Metropolitics

The Treatment of “North Africans” in 1960s Urban Renewal in France

Janoé Vulbeau & translated by Oliver Waine — 2019-02-01T06:00:00Z

While France's 1960s urban renewal has been studied in terms of its effects on the working classes, its racial dimension has rarely been highlighted. Janoé Vulbeau examines two neighborhoods in the northern cities of Lille and Roubaix, considered in light of Henri Coing's pioneering Paris study, and shows how the development of what amounts to a settlement policy was partly based on the grouping together of, and discrimination against, “North Africans.”
The urban-renewal policies implemented

- Essays / France, immigration, urban renewal, Algerian War, discrimination, Roubaix, Lille, settlement, population, Hauts-de-France, Northern France, decolonization, Nord–Pas-de-Calais

Algerians and the police: colonial continuities and the weight of war

Françoise de Barros & translated by Oliver Waine — 2013-03-13T05:55:00Z

How can the treatment suffered by Algerians at the hands of the Paris police in the mid‑20th century be explained? Emmanuel Blanchard's recent work – the fruit of detailed investigative research – describes the role played by the transfer of Algerian organisational structures, career structures and colonial practices to mainland France, and underlines how the context of the War of Independence loomed large in the genesis of this police violence.
---- Series: How the Algerian War shaped French

- Reviews / police, Algerian War, colonization

Quotas of foreigners in social housing: a legacy of the Algerian War? Les Canibouts, Nanterre (1959–1968)

Marie-Claude Blanc-Chaléard & translated by Oliver Waine — 2012-04-11T07:29:45Z

Was it better to concentrate or disperse Algerians during the Algerian War? In the course of the conflict, both strategies were defended in terms of police action and integration. For Algerians accommodated in standard social housing, dispersal was the preferred solution, justifying the implementation of a quota system limiting the number of foreign residents in each housing complex.
---- Series: How the Algerian War shaped French cities Sonacotral, the National Construction Company for

- Essays / ghetto, immigration, Nanterre, housing, social housing, Algerian War

Housing the “harkis”: long-term segregation

Abderahmen Moumen & translated by Oliver Waine — 2012-04-04T04:55:00Z

The end of the Algerian War saw the arrival en masse of thousands of pieds-noirs and harkis in mainland France. From the camps of the 1960s to the estates where these repatriated populations were housed until the 1980s, the fate decided for the second of these groups by the “homeland” was one of sustainable segregation.
---- Series: How the Algerian War shaped French cities The arrival of returnees from Algeria in 1962 – the year of its independence – represented a demographic upheaval in

- From the Field / camps, segregation, housing, Algerian War, harkis, returnees, repatriation

“Cités de transit”: the urban treatment of poverty during decolonisation

Muriel Cohen & Cédric David & translated by Oliver Waine — 2012-03-28T04:55:00Z

At a time of profound housing crisis in the 1950s, cités de transit were adopted as a means of rehousing Algerian families from cleared bidonvilles. The background of this measure – at the crossroads between colonial legacy, a long history of education through housing, and the Algerian War – explains the enduring stigma associated with it.
---- Series: How the Algerian War shaped French cities “Social rehabilitation projects”, “short-term housing”, “rehousing estates”, “virtual prisons”,

- Essays / bidonville, housing, cités de transit, Algerian War, shanty town, slum, transition estates

“Bidonvilles”: from colonial policy to the Algerian War

Françoise de Barros & translated by Oliver Waine — 2012-03-21T07:07:58Z

The term bidonville (literally a town built of oil drums) originated in North Africa in the 1930s and came into use in mainland France in the 1950s to designate neighbourhoods composed of temporary, makeshift housing, particularly housing that accommodated Algerians. Here, Françoise de Barros shows that the management of these bidonvilles by the public authorities was situated at the crossroads between a colonial legacy and constraints associated with the Algerian War.
---- Series: How the

- Essays / bidonville, Nanterre, colonisation, local councillors, Algerian War, shanty town

The police and the “Algerian medinas” in France. Argenteuil, 1957–1962

Emmanuel Blanchard & translated by Oliver Waine — 2012-03-07T05:55:00Z

Fifty years after the end of the Algerian War of Independence, it should not be forgotten that this conflict was also played out in mainland France. Here, Emmanuel Blanchard shows the extent to which the control of territories with a strong Algerian presence was a key aspect of the war.
---- Series: How the Algerian War shaped French cities From the 1920s onwards, the town of Argenteuil, in the north-western suburbs of Paris, was one of the main places in the Paris region where migrants from

- Essays / segregation, housing, police, transport, Sonacotra, Algerian War, shanty town, lodging houses, workers' hostel