THE STATE, HOUSING POLICY AND AFRO-CARIBBEAN MIGRATION TO FRANCE

France's Afro-Caribbean population forms a distinctive element in postwar migrant labour recruitment: of French nationality, with an equal balance of men and women, and strongly concentrated in public sector employment, especially in the Paris region. State policy strongly influenced the migration flow from the Caribbean islands, especially from the early 1960s. This article looks at aspects of the migrants' housing experience, using aggregate statistics to establish general tenure patterns and interviews to recreate biographical histories. Afro-Caribbean migrants avoided for the most part the worst excesses of the housing crisis of the 1960s and 1970s, though housing conditions - especially for newly-arriving migrants - were frequently poor. Access to the public housing sector is shown to be crucial, though the role of the state was less direct (specifically aimed at the Caribbean population through the migration agency) than indirect (through the role of employers and the general involvement of the state in housing provision).