Posted: Sat 05 Nov 2005 00:25 Post subject: Paris Rights Pt. I: Job Discrimination & Affirmative Action
It's interesting to see the parallels continue: Laws preventing discrimination are ignored; the recommended solution is Affirmative Action. What many people on the right don't want to admit is how successful affirmative action has been in the U.S. but in other multiracial and multiethnic countries (like Singapore, India (the Dalits) and Malaysia) where the practice helped to stabilize the countries.
BBC NEWS
French Muslims face job discrimination
Days of rioting in the bleaker suburbs of Paris have highlighted discontent among many French youths of North African origin.
As part of a series on French Muslims, the BBC News website's Henri Astier looks at the issue of discrimination, a leading source of frustration in France's unemployment-riddled ghettos.
Sadek recently quit his job delivering groceries near Saint-Denis, just north of Paris. He was tired of climbing stairs with heavy bags.
Sadek, 31, has a secondary school education and aspires to something better. But he knows his options are limited: "With a name like mine, I can't have a sales job."
Telemarketing could be a possibility - his Arab roots safely hidden from view. Of course, he would have to work under an assumed name.
Sadek's story sums up the job prospects of the children and grandchildren of Muslim immigrants.
They may be French on paper - but they know that Ali and Rachid are much less likely to get ahead than Alain or Richard.
Racial discrimination is banned in France. But a quick look at the people working in any shop or office suggests the practice is widespread.
The impression is confirmed by official statistics.
Unemployment among people of French origin is 9.2%. Among those of foreign origin, the figure is 14% - even after adjusting for educational qualifications.
Closed doors
The pressure group SOS Racisme regularly highlights cases of employers discarding applicants with foreign names.
It says such discrimination is particularly rife in the retail and hospitality industries - but also for jobs involving no contact with the public.
"Some companies believe that to be responsible for marketing you must have roots in mainland France over several generations to understand the French consumer attitudes," according to a recent SOS Racisme report.
You feel you will never make it because you are Arab
Journalist Nadir Dendoune
"Doors are closed when you are an Arab," says Yazid Sabeg, a businessman and writer.
For many young people, the first time they notice the closed door is when they try to go clubbing.
"The first time the guy at the entrance says: 'You're not coming in', you accept it," says Nadir Dendoune, a journalist from Saint-Denis.
"But after two or three times, you go home carrying a bag of hatred on your shoulders."
And when you can't find a job, Mr Dendoune adds, despondency turns to paranoia.
"Every rejection - even those that may not be racially motivated - undermines your self-confidence. You feel you will never make it because you are Arab."
Failed approach
France has countless bodies dedicated to helping immigrants - a High Council for Integration, a Directorate for Populations and Migrations, several regional commissions for the insertion of immigrants, and so on.
Despite this, France's integration policy has failed, the Court of Accounts, a government watchdog, concluded last year.
The situation could lead to "serious social and racial tensions", the court warned prophetically.
According to some, the concept of "integration" itself is flawed.
"People always talk of the need to 'integrate' Muslims. But the youths are French. Why should they need integrating?" asks Samia Amara, 23, a youth worker near Paris.
Mr Sabeg agrees that "integration" is just hot air. "What does it mean? Are some French people supposed to integrate and others to be integrated?"
Some politicians argue that France should admit this failure and try something new.
UNEMPLOYMENT WOES
9.2% unemployment rate for people of French origin
14% unemployment for people of foreign origin (adjusted for education)
5% overall unemployment for university graduates
26.5% unemployment for "North African" university graduates
Source: Insee
Manuel Valls, an MP and mayor of Evry, a town south of Paris where half the population have foreign roots, says France "cannot lecture Britain or the US" on immigration issues.
His country, he points out, has no black or Arab TV presenters, and all MPs from mainland France are white.
Mr Valls is a firm believer in "positive discrimination" - a very un-French concept that is beginning to gain acceptance.
The broad idea is extra help based on geographical and social - but not racial - criteria. Mr Valls points to an example of such action in his own constituency.
The Lycee Robert Doisneau is a secondary school surrounded by some of the country's worst housing estates, with unemployment in excess of 30%.
About 70% of pupils have foreign parents or grandparents.
Despite such a challenging intake, the school offers a way out of the ghetto.
"The students come here to study and to succeed," says head teacher Genevieve Piniau.
She has pioneered partnerships with elite schools, whose high-fliers groom local pupils to develop their aspirations.
The school also takes part in a scheme run by Paris' Political Sciences Institute, providing special access for students from deprived areas.
The result is 89% success in school leaving exams - well above the national average - and a record of success at university level for former students.
Distant dream
Of course, youths from poor suburbs need more than an education - they need jobs.
Efforts are being made to encourage employers to take them on. Unlike the failed legislative approach, the emphasis is now on voluntary pledges by employers.
Mr Sabeg is among the sponsors of a new "diversity charter" encouraging companies to "reflect the diversity of French society" by hiring qualified non-whites.
It remains to be seen how this will be implemented.
Mr Sabeg is looking across the Channel for inspiration, noting that the head of Vodafone, one of Europe's largest companies, is an Indian, Arun Sarin.
"When this happens here, we will know France has changed," he says.
Posted: Sat 05 Nov 2005 00:30 Post subject: French Riots Pt 3: France's disaffected Muslim businessmen
BBC NEWS
France's disaffected Muslim businessmen
France has been stunned by rioting in low-income suburbs dominated by immigrants. But ghetto youths are not the only French people of foreign origin to feel sidelined.
As part of a series on French Muslims, Henri Astier spoke to two businessmen about their perception of prejudice against them.
Yazid Sabeg is a rarity among France's business elite. He is North-African. And those two facts, he believes, are not unconnected.
"A lot of people don't like my face," says the 55-year-old industrialist.
Whether or not corporate France is "viscerally racist", as Mr Sabeg contends, it certainly lacks diversity.
The chief executive of CS, a big communications group, he is the only person of North African origin to head a leading French company.
His father, an Algerian worker, came to France in 1952. Young Yazid studied hard and worked as a civil servant before setting up his own finance company.
In certain circles the Algerian war continues
Yazid Sabeg
In the early 1990s Mr Sabeg took over CS, a contractor in the sensitive field of secure communications for defence and aerospace.
The takeover met with fierce resistance. "The establishment, notably the military establishment, did not like it," he recalls.
In 1991 intelligence services wrote a scathing report about Mr Sabeg, based on false rumours that he was financing Algerian militants.
Investigative journalist Christophe Deloire - who uncovered the report - says the rumours about Mr Sabeg were malicious.
"It looks as if somebody tried to sink him," Mr Deloire said.
Damaged relationship
Mr Sabeg says he has no idea who started the whispering campaign. But he is convinced people with intelligence contacts are still trying to undermine him
"Some people spend their whole lives spinning tales, because in certain circles the Algerian war continues," he says.
FRENCH ISLAM
Five million Muslims (estimate)
35% Algerian origin (estimate)
25% Moroccan origin (estimate)
10% Tunisian origin (estimate)
Concentrated in poor suburbs of Paris, Lille, Lyon, Marseille and other cities
"In their minds you can't be both Arab and French."
Mr Sabeg says the reputation of his firm is his best protection. CS is a listed company with 4,000 employees in France and abroad and a 400m-euro turnover.
"I am established. To sink me they would have to find more than rumours, and that's all they've got."
Still, the company has suffered. It took Mr Sabeg three years to get the security clearance needed to work on military projects.
He says his relationship with the defence ministry never completely recovered.
His claim that his Algerian roots have been used against him is hard to verify.
But what is certain is that you see few black and brown faces in France's boardrooms. The only Arab entrepreneurs you are likely to meet run corner shops.
Going halal
For an illustration of the problems faced by North African-born businessmen at the other end of the economic ladder, a good place to start is Evry, south of Paris.
The town has an Avenue des Champs-Elysees, but it is a far cry from its grand Parisian namesake.
Much of Evry consists of low-income housing estates that white people fled long ago.
In 2002 Abdel and Mohamed Djaiziri bought a small supermarket chain in one of bleakest of these estates, Les Pyramides - named after one of Paris' glitziest areas.
The Tunisian brothers then did a fateful thing. They turned the supermarket, affiliated to the Franprix chain, into a halal shop.
It was purely a business a decision, they insist: In a predominantly Muslim area, there was no point stocking pork or alcohol that would stay on the shelf.
"When a shopkeeper has a range of 15,000 products available to him, he will choose those that will sell," Abdel Djaiziri said in a recent interview.
But the mayor felt the move contributed to creating a ghetto by making life difficult for non-Muslims, and tried to get the store closed on health grounds.
There was nothing to buy, so we lost all our customers
Abdel Djaiziri
The Djaiziri brothers' problems got even worse in early 2003, when Franprix stopped supplying them.
"There was nothing to buy, so we lost all our customers," Mr Djaiziri says.
It took the brothers three months to find other suppliers - by which time they had got heavily into debt to pay the rent and salaries.
Ongoing fight
Mr Djaiziri says he does not know why Franprix withdrew the franchise. Perhaps the chain wanted to steer clear of the conflict with the mayor, he speculates.
Franprix, when contacted, declined to comment.
I want them to go. I want to rehabilitate the square and bring in quality shops
Evry Mayor Manuel Valls
Two years on, the business is still standing - although Mr Djaiziri says the debt remains a big burden.
But relations with the mayor, he says, have improved. Health inspectors still come round regularly, but the visits are courteous.
"I consider the matter closed," Mr Djaiziri says.
The problem is that Mayor Manuel Valls does not.
"The store is filthy," he says. "I want them to go. I want to rehabilitate the square and bring in quality shops."
It is impossible to say for sure the brothers suffered on account of their origin.
They had no previous experience in retailing - and Mayor Valls, a socialist with a record of reaching out to minorities, is no xenophobe.
But their experience - as well as Mr Sabeg's and the general scarcity of immigrant entrepreneurs in France - helps explain why some Muslim businessmen feel as marginalised as ghetto youths.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/world/europe/4405790.stm
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