The debate over ethnic statistics is raging. If Britain allows questions on the "ethnic origins" of these citizens during census campaigns, these requests are prohibited in France. Two leaders of associations oppose their arguments. For Patrick LOZES, of the Representative Council of Black Associations of France, statistics would be used to reveal discrimination, particularly in the education system and employment. Dominique SOPO, of SOS Racisme, believes that the quantification of discrimination is not relevant in the fight against inequalities. He also talks about the risk of a community retreat, as was observed in England. On the other hand, Patrick LOZES considers that in none of the countries that allow ethnic enumeration and fight against discrimination, communitarianism has been strengthened.
Philosophers, lawyers, sociologists, anthropologists have gathered around an alternative commission to counter the Committee of Yazid Sabeg the diversity commissioner, charged by the government to measure diversity and discrimination. Jean Loup AMSELLE, anthropologist protests against this "house arrest identity". For Alain FOIX, writer and philosopher, the way the word "ethnic" or the word "diversity" is used hides a synonymy with the term "race" and already induces discrimination. For lawyer Gwenaele CALVES, companies that defend "diversity" are the ones that have been most condemned for discrimination. Michel GIRAUD, sociologist, believes that these approaches of ethnic counting completely obscure the problem of racism.
Journalist Arnaud BOUTET sheds light on the legal framework that regulates ethnic and religious registration in France. It discusses the practices and issues of ethnic statistics in Germany and Britain. He concludes by citing two French studies that had the exceptional permission of the CNIL to collect information related to origins.
Britain and the United States use ethnic statistics to identify and categorize their population according to their geographical origins, skin colour and religion. In the United Kingdom these data are public and can be used to apply quotas in companies or public services. In France, the collection of this type of data is prohibited, except with exceptions and under the control of the CNIL, the National Commission for Informatics and Freedoms. This system can generate excesses, as in the United States, where 130 "ethnic" categories already exist.
Samuel THOMAS, vice-president of SOS racisme and Patrick SIMON of the National Institute of Demographic Studies argue about ethnic statistics. For the first, it is the discriminatory systems that must be analyzed, and not the behavior of people from immigration or overseas territories. The demographer, meanwhile, believes that it is impossible to enforce equality without statistics and that knowledge is not dangerous for society, on the contrary. On the question of the political recovery of such an investigation and the questioning of the French republican model, the vice-president of SOS Racisme stresses that this risks exacerbating the communitarian demands. He says he is shocked that the state creates "subcategories of French", a principle defended by the extreme right. The INED researcher believes that far-right theses are built on fantasies and that statistics are a justified response to their discourses.
INED, the National Institute of Demographic Studies, is developing a survey to measure the diversity of the French population, in the form of an anonymous questionnaire. Its author, Patrick SIMON, a researcher at INED, explains: the questions formulated to determine ethnic origin must not be disturbing or violent for the respondents and must make it possible to work on discrimination. However, establishing ethnic statistics raises a number of ethical problems that Alain FOIX, philosopher and Samuel THOMAS, vice-president SOS Racism, detractors of this tool. "Categorizing people is very dangerous... At Auschwitz, the first thing we did was to ask the Jews to identify themselves and to count themselves"