On the Streets of Paris: The Experience of Displaced Migrants and Refugees

In the wake of the demolition of the “The Jungle” at Calais, northern France, in October 2016, more than three thousand asylum seekers, refugees and other informal immigrants at any given time live in informal tent cities throughout the city’s northern areas. These makeshift camps appear to manifest a central issue in the French asylum system, that is applicants after making a claim for protection, and awaiting a hearing or decision, receive next to no formal support (financial, or residential) and are largely left to fend for themselves.Not all of the camp residents are asylum seekers wanting to stay in France. Some are migrants (or asylum seekers) en route to the United Kingdom; others are refugees who received French protection, with no housing. Between 2015–2017 there were multiple outbreaks of scabies in these tent cities leading to sanitation workers refusing to work in their vicinity. The current Covid-19 crisis has, moreover, further exacerbated concerns about the health of the unhoused asylum seekers and migrants in Paris - unaccompanied minors, in particular. This article will consider the repeated displacement, or dispersal, of this population in terms of the changing “politics of immigration”and policing in France under President Emmanuel Macron. In order to present the broader social context, it will also describe current events in Paris, including Macron government’s legislation relating to asylum/immigration, policing and more, amid the Covid-19 health crisis.