EMIGRATION FROM THE FRENCH CARIBBEAN - THE ORIGINS OF AN ORGANIZED MIGRATION

Migration from the French Caribbean islands of Guadeloupe and Martinique to the metropole has been rather neglected in the wider discussion of immigration in the postwar years. The French nationality of the migrants and their unrestricted rights of entry have set them apart from the immigration of foreign nationals. By the early 1980s, there was a large population of Afro-Caribbean origin. heavily concentrated in the Paris basin. This paper concentrates on the early evolution of state policy on recruitment. It traces the setting up of the state migration agency for the overseas departments and territories in the 1960s, and its precursors, and stresses the involvement of the state at a time usually characterized by laissez-faire in labour migration. Using an entirely new source of individual migrant files. the paper then takes two samples from the 1960s to assess the impact of policy on the fate of the first arrivals. The mechanisms of recruitment and the characteristics of migrants are discussed. The paper shows that migrants went into both the public and private sectors where labour demand was greatest, and that the assistance afforded migrants in training and housing was much less effective than state policy claimed.