Migrants of Chinese Origin in France: Economic and Social Integration

Abstract

There are at least two perspectives from which it is possible to analyse international migration. We can observe the migration of population X in country Y or the place of country Y in the migration of population X. These two perspectives are very different. The first is the point of view of the settling country; it is the dominant one in the study of international migration. The second is the point of view of the migrant population. I privilege this perspective in this chapter, so I consider that Chinese immigration in France is the local manifestation of a global phenomenon: the Chinese diaspora. The main characteristic of this diaspora is its ‘entrepreneurial’ dimension. It is the topic of the first section where I describe the formation of the Chinese diaspora. In the second section I deal with the specificities of Chinese immigration in France and the cohabitation of two flows (post-colonial immigration and ‘free’ immigration). In the last section I show that economic integration operates through an ethnic labour market linked to the ‘ethnic Chinese economic device’ which is itself the local expression of the entrepreneurial character of the diaspora. The objective is to provide some general lines of interpretation that can be found in other places like Prato.