The Most Violent Police Force in Europe: Police Brutality in France

theguardian.com

“Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité.” This phrase, meaning “Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity,” first appeared during the French Revolution of 1848 and has since become entrenched in the history of France. It is part of their current constitution and is considered to be a central piece of French heritage; however, France has yet to successfully live up to this promise, due in part to deeply entrenched institutional racism. One dangerous manifestation of this racism is in the country’s policing. French police officers are more heavily armed than any other police force in Europe and, in recent years, they have also been the most aggressive. Since 2022, French police officers have killed 15 people during traffic stops. Most recently, on June 27, 2023, a 17-year-old boy named Nahel Merzouk was shot in the chest at point-blank range by a French police officer during a traffic stop in Paris. The police officers claimed that Merzouk (who is of Algerian descent) had been physically threatening them with his car; however, witness statements and video footage told a different story. According to passengers in the car at the time of the shooting, the two police officers pulled up on motorcycles next to their car in stand-still traffic after Merzouk, who was too young to have a license, failed to stop for them. One passenger claimed that the officers took turns hitting Merzouk with the butt-ends of their rifles while they threatened to shoot him. On the third hit, the witness recounted that Merzouk let go of the brake pedal, causing the car to restart. It was at this moment that one of the officers fatally shot the teenager, causing the car to continue to accelerate until it crashed. Merzouk was pronounced dead at the scene. Merzouk’s mother believes the shooting was racially motivated, having said the officer “saw an Arab face, a little kid, and wanted to take his life.” The murder of Merzouk sparked nation-wide protests against racially-motivated police brutality. President Macron responded to the protests by employing heavy police presences, which resulted in the arrests of over 3,600 people. Still, Macron was quick to condemn the murder of Merzouk and one of the police officers involved in Merzouk’s death has been charged with voluntary homicide. However, proponents of racial justice movements in France point out that this incident is part of a larger pattern of excessive use of force by police officers in which police officers are rarely charged.

Police brutality in France has been a heated topic of discussion for years. It first became a major political issue after the gilets jaunes (meaning “yellow vests” in English) protests in 2018 and 2019, in which French workers with long commutes took to the streets in yellow vests to protest against the proposed rise in diesel taxes. The movement slowly transformed into a larger movement against President Macron’s general economic decisions, and, at its peak, 285,000 people were protesting across France. During these protests, around 2,500 protesters were injured (some losing eyes and limbs) in violent encounters with police. While this led to a smaller movement calling for a ban on police use of explosive grenades and rubber bullets, government representatives argued that this use of force was necessary because, while the overwhelming majority of protesters were peaceful, some did turn to acts of vandalism and violence. In fact, the French Ministry of the Interior reported that around 1,800 security personnel were injured in the protests. In response, Lauren Nuñez, Secretary of State to the Minister of the Interior from 2018 to 2020, expressed that he had no regrets about the use of force against protesters and stated that “Just because a hand has been torn off or an eye damaged doesn’t mean that this [response] is illegal. Above all, it’s important to make it clear that it’s not acceptable for police officers to be attacked in a violent manner by those wishing to express their convictions.” The general argument made by those supporting the police is that police officers are using an appropriate amount of force because some of the protests have turned into riots with significant property damage. They argue that police officers must use teargas and other weapons to protect themselves and to quell the riots in order to protect French society.

While some excuse the violence perpetrated by French police in response to the gilets jaunes protests as a necessary evil, others like Dunja Mijatovic, the human rights commissioner for the Council of Europe (an international human rights organization), have argued that police brutality is never acceptable. In response to police violence committed during anti-pension reform protests in March of 2023, Mijatovic stated “violent incidents have occurred, some of which have targeted the forces of law and order. But sporadic acts of violence by some demonstrators or other reprehensible acts committed by others during a protest cannot justify excessive use of force by agents of the state.” French police forces have demonstrated a pattern of increasingly violent behavior, especially in regards to their handling of protests and demonstrations. From March through May of 2023, French police forces were criticized for their excessive use of force against protesters during the anti-pension reform demonstrations as some felt that the heavy police presence at the protests escalated the potential for violence. On March 25, 2023, police officers engaged in another polarizing, violent confrontation with protesters during a separate demonstration in Sainte-Soline over environmental concerns. During this confrontation, police officers launched tear-gas grenades at protesters, injuring 200 demonstrators and sending one demonstrator into a coma with life-threatening injuries. Similarly to the anti-pension reform protesters, protesters at Sainte-Soline blamed the police presence for the violence that erupted. An engineering student (referred to as David) who was present at the protests said, “This is the first time I have attended a demonstration that was this violent, but, in fact, the violence did not come from the protestors. It was violent because the police were violent.” Human rights organizations have increasingly raised alarms over police violence in France as they use aggressive crowd control tactics even against peaceful protesters. French police forces have been criticized for using weapons that are often banned elsewhere, including flashballs, grenades, water cannons, batons, and firearms. These weapons exacerbate the risk of injury at the hands of an overzealous, potentially aggressive police force.

While police forces in France have been criticized for racial biases in their application of force, this violence does not exist in a vacuum. It is heavily influenced by the larger social dynamics and stigmas present in French society, which include racial and religious biases against minority groups. In a study presented to the French national assembly by the Representative Council of France's Black Associations, 9 in 10 Black people in France reported experiencing racial discrimination. This racial prejudice manifests in a variety of ways, including in the country’s policing practices. The Défenseur des droits, an independent constitutional authority in France, found in a 2017 study that a young man who is perceived to be Black or Arab is 20 times more likely to be stopped than other members of the French population. However, these French racial biases do not only manifest in policing policies. For example, recent public discourse has revolved heavily around discriminatory educational practices. France has strict laws banning religious symbols in public schools. The French government justifies these laws by arguing that they are necessary to promote secularism; however, they have a disparate impact on Muslim students and are often said to be targeted to restrict the wearing of hijabs and other articles of clothing associated with Muslim students. Most recently, in August of 2023, the Minister of Education Gabriel Attal announced that students will no longer be allowed to wear abayas in schools. Abayas are long, loose traditional dresses worn primarily in North Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. This decision caused outrage since there is no direct link between abayas and Islam, so these dresses could be considered a cultural item rather than a religious one. France has attempted to guard against racial biases by creating laws without explicit mention of people's race; however, this does not prevent laws from disproportionately impacting minority communities. The French police can provide information on how many people have been killed by police officers; however, they cannot provide information on the race of those victims because it is illegal to collect that information in France. The French government’s attempts to create color-blind laws ignores the realities of life in France for minorities. It exacerbates the problem of racial injustice because it strips the oppressed of the ability to quantify their oppression as a weapon to combat it.

Still, some are working to combat racial prejudice in policing. In 2021, six French and international human rights groups, including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and Open Society Justice initiative, filed the first class-action lawsuit against French police forces in which the plaintiffs are asking for mandatory police reform. This lawsuit, heard by the Conseil d’État (the highest administrative authority in France), began proceedings on September 29, 2023. The plaintiffs argued that there is significant, systemic discrimination in police action, including racial profiling and discriminatory identity checks. On October 11, 2023, the court found that police activities surrounding racial profiling in identity checks did constitute discrimination and were not “limited to isolated cases”. However, the court did not impose measures to force the French government to end these discriminatory practices because the court said it did not have the authority to change political policy. While this decision was disappointing to proponents of this case, the court did recognize the repeated abuses of identity checks in policing as racial discrimination. This is significant because some political leaders have historically denied the notion that racial discrimination exists in policing at all. For this reason, it is possible that proponents of racial justice in France could still use this finding to force their political leaders to confront the realities of racial inequality in France and enact some real change.

How the Teaching Methods of PWIs Infiltrate the Teaching Methods of HBCUs

Thousands of PWIs (predominantly white institutions) across the United States have made themselves enticing to marginalized students, but have failed to create inclusive, safe, and accepting spaces for them. Davarian Baldwin’s, In the Shadow of the Ivory Tower: how Universities are Plundering our Cities, beautifully depicts the impacts of “univerCities” as an ivory tower–a metaphorical location– where primarily privileged people are cut off from the rest of the world, enjoying their own life’s pursuits and how students, residents, and activists of the community rise up to meet the institutions. Andrew Rossi’s film, The Ivory Tower, conducts a rich cost-benefit analysis of HEIs (higher education institutions) and concludes that numerous HEI professors and faculty members disseminate information on such niche subject matter in coursework, often disconnected from students’ life experiences, notably the experiences of underserved students, such as low-income students, Black and Brown students, queer students, students with disabilities, and/or students with ACEs (adverse childhood experiences). The ivory tower’s pedagogy, or method of teaching in the higher education classroom, is deeply embedded in what Paulo Friere has denoted, in Chapter 2 of his book, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, the “narrative” aspects of education in the conventional western classroom under the “banking model of education.” In the model, the teacher or educator is a “narrating subject depositing information” into the students’ minds, with their students as passive agents. The students’ life experiences become disconnected from their instructor’s “narration” because they absorb information without its full context. Not only does it exclude context, but it lacks space for student creativity and expression, and it discourages questions and the production of knowledge, which emerges from constant questioning. The “banking model of education” grants the teacher all knowledge and assumes that the powerless (students) are ignorant, which highlights the crux of the issue in western HEIs. 

Scholar bell hooks, in Teaching a Community Pedagogy of Hope, discusses the problematic ways in which higher education transformed its banking pedagogy to invoke more radical and “liberating” ideas in incrementally problematic ways. As white and cis-gendered men have dominated and continue to dominate the academic sphere, they have championed gender equality over racial equality in their analysis. To avoid being replaced in academia, they had to (at least) adopt a gender/feminist lens. In turn, this created a binary between “feminist studies” professors and “Black studies” professors, with an alternative of “cultural studies” professors thrown into the mix. “Cultural studies” professors are established by and comprised of white, cis-gendered male professors, who “recognized” and “incorporated” race and gender into their curriculum, yet primarily fear those who “question,” as Friere’s model indicates. These “liberating” ideals have infiltrated HEIs, starting in the latter half of the 20th century, and persisting across colleges and universities today, including HBCUs (historically Black colleges and universities). Not only do they exist pervasively within PWIs, but they have infiltrated HBCUs across the United States. 

At their inception, HBCUs were established to develop spaces for Black intellectualism and to center students who have been excluded from white academic spaces– academic spaces that are upheld by an economic ecosystem of racial capitalism. Students at universities are privileged consumers investing in a commodity of education, an exclusive commodity that Black people have historically and continuously been denied. As a hub of intellectual, scholarly, and academic pursuits, universities and colleges have the assets to build certain structures. Universities have also accumulated a social responsibility to not only their students, but to their surrounding community; Baldwin has effectively concluded that they have largely failed to fulfill their social responsibility to the community. 

Moreover, Friere’s “banking model of education” has permeated not just HEIs, but all aspects of western education (specifically in the U.S.), resulting in the “liberal” state of affairs that bell hooks exhibits. It is clear that there has been an infiltration of white supremacy deeply laced into the infrastructure and pedagogy of HBCUs, resulting in a manifestation of white supremacy within these spaces. This cycle of white supremacy is reinforced within PWIs and has resulted in prevalent discourse across academic and social circles regarding the notion of whether Black students are better off attending HBCUs versus PWIs. According to an NPR interview with Dillard University president, Walter Kimbrough, Black students are in search of safe learning environments due to abundant incidence and coverage of the recruitment of white supremacy on college campuses, hate crimes against Black students, among other instances of racial aggression. While HBCUs haven’t been recognized for the same more blatant forms of racism that happen at PWIs, students at HBCUs are not liberated from the dominance of white ideologies that invade academic and social spheres altogether. Research traffic has overlooked the impact of HBCUs as HEIs that perpetuate white ideologies (Feagin 2010, 189). To understand this, it is integral to note the mere control white people have over systems of power, specifically over educational systems of power. Ultimately, the incidence of white control across educational systems of power has resulted in Black Americans internalizing hegemonic methodologies–even at HBCUs. 

Moreover, the history of HBCUs reflects the United States’ failure to attain racial justice in academic and social realms. White supremacist ideas that became laced into these spheres prohibited Black people from succeeding as intellectuals, barred from reaping the benefits of any form of higher education as most HBCUs were established post-Civil War by missionaries. Northern missionaries collaborated with the Freedmen’s Bureau to create Black colleges with the intent to free Black people by providing them with primary and secondary education. The establishment and philanthropic funding of these institutions was produced by northern industrialist white men–its initial pedagogy entrenched in Christian values and moral character (Albritton 2013; Gasman 2010; Wilcox et al. 2014; Cantey et al. 2011).

 The goal of these institutions at their origin was to prepare their students for labor-based work. Leading philosophers of the moment like Booker T. Washington advocated the vocational model for Black folks, emphasizing the need for them to develop useful skills in the labor force that would help industries immediately. Washington argued that with hard work and determination in the industrial sector, Black people would eventually gain the acceptance of their dominant counterparts and of the system. Washington’s theory emerged into a pedagogy of upward social mobility across HBCUs like Morehouse College, Tuskegee University, and Spelman College in the early 20th century to present an identity that would appear “respectable” to white folks (Albritton 2013; Cantey et al. 2013). These universities offered several classes on manners and industrial labor work. The institutionalization of such a theory reifies white supremacy that has been upheld throughout U.S. history. Under Plessy v. Ferguson, slavery was justified by white men to ‘improve the lives of uncivilized Africans who were intellectually inferior.’ This frame persists in HBCUs today where the inferiority of Black students has become laced into the education system through these practices (Feagin 2010). 

Black students and faculty resisted this hegemony across Black colleges and demanded agency over their HEIs and more Black people were hired as faculty (deans, administrators, professors, etc) at HBCUs. This more radical shift paralleled a shift to a liberal arts pedagogical approach–one more closely associated with thinkers like W.E.B. Du Bois. Du Bois countered Washington’s theory of industrializing students at Black colleges and adopted a holistic curriculum of courses (Albritton 2013; Gasman 2010; Cantey et al. 2013). In the 1960s, HBCUs emerge as epicenters of student activism and resistance. At this moment, HBCUs acted as spaces of validation of Black students’ identities and dares them to use their knowledge to call for justice in the Black community, which still holds true for Black students at HBCUs today. At HBCUs in the south, college campuses were sometimes the only safe space for Black folks to safely radically organize with allied white folks (Mbajekwe 2006).  

While understanding the crucial role these institutions play, how do we sustain the strengths of the institutions while adapting to the hegemonic curriculums that have permeated higher education? HBCUs are challenged with centering Black liberation for their student population, while also preparing their students to live in a society that has been designed to favor whiteness. Although Black Americans will never have full and open access to white spheres of power, HBCUs have certainly accrued politics of respectability. However, it is no question that a radical call-to-action is necessary in order to completely restructure the system that dominates HBCUs. There should not be educators at HBCUs that cannot connect course material to the students’ life experiences, as Paulo Friere asserts. As a white student about to finish my undergraduate education at a PWI, I acknowledge that there is a lot of information I don’t know and haven’t experienced with regard to the racism that happens within the confines of HBCUs campuses, and there is information regarding the personal experiences of Black students that I do not and will not ever understand– both of which speak to my role as a scholar and activist interested in educational reform for oppressed peoples. However, it is imperative to grow aware of the notion that racism doesn’t only seep through predominantly white spaces. 

References

Albritton, Travis. 2013. “Educating Our Own: The Historical Legacy of HBCUs and Their Relevance for Educating a New Generation of Leaders” Urban Rev 44 (3): 311-331.

Arroyo and Gasman. 2014. “An HBCU-Based Educational Approach for Black College Student Success: Toward a Framework with Implications for All Institutions” American Journal of Education, 121(1): 57-85.

Cantey, Nia, Bland, Robert, Mack, LaKerri, and Danielle Joy-Davis. 2013. “Historically Black

Feagin, Joe R. 2010. The White Racial Frame: Centuries of Racial Framing and Counter- Framing, second edition. New York, NY: Routledge.

Gasman, Marybeth. 2010. Unearthing Promise and Potential: Our Nation’s Historically Black Colleges and Universities. San Franscisco, CA: Jossey- Bass.

Mbajekwe, Carolyn. 2006. The Future of Historically Black Colleges and Universities. Jefferson,

Washington, Amanda and Marybeth Gasman. 2016. “Why Enrollment is Increasing at HBCUs,” The Hill, August 22.

Washington, Booker T. 1906. “Tuskegee: A retrospect and Prospect”. North American Review, 182(593): 513–523.

Wilcox, Clyde, Wells, Jovita, Hadda, Georges, and Judith Wilcox. 2014. “The Changing Democratic Functions of Historically Black Colleges and Universities” New Political Science 3 (4): 556-572.

An Appeal to Geneva: Racial Politics and Discrimination at the Founding of the United Nations

Human rights often pose a paradox - foundational human truths, such as freedom from oppression and discrimination are arguably some of the most contested rights in the world, spanning all continents, all countries, all races, all religions, and all peoples. Human rights were formally institutionalized by the United Nations in 1948. The UN definition of human rights inaugurated norms of such basic rights and the prioritization of them within a Western context and notions of world order post-WWII. With human rights established for the first time, it is important to be critical of the time frame and historical significance of political and societal culture of the West - most notably in the United States with racial segregation. With the US playing a critical role in the creation of the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), by-products of politics and racism - the UN Declaration of Human Rights at its founding is inherently racists and discriminatory. How the UN defined, wrote and prioritized the UDHR and subsequent application of the declaration, fail to acknowledge the oppression and human rights abuses in the United States. The United States is insincere in regards to the role the US played in the creation and policies of the United Nations UDHR. The United Nations was created at a time when basic human rights were being denied to many citizens of African, Asian, South American and Indigenous descent in the United States. Forced segregation, Jim Crow laws, mob lynching and institutionalized racism, classism and sexism were experienced across the country. With a particular look at racism and the creation of the United Nations, a sense of injustice, inequality and Western ideology are at the core of the founding of the institution that represents the world. With the United States being the most influential leader in the creation of the United Nations, it is important to scrutinize the role the U.S. had in the creation of the institutional flaws of the UN.

The United States has one of the most complex and paradoxical histories of a democracy; built on the enslavement of Brown and Black bodies. Institutional racism will be defined and used within the context of the U.S. “...as the policies, programs, and practices of public and private institutions that result in greater rates of poverty, dispossession, criminalization, illness, and ultimately mortality of African Americans. Most importantly, it is the outcome that matters, not the intentions of the individuals involved.” This definition comes from African and Black Diaspora scholar, Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor. The fight for racial equality has been present in the US since the founding. Similarities between Frederick Douglass’ 1852 speech, “What is the fourth of July to a slave?” have similar tones to W.E.B. Dubois’ Introduction to Appeal to the World: A Statement of Denial of the Rights to Minorities in the Case of Citizens of Negro Descent in the United States of America and an Appeal to the United Nations for Redress (The Appeal). While a key difference from 1852 to 1947 was that slavery was unconstitutional in 1947, the rough 100 years, however, did little to change the oppression and institutionalized racism of Brown and Black bodies in the United States. However, with the creation of the United Nations as an international institution, a mode of redress was able to be amplified beyond the borders of the so-called Land of the Free. An Appeal to the World began the foundational movement for future Black power and race-related rights to be addressed, recognized and contemporary ideologies to be contested through the use of international institutions such as the UN on an international level. The elevated attention and body of nations allowed for racial oppression in the U.S. to be heard on a much larger platform than previously in human history.

The Appeal

The Appeal was not the first document presented to the United Nations on the racial oppression and discrimination in the United States. On June 6, 1946, the National Negro Congresses (NNC) petitioned the United Nations’ Secretary General’s Office with A Petition to the United Nations on Behalf of the 13 Million oppressed Negro Citizens of the United States of America (the Petition). This 15-page petition outlines the “economic, social, political, and physical machine of oppression” experienced by Black bodies in the U.S. The Petition was distributed and gained positive responses around the world from Bolivia to the West Indies along with support from American groups such as the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). While the NNC was known for communist ideologies, the U.S. Government and primarily the FBI tried to discredit the Petition as communist propaganda and ‘un-American’. The UN required evidence to be gathered as proof that the rights of African Americans were being violated. Because of the organizational structure of the NNC, collection of evidence was almost impossible for the organization and the Petition was dropped. The NAACP leaders Walter White and W.E. Burghardt Du Bois’ inspiration came from the Petition and began to craft their own appeal. The chair of the Human Rights Commission was Eleanor Roosevelt, who was also on the Board of Directors of the NAACP, Du Bois and White believed they had a fighting chance at the idea and believed Roosevelt would support their work (Anderson 2003, 93).

The Appeal to the World: A Statement of Denial of the Rights to Minorities in the Case of Citizens of Negro Descent in the United States of America and an Appeal to the United Nations for Redress was written by W.E. Burghardt Du Bois; Earl B. Dickerson, Milton R. Konvitz; William R. Ming, Jr; Leslie S. Perry; Rayford W. Logan and presented to the United Nations

On October 23, 1947. Where the Petition was ideologically driven, it failed in being able to provide the appropriate structure that was required by the UN. The Appeal was able to fulfill the instructional bureaucracy, provide in-depth analysis and evidence, all while creating a compelling argument. The Appeal sought to change the way in which rights were conceptually understood and realized in the racial context of America. A movement and discourse to change from civil rights to human rights. The discourse was all within the freedom and equality struggle not just in the U.S. but racial equality around the world. Scholar Carol Anderson emphasizes that this was a critical move because equality from the perspective of white America and institutionalized racism understood equality as a slow progression to ‘equalness’ rather than the literal definition of equal. Through the conceptual shift to human rights, Du Bois then contends that the greatest threat to the US is within its own racist ideology. Du Bois gives a powerful introduction stating that, “When will nations learn that their enemies are quite as often within their own country as without? It is not Russia that threatens the United States so much as Mississippi; not Stalin and Molotov, but Bilbo and Rankin; internal injustice done to one’s brothers is far more dangerous than the aggression of strangers from abroad.” While history agrees with Du Bois in the importance of dealing with domestic issues, it is important to acknowledge that while simplistic, slavery, the Civil War, lynching, police brutality and racism at this time had killed more Americans than the Cold War ever did and ever would (including any proxy wars). The Appeal is a 94-page document and history of the grievances of Black and African-Americans organized chronologically; providing examples of oppression and discrimination. Organized by chapters from the USA's founding to pre-World War I; Black Legal status since WWI, present Black legal status from WWI to WWII; Patterns of Discrimination in Fundamental Human Rights; and concluding with the efforts made by the UN for Human Rights and rights of Minorities. The Appeal provides basic statistics, facts, and evidence, most of which was in the NNC’s Petition but dramatically expanded upon. The international component not only points of the hypocrisy of Western nations in DuBois stating that,

To disarm the hidebound minds of men is the only path to peace; and as long as Great Britain and the United States profess democracy with one hand and deny it to millions with the other, they convince none of their sincerity, least of all themselves… Most people of the world are more or less colored in skin; their presence at the meetings of the United Nations as participants, and as visitors, renders them always liable to insult and to discrimination; because they may be mistaken for Americans of Negro descent...

A critical aspect of The Appeal was the lack of state sponsorship, and the US had zero intention of sponsoring the document. While the African-American Black populations was larger than the population of some member states in the UN, the Petition was nonetheless dismissed as a domestic grievance and inapplicable.

The symbolism behind both the NNC’s Petition and the NAACP’s Appeal was one of the first instances of requesting redress beyond and acknowledgment of oppression within your own state to an international audience. The Petition and The Appeal at the time were politically disruptive towards American Foreign policy because of the danger of UN jurisdiction over “domestic affairs” and Cold War politics. The Soviet Union used America’s failings in racial equality in political attacks against the U.S. and democracy. On June 22, 1946, India filed a complaint with the UN with the South African Apartheid Government over racial discrimination laws that violated treaties. The Union of South African government claimed the mater outside the jurisdiction of the UN and that no internationally recognized human rights existed at the time.The matters of jurisdiction, defined and recognized rights became ever more a political discussion. Scholar Mary Dudziak emphasized the idea that if Apartheid human rights violations were enforceable by the UN, subsequently Jim Crow laws could be next and vice-versa. The U.S. had no interest in allowing for that to happen and neither did other nation-states’ such as Union of South Africa that had human rights violations occurring in their country and used what power they had to influence the UN to think and act in the interest of the US.

The Impact of the Appeal

The Appeal set into motion key Cold War ideological debates as well as provided a new international platform for the oppression of African-Americans and Blacks’ voices to be heard. One key and important response that The Appeal had was that of Eleanor Roosevelt’s refusal to be present and disdain to have The Appeal be presented to the United Nations. Roosevelt herself, who was a known critic of racial discrimination, refused to acknowledge The Appeal in fear of what The Appeal would do to America’s fight against communism. Her concern was sound in that the Soviet Union proposed that the NAACP’s charges be investigated. “On December 4, 1947, the United Nations Commission on Human Rights rejected the proposal, and the United Nations took no action on the petition”. The image of the US as a racial opressor, however, remained a significant battle for US foreign policy during the Cold War. As scholar Mary Dudziak points out in her book, Cold War Civil Rights, “If the [US] could not eradicate the conditions that gave rise to foreign criticism [racism in the US], it could at least place them ‘in context’... Rehabilitating the moral character of American democracy would become an important focus of Cold War diplomacy”. And so the United States, rather than foundational challenging and changing the racialized country created justifications and defenses for post-WWII segregated America.

The Appeal to the World not only significantly pointed out the flaws in American democracy, but the document also inspired documents of the like to be continuously presented to the UN. The petition, We Charge Genocide was presented to the UN in 1951 in Paris. We Charge Genocide created a linkage between police brutality and the inhumane targeting, profiling, and killing of a group of people based on notions of race specifically in the United States. The petition argued that police brutality crimes should be punishable by the UN Genocide Convention. The Appeal, and the subsequent We Charge Genocide created a notion for future Black Power leaders such as Malcolm X who in his famous speech, The Ballot or the Bullet in 1964 directly calls out the UN and highlights the need to define the oppression and the Civil Rights movement as a human rights issue, which appeared as well in the Appeal to the World.

Conclusion

“To forget them, to pass lightly over their wrongs, and to chime in with the popular theme, would be treason most scandalous and shocking, and would make me a reproach before God and the world”. - Frederick Douglass

To apply to modern times, to not acknowledge and scrutinize the motives, power politics and manipulation by the United States’ interest into the foundation of the creation of the first human rights laws is a server injustice not only the people whose human rights were violated but to also concede defeat to the belief that human rights only apply to certain people. While An Appeal to the World did not address, restore or equalize the rights of African-Americans and Black people in America, it did foster the scholarship and language in regards to how racial rights and therefore human rights are discussed in the context of the US. However the question remains, does the United Nations, or any international organization, such as the International Criminal Court (ICC) serve in modern notions as a platform for human rights denials to be heard and addressed in the United States? Answering this question requires a realistic analysis of these institutions - particularly looking at the UN and ICC, two institutions based on the protection and defense of human rights. The hope of redress through the United Nations in 1947 was also centered on the hope of international support from South American states and in recently decolonized states in Africa. With the development of power and politics within the last 50 years - the hope of redress through the United Nations, in particular, is less likely.  In regards to the ICC, the United States while signed the Rome Statute, that instituted the ICC, never ratified it and thus ICC does not have jurisdiction unless the United States consents to involve the ICC. Institutions such as the UN and ICC are forces of good and do valuable international work. While the creation of the United Nations was groundbreaking, it is critical to be mindful of the process that still needs to happen. The concepts and arguments created in The Appeal and in the formation go beyond the domestic sphere through international institutions and politics. Progress has been made, in that the UN now has a committee on The Elimination of Racial Discrimination and the United States is recognized as an obvious violator of racial equality. Racial inequality still exists in the world and in the United State. With movements such as #BlackLivesMatter, the fight for true equality continues.

Re-contextualizing “The White Man’s Burden” to Understand France’s Recent Xenophobic Policies

On August 23, 2016, police forced a woman relaxing on the beach in France with her family clad in a blue long-sleeved tunic with black pants and a blue headscarf to either leave the beach or take off her headscarf and tunic; meanwhile, onlookers yelled “go home” and applauded the police while her daughter cried. This incident is just one exampleof the backlash on burkinis that began when a water park closed to only allow women covered from chest to knees. The opposition to burkinis further spread when many towns banned burkinis from their beaches, resulting in women being fined or asked to leave for wearing burkinis. The burkini waterpark day would provide an opportunity for women to observe their beliefs while enjoying typical summer activities such as going to a waterpark, which was the motive for the Lebanese-born Australian woman who created the burkini in 2004: to accommodate conservative values while still allowing observant women to swim. A local Member of Parliament (MP) voiced his concern that veils represent fundamentalists who want to control women, while the mayor of Les Pennes-Mirabeau opposed the Burkini Day because he thought it was threatening to public order. Even the French Prime Minister supported cities and resorts banning burkinis, stating that burkinis affirm “political Islam” in a public space. France has 5 million Muslims, about 2000 of which wear full veils. The burkini reveals an ideological battle in France over French identity and the influx of Muslim immigrants from France’s former colonies.

France has a unique identity, which, like all other national identities, was established in a mainly homogenous society through a perceived difference from other identities and nationalities. The origins of French identity mean that fully-assimilated French citizens possess a high propensity for xenophobia, which causes citizens to view different identities as intrinsically opposite to their own identity. “The White Man’s Burden,” a poem written during the Scramble for Africa in 1899 expressing the sentiment of the colonial time-period, stated that colonies are a burden that empires should acquire in order to “civilize” inferior, or non-European, populations. While “The White Man’s Burden” originally influenced Europe’s colonial agendas, contemporary French policies toward immigrants, particularly Muslims, demonstrate that the poem’s ideological core continues to reproduce itself in French policies, including bans on burkinis, niqabs, and headscarves, surveillance of immigrants, and assimilation efforts.

Europe began colonizing Africa in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries in a race to secure profits in the slave, sugar, gold, and spice trades. France’s colonies were mainly in North and West Africa. France continued to consolidate their colonies in the late nineteenth century in order to secure their colonial economic system. In order to do so, the French government harshly implemented their hegemony in order to maintain their oppressive system. “The White Man’s Burden” expressed the rationalization for these oppressive policies, but by 1960, French-controlled West African states had gained independence, which spurred an increase of migrants in France.

Since 1960, there have been two streams of immigration: return, consisting of those of mostly European descent, and labor migration, resulting mainly from those indigenous to former colonies. After the independence of French West Africa, most labor migrants native to the former colonies were male workers looking for employment, whose settlement in French cities began postcolonial migration to France. However, these indigenous immigrants were not well-received, in part because of their history of exploitation which helps produce current prejudices and, in some cases, the fights for independence. Thus, colonization still impacts immigrants’ lives today: indigenous immigrants from former colonies face racial or ethnic discrimination and stereotypes as a result of colonization and might view the host country with suspicion because of their history of colonization. Many immigrants therefore find it difficult to assimilate into French society, and the history of exploitation during colonization becomes a present reality in employment discrimination. Oppression of indigenous labor migrants in France has occurred since the colonial era and continues today.

Much of the present discrimination stems from xenophobic, racist, or islamophobic sentiments dating back to French colonization. One of the events highlighting this discrimination in recent French history was an investigation in 1943 based solely on immigrants’ ethnicity. The 1943 investigation surrounded a rumor in French bureaucracy that Arab cafés in Paris were playing Arabic radio broadcasts that criticized French immigration policies. This rumor incitedinvestigations into civil status, political affiliation, nationality, and other qualities of the immigrants going to these cafés, marking the start of surveillance of immigrants in France that continues today. In the 1960’s and 1970’s, French surveillance became subtly and symbolically violent because authorities were alarmed at the perceived radicalization in the African immigrant community because of the potential to destabilize French society and politics. French surveillance emphasized control and undesirability of immigrants from former colonies in addition to understanding the immigrants and how to best assimilate them into French society. Since the 1980’s, radical right-wing parties campaigning on xenophobic platforms have grown in popularity in Europe, and these parties take advantage of citizens’ fears of threats from immigration in order to gain power and enact discriminatory legislation.

Presently, France’s population is comprised of 6% immigrants, 61% of which are from outside the EU; however, most immigrants of non-European descent remain poor due to segregated institution, failing school, low upward mobility, and racism and discrimination in employment, which are all remnants of the colonial era. France has limited immigration data since the French census or other data sources pose no questions of ethnic origin in order to adhere to France’s efforts to promote social cohesion. French citizens are generally more tolerant towards immigrants, but they demand more public order, which leads to intolerance, as they consider immigrants producing social disorder.

French colonial history has shaped the French government’s attitude toward this wave of immigration, viewing immigrants as unlikely to fit into France’s rigid society. France surveils its immigrants, as it surveilled indigenous peoples during colonial times. North African groups seek to be recognized as equal citizens instead of being viewed as natives because of their colonial history. Gaining citizenship as an immigrant from the Maghreb is difficult because of colonial history, and the colonial past is downplayed by justifying delays of granting citizenship as practical considerations. In order to obtain citizenship in France, candidates must prove they support the Republic’s values and cultural standards in public and private life. The French government uses surveillance techniques not only to understand the immigrant populations, but also to determine how to develop or alter policies regarding their presence in France and to shape immigrant communities in France. Thus, surveillance contributesto conformist policies. Xenophobic Frenchman view cultural difference as an obstacle to integrating immigrants into French culture and society.

French authorities have low regard for African immigrants because they believe African migration poses problems for a cohesive French society, illustrating the need to assimilate immigrants into French society. Authorities also viewedimmigrants as apolitical and grew concerned when immigrants became more politicized, thinking that African workers were radicalizing and thus threatening French society. This thought process justified the increase in efforts to detect radical or dangerous African immigrants. Recently, the populist extreme right has taken advantage of less social cohesion and status uncertainty by creating exclusionary policies, including the recent burkini bans, the 2004 headscarf ban in schools, the 2011 “burka ban” which banned face coverings from public spaces, and the May 2016 law passed in the National Assembly, giving police and prosecutors extensive power.

The 2004 headscarf ban protected the French Constitution’s interpretation of “libérté de la réligion,” which literally translates to two possibilities: freedom from religion or freedom of religion. The French government is organized around the interpretation, freedom from religion, which is the basis for their secular policies, or laïcité. According to the French government, the headscarf banprotects France’s policy of laïcité. The 2004 law that bans headscarves also bans other conspicuous, religious symbols including wearing a turban or a cross in school. Supporters of the ban argue that France must start the notion of secularity in schools. This law was made in reaction to tensions between ethnic or religious groups in France and in order to cement ideas of laïcité. Despite the controversy of the headscarf ban, it remains in place.

Additionally, in 2011, former President Sarkozy banned the niqab in all public spaces, meaning full face coverings are not allowed in public. Some women who wear niqabs or burqas are essentially under house arrest because they are not allowed to go outside wearing niqab or burka but value it such that they will not appear outside without it. Exemptions from the face-covering ban includemotorcycle helmets, face masks for medicinal reasons, and traditional face coverings such as for carnivals or religious processions. One woman filed a claim that the ban violates her rights and freedoms, but the European Court of Human Rights upheld the ban in 2014. With the face-covering ban in place, Sarkozy hinted at banning all headscarves in public places if he wins the French presidential election in 2017.

Other French politicians have reiterated Sarkozy’s suggestion to ban any headscarves from public places. French Prime Minister, Manuel Valls, has suggested a ban on headscarves for universities, asserting that the majority of the French people think that headscarves contradict French values. However, the education minister opposes this suggestion, asserting that banning headscarves would unjustly deny access to foreigners attending French universities and that university students, as adults, can independently decide to wear a headscarf. In defense of the headscarf ban at universities, Valls told a French publication, Libération, that banning headscarves would prove that Islam is compatible with the French Republic’s values and that he thinks it is possible for Islam to be compatible with the values of the Republic. Valls’ statements imply that he currently thinks that Islam is not compatible with the French Republic and its values. These statements showcase the growing xenophobic and islamophobic sentiments among government officials, which both reflect and are reflected in the public opinion towards similar policies. Islamophobic sentiments trigger oppressive policies such as headscarf and niqab bans, which reflect sentiments of “civilizing an inferior population” in “The White Man’s Burden.” This poem continues to portray public and government opinions on immigration, and in this case, particularly immigration to France from former colonies in North Africa.

Triggered by the recent terrorist attacks in Paris and Brussels, another law, passed in May 2016, now gives police and prosecutors extensive new powers. Police can now detain a person for up to four hours without a lawyer to check his or her identity and can place someone returning from a terrorist hotbed on house arrest for up to a month, promoting racial or religious profiling and targeting those with immigrant backgrounds. Additionally, police have access toelectronic eavesdropping technology that was previously only used by intelligence agencies, and prosecutors can approve phone tapping, communication surveillance, and hidden cameras to observe suspects. Police can detain a suspect for 144 hours without a charge. Opponents of the law argue that it would allow exceptional measures used for states of emergency to become commonplace and that France is trying to institutionalize extended powers for when the state of emergency ends. This law further institutionalizes the already systemic issue of xenophobia, racism, and islamophobia that are all reflections of France’s colonial past.

The large influx of immigrants to France has created a feeling of uncertainty in French society, so right-wing parties are campaigning on xenophobic platforms are gaining support. For example, the Front National makes immigrants from North Africa scapegoats, and under Sarkozy, France tightened criteria for immigration, including good language skills, minimum base of knowledge of French history, and accepting major norms and values. The idea that immigrants, particularly those with Muslim backgrounds, must be monitored and controlled as much as possible for France’s safety stems directly from the ideas put forth during the colonial era. “The White Man’s Burden” portrays opinion during colonization, and, as many immigrants in France originate from former French colonies, these sentiments still resonate today. Although much concern was placed over the burkini ban, the motivation for bans takes precedence. These bans and regulations are rooted in the dangerous and uninformed idea that immigrants, particularly those of another race or religion, are inferior populations and must be controlled and monitored.

France reproduces ideology from “The White Man’s Burden” today through new laws extending police and prosecutorial powers over targeted immigrant groups, bans on headwear, and other discriminatory and exclusionary laws. French politicians are capitalizing on the public’s fear of the “other,” or the unfamiliar, by designing xenophobic, islamophobic, and racist platforms. However, this phenomenon is not only specific to France. The United Kingdom has announced plans following its referendum to leave the EU to make immigration from India, a former colony, more difficult in order to protect business. Germany has been accused of offering money to asylum seekers to return to their countries of origin, including former colonies such as Ghana. Other European countries are experiencing similar results in terms of both elections of xenophobic parties and implementation of xenophobic policies. Recent terrorist attacks fuel these kinds of policies and xenophobic and islamophobic sentiment; however, the majority of these recent policies targeting immigrants stem from “The White Man’s Burden” ideology, portraying the need to control and civilize “inferior” populations.