Suburban Islam and the Republican promise

Religion, source of exclusion or resilience ?

The report published in 2011, Suburb of the Republic, sponsored by the Montaigne Institute, aims to understand why a community mode of integration of immigrants dominates today in the neighborhood studied. Gilles Kepel thus returns to the challenge described in the conclusion of his work The suburbs of Islamthe aim of which was to analyze the organization of Islam in France in the 1980s: “ It remains to be determined, he wrote then, whether the integration in question is the prelude to the integration of tomorrow or whether it constitutes one of the pieces of a future community puzzle. “. The political scientist then contrasts two modes of adaptation of immigrants to French society: integration and insertion. The first corresponds to the assimilation of immigrants into the settling society, a gradual process during which attachments to ethnic subcultures fade and the individual aligns himself, in socio-economic and cultural terms, with the “ central current » of the society of which he became a member. Inclusion, on the other hand, refers to a process of selective assimilation according to which structural integration would not be incompatible with the maintenance of minority cultural practices. However, this latter form of assimilation is perceived by the author as potentially leading to “ a community puzzle “, or to the fragmentation of the host society.

The opening scene brings the reader to a “ lost territory of the Republic » (p. 29), after the riots of 2005, where the most expensive French urban renovation project is nearing completion. The district, the Plateau de Clichy-Montfermeil, has become a canonical example of the future of the large heir suburbs of the 1960s and 1970s, a favorite target of researchers, journalists and city politicians. It is characterized by a high rate of poverty and inactivity, by a large immigrant population and by the presence of numerous places of worship and religious associations. The reader would do well, however, to remember that most French suburbs do not resemble Clichy-Montfermeil, neither in sociodemographic terms nor in terms of internal religious organization.

The attachment to the neighborhood that researchers observe among residents “ sometimes promotes a withdrawal between oneself which inhibits the steps of integration into global French society and social ascension » (p. 75). Five chapters examine the neighborhood from the perspective of social dysfunction and residents’ responses to it. The report shows in particular that in the face of social exclusion, religious life is used as a source of collective resilience. The research team favors the analysis of Islam over other faiths. Consequently, the reader is led to place the inhabitants of the neighborhood on a continuum whose ends correspond to radical Islam and uncompromising republicanism. The best integrated residents appear to be the least concerned by community dynamics, or they would at least have the common sense to express their religious convictions only in the private sphere. The most marginalized individuals appear as targets in a religious market where organized and proselytizing Islam reigns.

In accordance with these results, Kepel concludes by prescribing public investment in schools, youth and employment to remedy the lack of social integration. This first assessment, welcome and convincing, offers broad principles rather than detailed practical solutions. The rehabilitation of secularism, also prescribed, would have benefited from greater development. How will it resolve the primarily structural inequalities that neighborhood residents face in their daily lives? ? What type of secularism does the report recommend? ? Is it for example a secularism in the name of which the school canteen would not diversify its offer, or which would on the contrary aim at the pragmatic accommodation of all students whatever their diet? ? Depending on the precise and explicit definition given to it, the recommendations can go in radically different directions, as well as the future of relations between the French State and the religious communities which today are part of society. national.

The news of “ four i »

In the context of a French population that is both aging and more plural, of a stagnant economy accompanied by growing inequalities, the reluctance of certain citizens has translated into concern about national identity, immigration and community withdrawal observed in the suburbs. Suburbs of the Republic is anchored explicitly in the extension of the debates on the “ four i » : immigration, Islam, national identity and insecurity (p. 11). The report deals with current issues and its publication on the eve of the 2012 presidential elections guaranteed it ample media attention, even disproportionate according to some.

This interest was undoubtedly amplified by the fact that the book was commissioned by the Institut Montaigne, a think tank high profile, described as liberal and independent. Since its inception in 2000, the organization has engaged in knowledge production “ pragmatic ” And “ original » in matters of public policy. If certain projects carried out by the institute, such as the one launched in 2004 on the anonymous CV, deserve these designations, this is not entirely the case of this report.

The debates sparked by Suburbs of the Republic certainly attest to a certain pragmatic quality of the work: it lends itself to reading by a wide audience and not just academics. This accessibility is an admirable quality provided that empirical materials are not presented to the reader in a fragmented and opaque form. We are thinking here of the mobilization of extracts from interviews which impress by their quantity without however leading to a presentation of portraits or analytical typologies allowing the reader to clearly situate the singular examples in the survey sample or even to examine the portrait of the neighborhood. The interpretation of statistics from empirical materials also requires a significant effort from the reader to estimate their demonstrative force, particularly when they are based on very small numbers.

Pragmatism is also manifested in the dialogue in which the authors of the report participate, more political than scientific. The analysis of the weak integration of immigrants or descendants of immigrants into French society is at the heart of the work, as are the changes in the local religious landscape. And yet, the report has little dialogue with the literature on themes such as the return of religion, the individualization of faith, ethnicization or even the racialization of social relations and the role of ethnic associations in the integration process. immigrants, so many points of view which make Islam intelligible in the suburbs in a less singular and stigmatizing way. Does pragmatism consist here of inserting the portrait of the neighborhood into conventional and politicized analytical frameworks? ?

Republicans in spite of themselves ?

Suburbs of the Republic has the auxiliary merit of encouraging us to examine the conditions for producing research and original practical solutions. The starting point is rather promising: a think tank with a progressive vocation commissions a report on a current subject from a recognized political scientist who carries out a careful investigation with a multilingual team made up of young researchers. Despite this, the results confirm rather than upset, and show the suburbs studied and its inhabitants as we are used to seeing them: victims of structural issues and prey to radical (religious) movements.

This lack of originality is symptomatic of the still strong tradition in the French political and academic world of the model of republican integration to deal with social issues linked to minorities, religion and immigration. With conventional conceptual tools, can we forge innovative results? ? For example, the authors of the report observe a multitude of individual positions in relation to structural integration and religious observance (notably chapter III). They show that individuals of different faiths invest in religion, but if the intense investment in the Christian faith by one of the respondents facilitates his relationship with the surrounding society, the practice of Islam is interpreted in the sense of a break with French society. The discussion of the divergent results of religious mobilizations in a society that claims to be secular would find more strength if it were accompanied by a reflection on the very nature of this French secularism. Would republican integration accommodate itself, for example, to secularism? of recognition » more open to a pragmatic accommodation of religious otherness than its traditional French variant ?

The authors also open the discussion on the effects of discriminatory experiences in the educational and professional environment on the trajectories of young adults. The reader meets young men who, despite their academic success and their integration into working life, experience a feeling of injustice and are thinking of leaving France to try their luck in another Western country. Interpret these experiences differently than the author, who sees in them the expression of a “ snobbery » (p. 182) with regard to the French Republic, constitutes not only a scientific but above all a civic exercise. A systematic analysis of discriminatory practices and cultural representations which generate such overwhelming effects on some people would perhaps produce results which would surprise others.

Finally, continue to mobilize these implicit and unproblematized frameworks and categories such as republican promise or the community fence or even the division between those who “ flow into the mold » and the “ prolific and socially irresponsible families » (p. 208) does not allow us to question the very construction of the problems analyzed nor the established social (and ethno-religious) order. This contributes, on the other hand, to drawing a rigid border between the suburbs and the center, the citizen and the immigrant, the practitioner and the non-practitioner, the Republic and the communities. Doesn’t this confine the researcher – despite his intentions perhaps – and the individual – member of an ethnic or religious minority – to the role of republicans in spite of themselves? ?