Paris is burning all night long

The setting is Paris, and the sky is crystal clear over the city of dreams, eternally celebrated through films such as ‘Paris je t’aime’, and indeed the city itself is the very epitome of French romanticism. Yet behind the ordered facade of Haussman’s architecture and sweeping boulevards lurks a darker city.

Heading up to the Sacré-Coeur last week, I was immediately accosted by a group of charming young gentleman who were keen for me to buy a piece of red and yellow string for 40 Euros. Such was their insistence that I had to physically pull myself away from them, making my way hurriedly up to Montmartre.

There you find a picturesque square filled by predatory artists, who heckle you as you attempt to take a stroll. In fact one artist took so much offence at my unwillingness to purchase an over-priced portrait of myself, he shouted at me ‘why not? Just five minutes!’ This was at 10am, who knows what he did to people who turned him down by the
afternoon.

Today, Paris is plagued by such characters, who were used to a constant stream of naive tourists with Euros to spend, who are easily exploited. However, what with the poor exchange rates and the general recession, tourism is at a gentle ebb in Paris. In fact at every turn there are signs that France is deep in the throes of a depression. Furthermore, this slump is worse than the government cares to admit. With unemployment at eight percent of the population, the state is beginning to lose ground in the race to lead Europe’s economy, despite its claims to be on a par with Germany.

The economic downturn has exposed deep-seated social issues in France that were already beginning to rise to the surface. On a basic level, when I mention charming young gentleman, not one of these men were white, and indeed the people who were forcing roses into my girlfriend’s hand throughout the day were again from an ethnic minority. For the last few years the power of the banlieues has been on the rise, with religious and racial tensions becoming more and more prominent in French current affairs.

The topic of the day at the moment is immigration, with immigrants finally fed up with supporting the economy by supplying cheap labour while suffering social rejection. Indeed, on that fateful day there was a demonstration by dissatisfied immigrants outside the Hotel de Ville. On the train home, I started to compare the situation with that of Great Britain. With regards to unemployment, ours is fairly close to France’s level, yet the height of this figure is a far more recent occurrence in this country than in France.

Racial tensions are also often in the news in Great Britain yet, as is traditional in this country, we have not experienced the riots and questionable police tactics that have come to characterise the banlieues. These riots are started by, if not solely committed by, ethnic minorities that are usually first or second generation immigrants, thus the racial segregation of Parisian society is evident. The banlieues have effectively become massive ghettos populated by France’s workforce. Whilst immigration was encouraged in the late sixties and seventies, with unemployment high now, these new additions to French society are unwanted. How has France dealt with the legacy of its colonial exploits?

It maintains a strictly secular attitude to all matters of state, constantly causing tensions with religiously overt immigrants, particularly over the wearing of the veil in schools. Far from aiding integration, this has produced a counter culture among young Muslims, who practice their religion and wear the symbols associated with it in part as a form of protest.

Why write this article? Because despite what that fine media institution the Daily Mail might say, immigrants are not the source of all our problems in this country. They are also not taking over the country; in fact integration on some fronts is virtually complete. The black population of the country could be seen to be highly integrated; we certainly do not have the racial tensions seen in the United States, although parliament does remain a woefully white institution. However, looking at sports teams, the country has footballing heroes such Jermaine Defoe leading the line for the national team.

The point of this article is to discourage the myth that Britain is a racially segregated society miles behind its European neighbours. It would seem entirely reasonable to suggest that Britain is far ahead of its neighbours in this respect. Yet far from boasting this, Britain continues to be the hard worker behind the scenes in Europe, ploughing billions of pounds of support into the Copenhagen initiative, far more than its allegedly economically sound neighbours France and Germany.