Thirty years after its creation, the City Policy is highly controversial. The preponderant place left to the action of the State, which does not take enough account of the inhabitants, is called into question. On the occasion of the current reform, The Life of Ideas takes up this theme by making room for comparisons.
Invented experimentally after the Minguettes riots in the early 1980s, alongside the “Beurs March” for equality, the City Policy aimed to reform the functioning of the State and its relations with communities. local. To address the urgency of a new social issue, associated with certain neighborhoods where immigrant and minority populations were concentrated, an exceptional public action was going to be put in place, mobilizing a local and bottom-up approach, more participatory and transversal.
Thirty years later, it is difficult to measure the real effect of this policy which combines numerous measures: the gap between priority neighborhoods and other urban areas is not reducing, and sometimes even increases. However, this very negative vision does not take into account the mobility of the population of these neighborhoods. However, taking into account a less static and more dynamic approach to people’s trajectories reveals that these places also play a welcoming and “ sas ”, or even promotion.
In any case, the effect of this policy is not limited to that which they have on the populations, but also influences the modes of public action. The complex relationships that have been woven, through the institutionalization of the City Policy, between the different levels of local authorities, show in particular the limits of the stacking of disparate measures and the pervasiveness of compartmentalization. Perhaps more profoundly, it is the very categories through which the social is today analyzed which have been permeated by this policy and the numerous expert or evaluation works to which it has given rise. Territorial positive discrimination and the logic of zoning which are at the center of the French system have, in return, accredited the idea of an urban problem and given rise to a “ spatialization of social problems “.
If zoning evolves over time, like an accordion, it nevertheless remains the dominant logic. But other intervention models can be imagined. It would thus be possible to act on people – and not only on places – to get the first ones moving again instead of rebuilding the city on site. This debate, which was initiated in France, thanks to the work of Jacques Donzelot in particular, inspired reflections on ways of giving power to residents on whom mixed policies were imposed (see the text by Eric Charmes, “ For a critical approach to social diversity », published on March 10, 2009).
On the occasion of the current reform, The Life of Ideas wishes to open the debate on City Policy by inviting researchers to share their analyses. Starting from a series of quantified benchmarks on this action, the major issues of the reform are discussed, and a history of the various policies is retraced, in order to put into perspective the expected transformations of the mode of governance of the City Policy (Cyprien Avenel, “ City Policy in search of reform », published on May 7, 2013 ; Cyprien Avenel & Adeline Sagot, “ City policy: Benchmarks », published on June 5, 2013).
Among these issues, that of the power that it would be desirable to give to the inhabitants of poor neighborhoods so that they can decide their destiny, is not the least. Marie-Hélène Bacqué, specialist inempowerment – now responsible for the mission to the Minister Delegate for the City – returns to this notion in an interview (published on May 10). Thomas Kirszbaum analyzes the reasons for the French difficulty in engaging in such practices (“ Towards French-style empowerment ? “). In a contribution based on original empirical research (“ Mobilize working-class neighborhoods », November 26, 2013) Julien Talpin reveals the confusion that exists in France between the community organizing and community development. It shows that some French researchers promote an outdated vision in the United States because of its depoliticizing nature.
Anaïk Purenne’s essay (“ Police and urban poverty: Canadian alternatives ), published on May 14) shows that experiences exist, particularly on the Canadian side where the place given to communities in the management of social disorders show that there are alternatives to the penal treatment of poverty In response to this essay, Manuel Boucher returns to the “ Street police in working-class neighborhoods », June 5.
The second aspect of this set of contributions relates to the importance of comparisons to understand the modes of operation, and therefore the results, of the French City Policy. Renaud Epstein (“ Urban policy in France and Great Britain », June 4), compares it with its British counterpart, while the United Kingdom is perceived as having a form of management of relations with communities very different from that which prevails in France. Hilary Silver will return to Barack Obama’s urban agenda and show, in this way, the too often neglected importance of the federal state in this area. To complete this overview, Maurice Blanc evokes the German case (“ Urban renovation: demolition or heritage preservation ? », June 11, 2013).
But City Policy does not stop at the actions mentioned above, because other forms of intervention have, indirectly, an effect on the populations of the most disadvantaged urban neighborhoods. This is particularly the case of the school system and vocational high schools where social class logics come into play (Christian Baudelot, “ Classroom tactics in vocational high school », April 25, 2013) and where the young people concerned try to deal with an institution appearing “ opponent » as it leads to the reproduction of social destinies. Housing policy as a whole is also challenged by the situation of the poorest neighborhoods (Pascale Dietrich, “ A roof to sleep in », May 8, 2013). Likewise, many institutions, including Islam, contribute to forging the identity and destiny of the inhabitants of these neighborhoods, even if they are not always recognized as such (“ Suburban Islam and Republican promises », Linda Haapajarvi, May 20) ; the prison, for example, is among those institutions whose impact goes far beyond the person of the prisoner (Fanny Salanne, “ Prison outside the walls », published on April 15, 2013) and is widely deployed in the most popular categories.
Finally, the fight against discrimination, which is one of the objectives of the Urban Policy, is too important to be treated simply through an analysis of this policy. “ Total social fact » of the life of minorities, it will however be the subject of an approach through the report by Olivier Masclet of the book by François Dubet, Olivier Cousin, Eric Macé and Sandrine Rui, Why me ? (July 5, 2013).