The State and the Political Participation of the "New" Immigrants in France and the United States

Whether legal or illegal, immigrants to the United States and France have increasingly arrived from the Third World over the past several decades. Since the permanent nature of their (and their families') settlement in these societies has become apparent, so have the social and political costs associated with concentrations of non-Europeans. Despite the limitations on noncitizens' legal and political rights, both in the U.S. and France a transient work force has been converted into consumers and residents engaging in active political participation. Immigrants in the two societies have pursued often different political strategies, however. This paper will consider those strategies and will argue that legal discrimination and host governments' choices of structures to link immigrants to politics account for the differing patterns of their political participation. It will be suggested that the very different « linking » or « channeling » processes overseen by the French and American states have proven more important than class and ethnic/racial factors in determining what roles immigrants have been playing in the politics of the two nations.