Immigrants in modern France
According to the National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies in France, in the end of 2010,the country became home to more than 5 million immigrants (that is 8% of the population). In 2006 there were 5.1 million immigrants and 3.6 million foreigners. Every year, about 130,000 foreigners received the permission to enter France (this number does not include immigrants from the European Community). Approximately half of these permits are issued by the reason of family reunification, that is, they are close relatives of foreigners legally residing in the country. Every year about 150,000 people receive the French citizenship. The number of foreign nationalities is residing in France, from year to year. (INSEE, 1998)
This data proves that immigration is a burning issue in the French agenda. And despite the fact that France has been used to accept migrants for centuries, they nowadays face problems in this sphere.
It became clear that France has overestimated abilities to accept and integrate immigrants. «Labor immigration» has given way to family and illegal immigration, has outgrown in constant, demanding considerable state expenditure the economy and social policy factor(не понятно,что к чему!!), has found the political and cultural-religious component frequently contradicting the principles of the French identity, aggravating problem of public safety.
It appears, as a matter of fact, isolated from the French society owing to insufficient material possibilities, formations and cultures, immigrants in places of the mass residing form the subculture of ethnic minority often hostile to culture of the majority, and host country as a whole, calling into question society traditional values in which territory they live. In fact, immigrants became isolated from French society, because they do not have enough material possibilities, education and culture. Therefore immigrants form their own subculture of ethnic minority (often hostile to the culture of majority). That does not correspond to the model’s main principles. So that challenges the French model of integration.
The role of immigrants in the life of the country 2.1. Political sphere
The problem of migration has not been widely discussed until a certain moment. Politicians have perceived immigrants primarily as a labor force, rather than individuals with certain rights. There has been introduced the position of state secretary for integration problems. But it has mostly taken by people who are not involved in these problems. Instead of dealing with integration policy, politicians were making all the efforts to prevent the National Front from advancing. It was a short-sighted approach. The French government was satisfied with the fact that immigrants settled in the suburbs.
The autumn riots of 2005, which worried the French society, partly lifted the ban on the necessity of the political correctness in the discussion of ethnic issues and allowed the French people more objectively consider the problem of integration of immigrants and their descendants. Today, the French authorities are once again trying to resolve the difficult problems of the hard-to-integrate ethnic minority.
Several important areas of the state's immigration policy have been identified: access to jobs, better housing, various forms of integration of young people and considerable substantial funds. Despite the measures to strengthen the integration mechanisms, the doubt of their effectiveness forces the state to pass the laws in order to tighten immigration policy.
There are some examples: -A residence permit can only be got by qualified workers and specialists; -The ability of family reunification is limited; -Struggle against sham marriages is strengthened, spouses from other countries will have to wait longer for residence permit -The selection is done according to the needs of the sectors of economy. A card of the temporary state can be introduced for one year and can be renewed, depending on the length of the employment contract; -The automatic grant of the citizenship after 10 years of residence is cancelled.
Now each individual case will be considered. Refusal to grant the right to stay in the country requires a foreigner to leave the country within a month.
Here are some data about the French immigrants from the Maghreb in the political life. Rejection of the French nationality is recorded in few cases, almost all the migrant children at the age of 18 become French. The percentage of French people, immigrants from North Africa registered in the lists of voters is slightly lower than in the whole country. However, those people vote in the same way as others. By the way, it is noted that in the regions where there is a strong movement in support of the candidates from the National Front the activity is higher. At the same time attention is drawn to a disproportionately low number of the French of the North African origin among the elected leaders of local authorities and MPs. In the National Assembly, only 2 deputies out of 577 are of the North African origin. (Diakonov K.B., 2008, page 86)
In 2005, the immediate cause of the "rebellion" of immigrants has become a tragedy of two teenagers, who, fleeing from the persecution of the police, hid in a transformer station and were killed by a discharge of electricity. As some people believe, the spread of the conflict could have been avoided if the Minister of Interior Nicolas Sarkozy had not said some reckless words that he was going to make the suburbs of Paris clear from "this rabble." The words pronounced by Sarkozy in an emotional state, became a kind of "declaring war" with the power for the young residents of the troubled Paris suburbs. The former minister of Interior and now president of France became "enemy number one" for the “suburbian youth”.
During the pre-election campaign, Nicolas Sarkozy tried to get rid of the image of the hard-right politician. After being elected, Sarkozy acts as the president of all the French, who expresses the interests of the pros and cons voters. To carry out painful reforms, the unity of the nation is needed. However, public opinion surveys, in particular, carried out by the newspaper Le Monde, said that the two-thirds of respondents believe: President Sarkozy will not solve the problem of uniting the nation.
Problem areas are one of the most urgent problems of modern France. It is the place where most of social diseases, such as poverty, unemployment, crime, ethnic segregation, the crisis of school policies and urbanism, have entwined. All these problems, in one way or another, are being locked into a common topic – the French model of integration and role of immigrants in the county’s life.