ENGAGEMENT WITH MUSLIM COMMUNITIES - FRANCE

UNCLAS PARIS 000306

SIPDIS

SENSITIVE
SIPDIS

For EUR/PGI (Weinstein),EUR/PPD (Davis)

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: OPRC PREL PHUM KPAO KISL FR XG

SUBJECT: ENGAGEMENT WITH MUSLIM COMMUNITIES - FRANCE

REF: 06 STATE 185834

Sensitive but unclassified - entire text. Please protect
accordingly.


1. Summary: The Ambassador and all of Mission France support a
sustained and focused effort to engage France's Muslim minorities,
recognizing that organizing and executing such an effort will
continue to require considerable discretion, sensitivity and tact on
our part. Although there is some evidence that France's Muslim
minorities are better integrated than their counterparts elsewhere
in Europe, the French have a well-known problem with discrimination
against minorities. French media has fallen short in their
reporting on these issues and French government and private
institutions also found it difficult to face up squarely to the
challenges involved. We can engage the French both privately and
via the media on the issue of minority inclusion, but superior
French language skills are crucial to make effective use of the
French broadcast media.


2. Our specific goals for this strategy: a) demonstration of our
commitment to these issues, b) sharing of our American experiences
in managing diversity, and c) encouraging social reforms within
France to improve the lot of its minorities.


3. Post will continue to grow its established minority outreach
effort, identifying Arab-Muslim outreach projects as such in
expanded program reporting. Effectiveness will be measured in terms
of audience and participant totals, improved French media treatment
of minority issues, a measurably improved perception of the U.S.
among target audiences, and the initiation of new policies and
programs by both the French government and French non-governmental
organizations to improve the lot of French Arabs and Muslims.


4. Contact information for post's designated minority engagement
officers - PDOff Colombia Barrosse and PolOff William Stephen Wells
- is in the last paragraph. End summary.

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The Challenge
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5. Reftel tasked post to produce a '07 - '08 public outreach
strategy for engaging France's Muslim minorities, to counter
terrorist recruiting among them, and to foster their greater
integration into mainstream French society. We regret the late
response to this tasking.


6. Embassy Paris and its seven field posts began to reach out
systematically to France's Arab and Muslim populations several years
ago, in 2003, targeting neighborhoods and institutions known to have
large immigrant populations (first, second and third generation.)
Since that time post established a broad base of political reporting
on French Muslim issues, and the post's Public Affairs Section
increasingly focused its program assets (speakers, DVCs, exhibits,
exchanges and grants) on minority communities, under the more
acceptable rubric of "civil society" outreach.


7. Organizing and executing this outreach required sensitivity and
discretion due to France's particular philosophical outlook and
history. It has the largest Muslim minority population in Western
Europe, both as an absolute number and as a percentage of the
national population. France's five million plus Muslims are largely
North African (Algerian, Moroccan and Tunisian) in origin, although
they remain diverse and resistant to blanket categorization. The
French Government's approach to religion and minorities
traditionally has been to promote assimilation under the banner of
equality, however imperfectly that goal has been achieved, with a
strong emphasis on "laicite" (secularism) in public spaces. This
policy demands official blindness to all racial and ethnic
differences. French law formally prohibits the collection of
statistics on the basis of race, religion, or ethnic background; and
only approximate figures are available to us regarding France's
minorities, including Muslims.


8. Concepts such as "affirmative action," "diversity,"
"multiculturalism," or compound descriptions of identity (e.g.
Arab-American) are relatively new and somewhat controversial in
France, where the approach has been more to target specific
geographic enclaves, e.g. educational programs for neighborhoods
with a high percentage of socio-economically disadvantaged (often
Arab and Muslim) youth.


9. Young French citizens across the religious spectrum tend not to
be practicing/devout, but disadvantaged minority youth remain an
obvious target for extremist recruiting. As a result of recent
events (including the November 2005 unrest in the suburbs),
diversity and integration are discussed more openly - at
conferences, as well as on talk shows and campuses. Nevertheless, it
remains generally indelicate in France to ask a person's religious
affiliation. Challenging the government's approach to assimilation
can amount to challenging the basis of French identity within the
Republic.


10. The organization and execution of any official USG Muslim
outreach strategy in such an environment - whatever the strong
justification in our eyes - will continue to require considerable
and continuing discretion, sensitivity and tact.

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Media Environment
--------------


11. As in other European countries, French media reporting of U.S.
policies and intentions is often skeptical. Reporting by the
mainstream media on Arab Muslims and their issues, however, is
typically not so much negative as negligent, falling short both in
its coverage of discrimination towards them and of juvenile
delinquency among them.


12. Official Americans and pro-USG surrogates have ready access to
most French media to convey official policy messages, but using that
access effectively presents a special challenge. Superior French
language and presentation skills are especially important for making
effective use of French broadcast media. Communicating to the
French about the treatment of their minorities, a topic they
themselves are often reticent to explore in depth, is more difficult
for us than, say, describing our own, American experience. Any
ill-prepared efforts to reach out to France's Muslim audiences could
easily become counter-productive. We therefore must continue to
proceed with care.


13. Our primary media focus needs to be on TV and radio, but print -
and the new media - should not be ignored.


14. Fewer or less than one French adult in four reads a national
newspaper regularly. Regional papers are still important, however,
with Ouest France (Rennes) being the largest daily. The French are
more avid magazine readers, buying over three billion copies a year.


15. French broadcasting is partly state-owned and partly in the
hands of private enterprise. Most French TV viewers still,
reportedly, prefer the six major broadcast channels, but the number
of channels offered by various cable and satellite operators
continues to grow, with the newest being France 24, a CNN-like
24-hour news-station. Average French TV viewership is over five and
one-half hours per day.

16. Radio, especially FM, remains an important medium in France:
over 99 per cent of French households own at least one radio and
almost 5 in 6 over the age of 13 year listen to the radio daily. As
with TV, French radio is part state-owned and part private.

17. Top French journalists are often products of the same elite
schools as many French government leaders. These journalists do not
necessarily regard their primary role as to check the power of
government. Rather, many see themselves more as intellectuals,
preferring to analyze events and influence readers more than to
report events.

18. The private sector media in France - print and broadcast -
continues to be dominated by a small number of conglomerates, and
all French media are more regulated and subjected to political and
commercial pressures than are their American counterparts. The
Higher Audio-Visual Council, created in 1989, appoints the CEOs of
all French public broadcasting channels and monitors their political
content.

19. Internet access is growing steadily in France, especially among
the younger generation, rapidly replacing traditional media. All
important television and radio channels in France have their own
websites, as do the major print media. Blogs are an increasingly
popular method of communication for minorities and NGOs, who use
them to express opinions they do not feel are reflected in the
traditional media.

20. France's first generation Arab immigrants typically continue to
read publications from their countries of origin, and the major
Algerian, Moroccan and Tunisian papers are widely available in
larger French cities. These individuals also watch satellite and
cable TV stations in Arabic, including Al-Jazeerah TV. Second and
third generation French Arabs, however, are typically not literate
in Arab, and their print media habits are similar to those of other
French readers.
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Specific Goals
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21. DEMONSTRATE OUR COMMITMENT. We need to say and show, repeatedly,
to Muslim and non-Muslim audiences alike, the USG is engaged for
good in the Arab-Muslim world, we respect Islam, and the USG takes
seriously the potentially global threat of disenfranchised and
disadvantaged minorities in France. For those reasons, and because
we believe in participatory democracy, we promote the advancement
and full integration of France's minorities into mainstream
society.


22. SHARE OUR EXPERIENCES. We also must continue to communicate,
well and often, to both Muslim and non-Muslim audiences in France,
the American experience with ethnic and social conflict - both our
successes and our failures - in order to establish our legitimacy
for engagement on this issue. We can strengthen the sense of shared
values and common cause between Americans and French working for
inter-communal cooperation, peace, stability, opportunity and
respect. In addition, we need to remain present, listening and
showing respect for French (immigrant and non-immigrant)
experiences.


23. Most French minorities, including Arabs, are somewhat aware of
the U.S. experience and positively inclined towards us, seeing us as
having tried to address our shortcomings. What many French lack is
specific information about or any in-depth understanding of our
experience that might help them to conceive of and implement a
workable French model for addressing ethnic conflict. The French
establishment, for the most part, has been reticent to face up to
these problems or their root causes, reluctant to accept the U.S. as
a model - or as a partner. The Ministry of Education, however, has
shown its willingness to engage with us in this area.


24. ENCOURAGE REFORM. We must continue to encourage and help to
empower moderate social reformers in France to preempt and thwart
those who would aggravate social discontent for the purposes of
extremist recruiting.

-------------- --
Humanitarian/Development Issues to be addressed
-------------- --


25. Although France has a highly developed, modern economy with
significant resources at its disposal, much of the discontent
reported by French minority communities relates to economic and
social exclusion. While direct development assistance from the USG
is not likely to be available for France, some USG financial and
program resources were and will continue to be deployed to address
the consequences of discrimination and minority exclusion in France.
Some French NGOs working to assist minority youth, for example,
received financial and other support - such as invitations to
participate in exchange programs - through the Embassy to pursue
specific programs.

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Target Audiences by Goal
--------------


26. DEMONSTRATE COMMITMENT. We need to show the USG takes seriously
the threat of disenfranchised and disadvantaged minorities around
the world, including in France, and we are committed to empowering
minorities as part of our fundamental belief in participatory
democracy.


27. Our target audiences for this goal include both Muslims and
non-Muslims: at-risk youth, professionals who serve them, NGO
leaders, and the media, both national and regional. We will
continue to engage resident Muslim country diplomats to improve
their understanding of the U.S. We also must continue to educate
ourselves systematically on Islam through such efforts as our
in-house speaker program, which recently invited a prominent French
scholar on Islam to address a lunchtime roundtable for Embassy
staffers.


28. While much of the existing effort already ties into our current
Embassy public diplomacy strategy, increased funding for exchanges,
speakers and grants would be most welcome. So would more help from
Washington with recruiting minority speakers (Francophones) and
further access to short-term exchanges, such as ECA's summer
institutes, to target minority educators.


29. SHARE EXPERIENCES. We must continue communication in a broad
and frequent manner to audiences in France about our own American
experience with ethnic and social conflict. We need to demonstrate
our legitimate standing on this issue in order to strengthen the
sense of shared values and common cause between Americans and the
French.


30. Our target audience for this goal, again, is Muslim and
non-Muslim, but especially the media, NGOs, educators, and French
youth (students and professionals.) All need to engage - themselves
and each other - to resolve the minority problems facing France.


31. As with the earlier goal, a considerable effort is already
underway, tied to our existing public diplomacy strategy, but
increased funding for exchanges, speakers and grants would enable us
to reinforce our current efforts.


32. ENCOURAGE REFORM. We need to encourage moderate social
reformers in France and thwart those who would aggravate social
discontent for the purposes of extremist recruiting.


33. Our target audience for this goal should be both social reform
elements and the individual young Muslims most likely to be targeted
by extremist recruiters. The reformers need to be encouraged and
resourced. The minority youth need to believe that they have a
bright future in their adopted country and that they have nothing to
gain and much to lose by association with extremist violence.
Specific programs we could deploy to address these audiences include
our existing media and Information Resource Center outreach efforts,
increased targeting of our exchange programs to those engaged on
minority issues, and expanded personal outreach by the entire
Mission staff via our in-house public speaker program. A concerted
effort will also be made to increase invitations to Muslims and
other minorities for Mission representational events, not only in
Paris but also in our field posts across France.
Again, increased funding for exchanges, speakers and grants would
enable us to reinforce our current efforts.

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Measuring Effectiveness
--------------


34. We will now identify our minority outreach efforts more clearly
as such in our routine program reporting, tying into the new PD
evaluation project led by ECA's PD Evaluation Office. We will
measure our effectiveness in terms of audience and participant
totals, improved French media treatment of minority issues, improved
perceptions of the U.S. among minority audiences, and the initiation
of new policies and programs by the French government and/or French
non-governmental organizations to improve the lot of French Arabs
and Muslims.

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Embassy Contacts
--------------


35. Minority engagement officers for Embassy Paris are PDOff
Colombia Barrosse (BarrosseCX@state.gov, x 4541),who coordinates
our programmatic outreach and PolOff William S. (Steve) Wells
(WellsWS@state.gov, x 4284),who tracks minority issues for
reporting.
STAPLETON