Age, profession, housing… Between January 16 and March 8, 9 million French people drawn at random will be invited to participate in the annual census conducted by the National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies (Insee) and the municipalities . Objective: to know the distribution of the population and its characteristics, in order to refine the public policies deployed in the territories.
For this campaign, three new entries are appearing in the questionnaire, which includes around thirty: frequency of teleworking, existence of a disability and place of birth of the mother and father. But the introduction of this last item divides those involved in the fight against discrimination.
INSEE, but also the Defender of Rights, Claire Hédon, believe that this question is necessary in order to “to highlight types of segregation or situational inequalities” linked to the origin of the parents, Muriel Barlet, head of the demography department at INSEE, explains to franceinfo. This information is useful to public decision-makers, but also to researchers or teachers, adds the Defender of Rights team, requested by franceinfo.
“This will allow public debate to take place on an informed basis and not, as is too often the case, on approximations, shortcuts or stereotypes.”
The Defender of Rights teamat franceinfo
On the other hand, the Human Rights League (LDH), the Movement against racism and for friendship between peoples (Mrap) and three unions (CGT, FSU and Solidaires) are concerned about the “dangers” what, according to them, this novelty presents. “The census is a public good (…), we call not to answer this new question”they say in a petition.
“It is necessary for questionnaires to ask the question of inequalities resulting from discrimination linked to skin color, supposed religion or origin geographical”assures franceinfo Jan Robert Suesser, member of the national office of the LDH. In France, the use of ethnic statistics is thus authorized with rare exceptions, notably for scientific research. As such, several studies such as the Trajectories and Origins survey by INSEE and INED already collect data such as skin color or the origin of parents.
For the association manager, the census is nevertheless not the right tool to highlight this discrimination.
“The question of the geographical origin of parents is useless in the census, because it is not justified by the deployment of a public policy.”
at franceinfo
Jan Robert Suesser believes that politicians have enough information on the subject. Not counting the studies already integrating this type of question, the previous version of the census asks the respondent their place of birth and their date of arrival in France, if they were born abroad.
Worse, this novelty is even “dangerous”according to Jan Robert Suesser. “The only additional thing that the question on the origin of the parents brings is a very detailed knowledge of the geographical distribution of people” descendants of immigration, and not just of the immigrants themselves. However, this count could open the way to inequalities of treatment on the part “actors who have nothing to do with the fight against discrimination”he points out, while national preference still appears in the program of the National Rally.
“The primary uses of counting the foreign origins of the population at fine territorial levels would be to enable populations to be targeted, to seek to arouse fears, to manipulate opinion during ‘news events’. ‘ which would lend themselves to discourses of rejection and exclusion”are also alarmed by the LDH and the CGT in a column published by Liberation.
In response to these concerns, INSEE emphasizes that the census offers a very large number of respondents, making it possible in particular to be able to “zoom in” on very specific situations of inequality, for example in a given employment area, or depending on of a specific wave of immigration.
The organization also recalls that “census data is confidential and is not transmitted to other administrations”. Neither the latter nor the general public will therefore have access to individual data. Furthermore, no data including the origin of the parents will be published for areas “less than 5,000 inhabitants”in order to preserve this anonymity. The questions on disability and the origin of the parents will also be optional, recalls INSEE, unlike the rest of the questionnaire.
The institute finally emphasizes that the addition of the new questions was the subject of a “long consultation process”during which a sample of the population, but also the Council of State and the National Commission for Information Technology and Liberties (Cnil) were contacted. The latter considered that the introduction of the question on the origin of the parents was “possible as long as all methodological precautions have been taken to guarantee data protection and the acceptability of this question has been tested beforehand”.
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