This book offers an unprecedented insight into migrants’ schooling that fills a major social, political and scientific blind spot in the ways we contemplate the challenges of immigration in the contemporary world. Working at the intersection of the sociologies of education, immigration and public policy, the analysis focuses on the French case, a land of immigration where school has historically been considered the cornerstone of the Republican promise of universalism and integration for everyone. The book mobilizes unique empirical material mixing archives work with a multilevel and sub-national comparative ethnography. Against the dazzling polarization on the 2010s’ “refugee crisis”, it shows that the current treatment of migrant students is embedded in the legacy of a special policy shaped by the colonial matrix, education reforms and immigration policy reorientations. From 1945 to nowadays, the book argues that migrant education has been a makeshift policy managed through improvised arrangements, localized initiatives, and lukewarm ministerial support. Migrants' schooling encapsulates the shaky support of migrant populations in modern nation-states and the complex interplay between social, economic and immigration policies. The book ultimately culminates in a broader examination of contemporary transformations in public policy and the political foundations of social inequalities. This book will appeal to scholars, faculty, and upper-level students with interests in migration, sociology of education, social policy, political sociology, international and comparative education and schooling.
