PASQUA POLICY DRAWS PROTESTS FROM MANY QUARTERS

FECL 17 (July/August 1993)

The significance of Pasqua's anti-immigration bills lies in their political symbolics above all. Many of the measures now becoming law had been graduously introduced into practice already by previous governments. But this was done in in shameful silence. For the French people, the country's role as the "cradle of human rights" , the mother of libérté, égalité, fraternité , has always been a matter of tradition and national pride. This ideal, although often not met by practice, was never questioned as a such and it strongly influenced law making. In the view of the French left and many liberals, the openly declared war on immigrants sets an end to this national consensus. Minister Pasqua's "reform" announces a profound change of the political and judicial climate in France. The following comments reflect this new situation.

A logic of generalised suspicion

In the introduction to its critical analysis and comment of the Pasqua package, GISTI, a Paris based organisation providing social and legal information and support to immigrant workers writes, among other things:

"Like a watermark, an implicit philosophy shines through [behind the bills] postulating, that foreigners - read: non- Community nationals - have no right whatever, neither to be in France, nor to live here, and that, as a consequence they can not benefit here of any protection other than such, one - arbitrarily and by pure kind-heartedness - consents to concede to them, and that, thereby, insecurity becomes the very essence of their condition". GISTI further stresses that the law on entry and stay of foreigners amounts to the "reinforcement of a police state whose most spectacular elements are its obsessional concern for public order and its identity checks, but which manifests itself more fundamentally through the setting up of a logic of generalised suspicion. Not just the (genuine or reputed) "clandestines" - but the foreigner population as a whole - labelled in front of public opinion as a source of potential threat having intruded on the national territory - will be the victims of this suspicion, just as all those whom some element designs as possibly being a foreigner, and those who have taken the risk of taking up affective relations with foreigners. But let us not fool ourselves: Even if the foreigners are in the first line, it is all of us, nationals included, who will have to endure the system of repressive policing that is being set up, piece by piece on the pretext of combatting clandestine immigration and insecurity."

Source: Légiférer pour mieux tuer les droits, GISTI paper, June 93. (See this FECL: Documents and Publications).

Immigrants - scape goats in a period of crisis

The president of the governmental Office of International Migration (OMI: Office des Migrations Internationales), Pierre-Louis Rémy stepped back on 3 June, because of disagreement with the government's immigration bill. In his letter of resignation Mr. Rémy says:

"I fear...that the proposed texts and the comments accompanying them might comfort those who consider foreigners as being the source of all our difficulties and that, in their bud, they [the texts] might bear disillusions and risks of serious tensions for our society". And in allusion to Mr. Pasqua's "immigration zero" slogan, he pursues: "I suspect that the assertion that France should strive after a nill immigration might hinder the integration of foreigners already residing in France legally. Besides, everybody knows that such an objective is not realistic. As a consequence, it must be feared that its mention might provoke uncontrolled reactions by French people having understood it far too literally... In periods of crisis, fear and mistrust of foreigners are common. And our country is currently - together with others - going through a difficult period. The social coherence is fragile. It is therefore particularly dangerous to point at the foreigner as a scape goat."

Source: Le Monde, 5.6.93

"What your ancestors used to call liberties, you already call it desorder"

In an article in the Paris daily "Libération" entitled "Marriages under high surveillance", Francois Camé writes:

"A citizen no longer has the right to receive foreign friends at his home without beforehand having requested the authorities for authorisation [according to government ordinances from 1982 and 1991]. The citizen, making such a request, must sign a paper authorising the officers of the Interior Ministry to come and inspect his home, without the mandate of a judge.

This is not happening in Russia, but in France.

Circular from 16 July 1992. A citizen desiring to marry a foreigner must also seek approbation by local authorities. In most of the cases he/she will be deferred to the public prosecutor, together with the one he/she loves. The police is namely charged with assessing if they have sexual relations with each other, the marriag otherwise being considered as nill.

This is not happening in China, in Burma, or North Korea, but in France. And nobody semms to be alarmed.

Let us make it clear: the issue here is not even about defending immigrants, or pleading the ius soli. These are just combats in favour of foreigners and their rights, of course. But this is not what all is about. The French people themselves are concerned... In a world of air transports, global market and international fluxes (cultural, economic, social), it is no longer possible to infringe on the free movement of persons without sacrifying on the the altar of fear one's own liberty, one's own wealth.

By wanting to confine themselves within their ethnic frontiers, the French people lose much more than they gain. In order to control 30.000 persons a year (the huge majority of whom really wish to marry from love) they sacrify their principles of democratic citizens, their dignity as free individuals - and, more simply, the eventuality of being happy some day with a person of different nationality..."

The author than quotes the French "right wing" writer, George Bernanos, who was concerned about the apathy of the French people with regard to the extension of identity checks, just after World War II:

"'The thought that a citizen who has never found up himself with the judiciary of his country, should be perfectly free to keep his identity to himself vis-à-vis whom ever he wishes and for reasons he alone is the judge of, or just for his pleasure; that no indiscretion whatever of a policeman concerning this domain should be accepted in absence of very serious grounds - this thought does no longe come to the mind of anyone... When the state will consider more practical... to impose us some exterior mark, why should we then hesitate to be marked with an iron, on the cheeks or on the behind, just as cattle... What your ancestors used to call liberty, you already call it disorder.'

This was fourty five years ago."

Source: Libération, 4.6.93: Marriages sous haute surveillance, by Francois Camé.