Clément Viktorovitch returns each week to the debates and political issues. Sunday June 18: the question of immigration, which has taken on new urgency since the tragedy in Annecy.
Six people, including four young children, attacked with a knife by a Syrian asylum seeker: the event is appalling and tears our hearts. Should we therefore see this as new proof that immigration would constitute a threat to French women and men? In recent days, Marine Le Pen for the National Rally, and Eric Ciotti, the boss of the Republicans, have not hesitated to make this link.
“The criminal or criminal acts committed by people who should not be on the territory are increasing”said Marine Le Pen on Europe 1. “Almost 25% of detainees or defendants who are imprisoned are foreigners. 50% of the defendants in the big cities, Lyon, Paris, Marseille, are foreigners. It’s a fact”said Eric Ciotti on franceinfo.
There would be a proven statistical link between immigration and delinquency, even criminality. An argument that we also heard from the mouth of the Minister of the Interior, and even the President of the Republic on France 2, October 26, 2022: “I will never make an existential link between immigration and insecurity. We must not generalize. On the other hand, when we look at crime in Paris today, we cannot fail to see that half in fewer acts of delinquency come from people who are foreigners.” The sentence is ambivalent, but there would be, according to Emmanuel Macron, a certain link between delinquency and immigration.
Over-representation of foreigners in prisons
These figures are correct: foreigners indeed represent, in France, 7% of the total population, but 23% of individuals in prison. Can we therefore conclude that foreigners are more delinquent than the French? The answer is no. Behind these figures, there are a number of statistical biases. In addition, several studies, including those conducted by the previous Defender of Rights, Jacques Toubon, show that “visible minorities from immigration” are more controlled by the police, and therefore arrested. And that’s not all. Once in court, with equal profile and equal offence, foreigners have a greater risk of being convicted, and the sentences they receive are longer. They are therefore more in prison.
If foreigners are over-represented in prison, it is also the consequence of discriminatory treatment throughout the police and judicial chains. And we can go further. I looked into the work of the CEPII, the Center for Prospective Studies and International Information, a body attached directly to the Prime Minister. Last April, two CEPII researchers, Arnaud Philippe and Jérôme Valette, published a note in which they take stock of several decades of international research on the link between immigration and delinquency. Their conclusion is clear: “The studies unanimously conclude that immigration has no impact on delinquency.” This is the exact opposite of what the Republicans, the National Rally, but also the government repeat over and over. The Annecy attack is a tragedy, it’s true. But we can in no way make a generalization.
Opinion manipulation
According to several polls, published at the end of May, around two-thirds of respondents believe that there are too many immigrants in France. Which obviously raises a question: where does this perception come from? The CEPII researchers mention a particularly eloquent German experience. In 2016, the Sächsische Zeitung, a newspaper distributed in the region of Saxony, took a drastic step: journalists began to systematically indicate the origin of the perpetrators mentioned in their articles. Not only when the latter were foreign, but also when they were German. Result: in this region, in a few years, concern about immigration has decreased significantly.
This result is not isolated: other research, in Switzerland in particular, converges in the same direction. What creates fear among the population is not the over-representation of delinquency among foreigners. This is the over-investment that this issue is subject to on the part of certain media and political leaders. What we are facing, from my point of view, is a gigantic operation to manipulate public opinion. And it is clear that, for the moment, it is crowned with success.