latin with Teutonic, Slavic, North African, Sub-Saharan African, Indochinese, and Basque minorities. Overseas departments: black, white, mulatto, East Indian, Chinese, Amerindian".[64] Its definition is reproduced on several Web sites collecting or reporting demographic data.[65]
The U.S. Department of State goes into further detail: "Since prehistoric times, France has been a crossroads of trade, travel, and invasion. Three basicEuropeanethnic stocks – Celtic, Latin, and Teutonic (Frankish) – have blended over the centuries to make up its present population. . . . Traditionally, France has had a high level of immigration. . . . In 2004, there were over 6 million Muslims, largely of North African descent, living in France. France is home to both the largest Muslim and Jewish populations in Europe."[66]
TheEncyclopædia Britannica says that "the French are strongly conscious of belonging to a single nation, but they hardly constitute a unified ethnic group by any scientific gauge", and it mentions as part of the population of France theBasques, theCelts (calledGauls by Romans), and theGermanic (Teutonic) peoples (including theNorsemen orVikings). France also became "in the 19th and especially in the 20th century, the prime recipient of foreign immigration into Europe. . . ."[37]
It is said by some[who?] that France adheres to the ideal of a single, homogeneous national culture, supported by the absence of hyphenated identities and by avoidance of the very term "ethnicity" in French discourse.[67]
As of 2008, the French national institute of statisticsINSEE estimated that 5.3 million foreign-born immigrants and 6.5 million direct descendants of immigrants (born in France with at least one immigrant parent) lived in France representing a total of 11.8 million and 19% of the total population inmetropolitan France (62.1 million in 2008). Among them, about 5.5 million are ofEuropean origin and 4 million of North African origin.[68][69]
Between 1848 and 1939, 1 million people with French passports emigrated to other countries.[70] The main communities of French ancestry in the New World are found in the United States, Canada and Argentina while sizeable groups are also found in Brazil, Chile, Uruguay and Australia.
There are nearly seven million French speakers out of nine to ten million people of French and partial French ancestry inCanada.[71] The Canadian province ofQuebec (2006 census population of 7,546,131), where more than 95 percent of the people speak French as either their first, second or even third language, is the center of French life on the Western side of the Atlantic; however, French settlement began further east, inAcadia. Quebec is home to vibrant French-language arts, media, and learning. There are sizableFrench-Canadian communities scattered throughout the other provinces of Canada, particularly inOntario, which has about 1 million people with French ancestry (400 000 who have French as their mother tongue),Manitoba, andNew Brunswick, which is the only fullybilingual province and is 33 percentAcadian.
The United States is home to an estimated 13 to 16 million people ofFrench descent, or 4 to 5 percent of the US population, particularly inLouisiana,New England,Northern New York, and parts of theMidwest. The French community in Louisiana consists of theCreoles, the descendants of the French settlers who arrived when Louisiana was a French colony, and theCajuns, the descendants ofAcadian refugees from theGreat Upheaval. Very few creoles remain in New Orleans in present times. In New England, the vast majority of French immigration in the 19th and early 20th centuries came not from France, but from over the border in Quebec, theQuebec diaspora. These French Canadians arrived to work in the timber mills and textile plants that appeared throughout the region as it industrialized. Today, nearly 25 percent of the population ofNew Hampshire is of French ancestry, the highest of any state.
English and Dutch colonies of pre-Revolutionary America attracted large numbers of FrenchHuguenots fleeing religious persecution in France. In the Dutch colony ofNew Netherland that later became New York, northern New Jersey, and westernConnecticut, these French Huguenots, nearly identical in religion to theDutch Reformed Church, assimilated almost completely into the Dutch community. However, large it may have been at one time, it has lost all identity of its French origin, often with the translation of names (examples:de la Montagne >Vandenberg by translation;de Vaux >DeVos orDevoe by phonetic respelling). Huguenots appeared in all of the English colonies and likewise assimilated. Even though this mass settlement approached the size of the settlement of the French settlement of Quebec, it has assimilated into the English-speaking mainstream to a much greater extent than other French colonial groups and has left few traces of cultural influence.New Rochelle, New York is named afterLa Rochelle, France, one of the sources of Huguenot emigration to the Dutch colony; andNew Paltz, New York, is one of the few non-urban settlements of Huguenots that did not undergo massive recycling of buildings in the usual redevelopment of such older, larger cities as New York City or New Rochelle.
French Argentines form the third largest ancestry group inArgentina, afterItalian andSpanish Argentines. French immigration to Argentina peaked between 1871 and 1890, though considerable immigration continued until the late 1940s. At least half of these immigrants came from Southwestern France, especially from the Basque Country, Béarn (Basses-Pyrénées accounted for more than 20% of immigrants), Bigorre and Rouergue, but significant numbers also from Savoy and the Paris region. Today around 6.8 million Argentines have some degree of French ancestry or are of partial or wholly of French descent (up to 17% of the total population).[72] French Argentines had a considerable influence over the country, particularly on its architectural styles and literary traditions, as well as on the scientific field. Some notable Argentines of French descent include writerJulio Cortázar, physiologist andNobel Prize winnerBernardo Houssay or activistAlicia Moreau de Justo. With something akin to Hispanic culture, the French immigrants quickly assimilated into mainstream Argentine society.
French Uruguayans form the third largest ancestry group inUruguay, after Italian and Spanish Uruguayans. During the first half of the 19th century,Uruguay received the most French immigrants of anySouth American country. It constituted back then the second receptor of French immigrants in theNew World after theUnited States. While the United States received 195,971 French immigrants between 1820 and 1855, 13,922 Frenchmen, most of them from theBasque Country andBéarn, left for Uruguay between 1833 and 1842.[73]
The majority of immigrants were coming from theBasque Country,Béarn andBigorre. Today, there are an estimated at 300,000 French descendants in Uruguay.[74]
According to a study byAncestry.co.uk, 3 million British people are of French descent.[75] Among those are television presentersDavina McCall andLouis Theroux. There are currently an estimated 400,000 French people in the United Kingdom, most of them inLondon.[76][77]
The first French emigration inCosta Rica was a very small number toCartago in the mid-nineteenth century. Due toWorld War II, a group of exiled French (mostly soldiers and families orphaned) migrated to the country.[78]
InMexico, a sizeable population can trace its ancestry to France. After Spain, this makes France the second largest European ethnicity in the country. The bulk of French immigrants arrived in Mexico during the 19th and early 20th centuries.
From 1814 to 1955, inhabitants ofBarcelonnette and the surroundingUbaye Valley emigrated to Mexico by the dozens. Many established textile businesses between Mexico and France. At the turn of the 20th century, there were 5,000 French families from the Barcelonnette region registered with the French Consulate in Mexico. While 90% stayed in Mexico, some returned, and from 1880 to 1930, built grand mansions calledMaisons Mexicaines and left a mark upon the city. Today the descendants of the Barcelonettes account for 80,000 descendants distributed around Mexico.
In the 1860s, during theSecond Mexican Empire ruled by EmperorMaximilian I of Mexico—in collaboration with Mexican conservatives and part ofNapoleon III's plan to create a Latin empire in the New World (indeed responsible for coining the term of "Amérique latine", "Latin America" in English)-- many French soldiers, merchants, and families set foot upon Mexican soil. Emperor Maximilian's consort,Carlota of Mexico, aprincess of Belgium, was a granddaughter ofLouis-Philippe of France.
Many Mexicans of French descent live in cities or states such asZacatecas,San Luis Potosí,Sinaloa,Monterrey,Puebla,Guadalajara, and the capital,Mexico City, where French surnames such as Chairez/Chaires, Renaux, Pierres, Michel, Betancourt, Alaniz, Blanc, Ney, Jurado (Jure), Colo (Coleau), Dumas, or Moussier can be found. Today, Mexico has more than 3 million people of full and partial French descent. mainly living in the capital, Puebla, Guadalajara, Veracruz and Querétaro.
The French came to Chile in the 18th century, arriving atConcepción as merchants, and in the mid-19th century to cultivate vines in thehaciendas of theCentral Valley, the homebase of world-famousChilean wine. TheAraucanía Region also has an important number of people of French ancestry, as the area hosted settlers arrived by the second half of the 19th century as farmers and shopkeepers. With something akin toHispanic culture, the French immigrants quickly assimilated into mainstream Chilean society.
Most of French immigrants settled in the country between 1875 and 1895. Between October 1882 and December 1897, 8,413 Frenchmen settled in Chile, making up 23% of immigrants (second only after Spaniards) from this period. In 1863, 1,650 French citizens were registered in Chile. At the end of the century they were almost 30,000.[80] According to the census of 1865, out of 23,220 foreigners established in Chile, 2,483 were French, the third largest European community in the country after Germans and Englishmen.[81] In 1875, the community reached 3,000 members,[82] 12% of the almost 25,000 foreigners established in the country. It was estimated that 10,000 Frenchmen were living in Chile in 1912, 7% of the 149,400 Frenchmen living in Latin America.[83]
Today it is estimated that 500,000 Chileans are of French descent.
Former president of ChileMichelle Bachelet is of French origin, as wasAugusto Pinochet. A large percentage of politicians, businessmen, professionals and entertainers in the country are of French ancestry.
It is estimated that there are 1 million to 2 million or more Brazilians of French descent today. This gives Brazil the second largest French community in South America.[84]
From 1819 to 1940, 40,383 Frenchmen immigrated toBrazil. Most of them settled in the country between 1884 and 1925 (8,008 from 1819 to 1883, 25,727 from 1884 to 1925, 6,648 from 1926 to 1940). Another source estimates that around 100,000 French people immigrated to Brazil between 1850 and 1965.
The French community in Brazil numbered 592 in 1888 and 5,000 in 1915.[85] It was estimated that 14,000 Frenchmen were living in Brazil in 1912, 9% of the 149,400 Frenchmen living inLatin America, the second largest community after Argentina (100,000).[86]
TheBrazilian Imperial Family originates from the Portuguese House of Braganza and the last emperor's heir and daughter, Isabella, married Prince Gaston d'Orleans, Comte d'Eu, a member of theHouse of Orléans, a cadet branch of the Bourbons, the French Royal Family.
The first French immigrants were politicians such as Nicolas Raoul and Isidore Saget, Henri Terralonge and officers Aluard, Courbal, Duplessis, Gibourdel and Goudot. Later, when theCentral American Federation was divided in 7 countries, Some of them settled toCosta Rica, others toNicaragua, although the majority still remained inGuatemala. The relationships start to 1827, politicians, scientists, painters, builders, singers and some families emigrated to Guatemala. Later in a Conservative government, annihilated nearly all the relations betweenFrance andGuatemala, and most of French immigrants went toCosta Rica, but these relationships were again return to the late of the nineteenth century.[87]
Large numbers ofHuguenots are known to have settled in theUnited Kingdom (from 50,000), Ireland (10,000), in Protestant areas ofGermany (especially the city ofBerlin) (from 40 000), in theNetherlands (from 50 000), inSouth Africa and inNorth America. Many people in these countries still bear French names.
In Asia, a proportion of people with mixed French and Vietnamese descent can be found in Vietnam. Including the number of persons of pure French descent. Many are descendants of French settlers who intermarried with local Vietnamese people. Approximately 5,000 in Vietnam are of pure French descent, however, this number is disputed.[90] A small proportion of people with mixed French and Khmer descent can be found in Cambodia. These people number approximately 16,000 in Cambodia, among this number, approximately 3,000 are of pure French descent.[citation needed] An unknown number with mixed French and Lao ancestry can be found throughout Laos.[citation needed] A few thousandFrench citizens of Indian, European or creole ethnic origins live in the former French possessions in India (mostlyPondicherry). In addition to these Countries, small minorities can be found elsewhere in Asia; the majority of these living as expatriates.[citation needed]
During the great power era, about 100 French families came to Sweden. They had mainly emigrated to Sweden as a result of religious oppression. These include theBedoire, De Laval and De Flon families. Several of whom worked as merchants and craftsmen. In Stockholm, the French Lutheran congregation was formed in 1687, later dissolved in 1791, which was not really an actual congregation but rather a series of private gatherings of religious practice.
^French historian Gérard Noiriel uses the phrase "creuset français" to express the idea, in his pioneering workLe Creuset français (1988). SeeNoiriel, Gérard (1996).The French melting pot: immigration, citizenship, and national identity. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.ISBN0816624194. ; translated from French by Geoffroy de Laforcade.
^One point of friction can be the status of minority languages. However, though almost extinct, such regional languages are preserved in France and one can learn them at school as a second language (enseignement de langue regionale).
^Drinkwater, John F. (2013)."People". In Ray, Michael (ed.).France (Britannica Guide to Countries of the European Union). Rosen Educational Services. pp. 28–29.ISBN978-1615309641. Retrieved29 January 2020.
^Stein, Gertrude (1940).What are masterpieces?. p. 63.
^Hughes LAGRANGES,Emeutes, renovation urbaine et alienation politique, Observatoire sociologique du changement, Paris, 2007[1]Archived 26 April 2012 at theWayback Machine
^ab"Les Gaulois figurent seulement parmi d'autres dans la multitude de couches de peuplement fort divers (Ligures, Ibères, Latins, Francs et Alamans, Nordiques, Sarrasins...) qui aboutissent à la population du pays à un moment donné ",Jean-Louis Brunaux,Nos ancêtres les Gaulois, éd. Seuil, 2008, p. 261
^Kruta, Venceslas (2000).Les Celtes : Histoire et dictionnaire (in French). Robert Laffont.ISBN978-2221056905.
^Laurence Hélix (2011).Histoire de la langue française. Ellipses Edition Marketing S.A. p. 7.ISBN978-2-7298-6470-5.Le déclin du Gaulois et sa disparition ne s'expliquent pas seulement par des pratiques culturelles spécifiques: Lorsque les Romains conduits par César envahirent la Gaule, au 1er siecle avant J.-C., celle-ci romanisa de manière progressive et profonde. Pendant près de 500 ans, la fameuse période gallo-romaine, le gaulois et le latin parlé coexistèrent; au VIe siècle encore; le temoignage de Grégoire de Tours atteste la survivance de la langue gauloise.
^abcMatasovic, Ranko (2007). "Insular Celtic as a Language Area".The Celtic Languages in Contact (Papers from the Workshop within the Framework of the XIII International Congress of Celtic Studies). p. 106.
^abSavignac, Jean-Paul (2004).Dictionnaire Français-Gaulois. Paris: La Différence. p. 26.
^Henri Guiter, "Sur le substrat gaulois dans la Romania", inMunus amicitae. Studia linguistica in honorem Witoldi Manczak septuagenarii, eds., Anna Bochnakowa & Stanislan Widlak, Krakow, 1995.
^Eugeen Roegiest,Vers les sources des langues romanes: Un itinéraire linguistique à travers la Romania (Leuven, Belgium: Acco, 2006), 83.
^abAdams, J. N. (2007). "Chapter V – Regionalisms in provincial texts: Gaul".The Regional Diversification of Latin 200 BC – AD 600. Cambridge. pp. 279–289.doi:10.1017/CBO9780511482977.ISBN9780511482977.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
^Benjamin Z. Kedar, "The Subjected Muslims of the Frankish Levant", inThe Crusades: The Essential Readings, ed.Thomas F. Madden, Blackwell, 2002, pg. 244. Originally published inMuslims Under Latin Rule, 1100–1300, ed. James M. Powell, Princeton University Press, 1990. Kedar quotes his numbers fromJoshua Prawer,Histoire du royaume latin de Jérusalem, tr. G. Nahon, Paris, 1969, vol. 1, pp. 498, 568–72.
^"Compared with the Europeans, the Tunisians belong to a much more recent wave of migration and occupy a much less favourable socioeconomic position, yet their pattern of marriage behaviour is nonetheless similar (...). Algerian and Moroccan immigrants have a higher propensity to exogamy than Asians or Portuguese but a much weaker labour market position. (...) Confirming the results from other analyses of immigrant assimilation in France, this study shows that North Africans seem to be characterized by a high degree of cultural integration (reflected in a relatively high propensity to exogamy, notably for Tunisians) that contrasts with a persistent disadvantage in the labour market.",Intermarriage and assimilation: disparities in levels of exogamy among immigrants in France, Mirna Safi, Volume 63 2008/2
^Emmanuel Todd,Le destin des immigrés: assimilation et ségrégation dans les démocraties occidentales, Paris, 1994, p.307
^Eric Hobsbawm,Nations and Nationalism since 1780 : programme, myth, reality (Cambridge Univ. Press, 1990;ISBN0-521-43961-2) chapter II "The popular protonationalism", pp.80–81 French edition (Gallimard, 1992). According to Hobsbawm, the base source for this subject isFerdinand Brunot (ed.),Histoire de la langue française, Paris, 1927–1943, 13 volumes, in particular the tome IX. He also refers toMichel de Certeau, Dominique Julia, Judith Revel,Une politique de la langue: la Révolution française et les patois: l'enquête de l'abbé Grégoire, Paris, 1975. For the problem of the transformation of a minority official language into a mass national language during and after theFrench Revolution, see Renée Balibar,L'Institution du français: essai sur le co-linguisme des Carolingiens à la République, Paris, 1985 (alsoLe co-linguisme,PUF,Que sais-je?, 1994, but out of print) ("The Institution of the French language: essay on colinguism from theCarolingian to theRepublic"). Finally, Hobsbawm refers to Renée Balibar and Dominique Laporte,Le Français national: politique et pratique de la langue nationale sous la Révolution, Paris, 1974.
^abcDrinkwater, John F. (2013)."People". In Ray, Michael (ed.).France (Britannica Guide to Countries of the European Union). Rosen Educational Services. p. 21.ISBN978-1615309641. Retrieved29 January 2020.
^Éric Gailledrat,Les Ibères de l'Èbre à l'Hérault (VIe-IVe s. avant J.-C.), Lattes, Sociétés de la Protohistoire et de l'Antiquité en France Méditerranéenne, Monographies d'Archéologie Méditerranéenne – 1, 1997
^Dominique Garcia:Entre Ibères et Ligures. Lodévois et moyenne vallée de l'Hérault protohistoriques. Paris, CNRS éd., 1993;Les Ibères dans le midi de la France. L'Archéologue, n°32, 1997, pp. 38–40
^"Notre Midi a sa pinte de sang sarrasin",Fernand Braudel,L'identité de la France – Les Hommes et les Choses (1986), Flammarion, 1990, p. 215
^"Les premiers musulmans arrivèrent en France à la suite de l'occupation de l'Espagne par les Maures, il y a plus d'un millénaire, et s'installèrent dans les environs de Toulouse – et jusqu'en Bourgogne. À Narbonne, les traces d'une mosquée datant du VIIIe siècle sont le témoignage de l'ancienneté de ce passé. Lors de la célèbre, et en partie mythologique, bataille de Poitiers en 732, dont les historiens reconsidèrent aujourd'hui l'importance, Charles Martel aurait stoppé la progression des envahisseurs arabes. Des réfugiés musulmans qui fuyaient la Reconquista espagnole, et plus tard l'Inquisition, firent souche en Languedoc-Roussillon et dans le Pays basque français, ainsi que dans le Béarn",Justin Vaïsse,Intégrer l'Islam, Odile Jacob, 2007, pp. 32–33
^(in French) P. Hassenteufel, "Exclusion sociale et citoyenneté", "Citoyenneté et société",Cahiers Francais, n° 281, mai-juin 1997), quoted by B. Villalba of the Catholic University of Lille,op.cit.
^Wardrop, Murray (12 April 2010)."Britons can trace French ancestry after millions of records go online".The Daily Telegraph. London.The documents disclose that despite our rivalry with our continental counterparts, 3 million Britons – one in 20 – can trace their ancestry back to France.
^"London, France's sixth biggest city".BBC News. 30 May 2012. Retrieved23 February 2013.The French consulate in London estimates between 300,000 and 400,000 French citizens live in the British capital
^Domingo, Enrique Fernández (10 November 2006)."La emigración francesa en Chile, 1875–1914".Amérique Latine Histoire et Mémoire. Les Cahiers ALHIM (12).doi:10.4000/alhim.1252.El 80% de los colonos que llegan a Chile provienen del País Vasco, del Bordelais, de Charentes y de las regiones situadas entre Gers y Périgord.
^"La influencia francesa en la vida social de Chile de la segunda mitad del siglo XIX"(PDF). Archived fromthe original(PDF) on 6 February 2004. Retrieved17 March 2009.Los datos que poseía el Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores de Francia ya en 1863, cuando aúno se abría Agencia General de Colonización del Gobierno de Chile en Europa, con sede en París, daban cuenta de 1.650 ciudadanos franceses residentes. Esta cifra fue aumentando paulatinamente hasta llegar, tal como lo consignaba el Ministerio Plenipotenciario Francés en Chile, a un número cercano a los 30.000 franceses residentes a fines del siglo.
^Paris, Société d'éConomie Politique of; Paris, Société de Statistique de (1867).Journal des économistes. Presses universitaires de France.Le recensement de la population du Chili a constaté la présence de 23,220 étrangers. (...) Nous trouvons les étrangers établis au Chili répartis par nationalité de la manière suivante : Allemands (3,876), Anglais (2,818), Français (2,483), Espagnols (1,247), Italiens (1,037), Nord-Américains (831), Portugais (313) (page 281).
^Collier, Simon; Sater, William F (2004).A history of Chile, 1808–2002. Cambridge University Press.ISBN978-0-521-53484-0.p. 29. The census of twenty-one years later put the total at around 25,000 – including 3,000 French.
^"Vivre à l'étranger". 25 January 2016.Ils ont été 100 000 à émigrer dans ce pays entre 1850 et 1965 et auraient entre 500 000 et 1 million de descendants.
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