Do citizens of former French colonies have citizenship with France, too?

[CTyankee]

I seem to recall that they did, but I could be wrong...

[jberryhill]

1. It's complicated

US citizenship is much simpler than many other countries.

Do you mean "a person born in Algeria last week with no parents who were French citizens", "a person born this week in Guadeloupe", "a person in Vietnam born in 1965 who had a parent who was a French citizen", "a person born in Vietnam last month"?

I'm guessing by "citizens of former French colonies" who were born at the time that the place in question was a colony? Quick answer - no, the entire population of Vietnam circa 1960 were not French citizens, and are not French citizens. There are of course, persons born in Vietnam who were and are able to obtain legal status in France, but not simply by virtue of having been born in Vietnam when it was a French possession.

Different circumstances, different answers. France had, and has, a variety of possessions with different types of status in terms of ability to obtain French citizenship.

[CTyankee]

2. OK thanks. I don't know where I got that idea...

[jberryhill]

3. Here's one wrinkle...

1. Are you Algerian?

2. If so, are you good at playing soccer?

If you answered "yes" to both questions, you can probably qualify for French citizenship.

[CTyankee]

4. I see.

[RockRaven]

5. If by former colonies you mean Overseas France

then yes, they are citizens and have voting rights. But not every former French colony is part of modern day Overseas France.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overseas_France

[CTyankee]

6. i was thinking of Algeria...would that country be considered "Overseas France"?

[jberryhill]

7. Algeria is an independent country

HOWEVER, as far as citizenship rules are concerned, many countries have a more extensive system based on parentage.

In the US, for example, you are a citizen by (a) being born in the US, (b) being naturalized in the US or the lesser-known (c) being born abroad with at least one US citizen parent who has or had been a resident for something like 16 years (I don't feel like looking it up right now). If you qualify under (c) you may or may not want to keep that US citizenship. The usual way it is obtained is by the parents filing a consular report of birth to a US citizen abroad, with the local US consulate. As many people around the world find out, keeping that US citizenship also obligates them to US income taxes (since the US is also a little odd on taxation of all income, wherever earned, by a US citizen).

That category (c) is self-limiting by the parental minimum residency requirement. In other words, you can't have successive generations of US citizens propagating abroad and never actually living in the US.

Other countries tend to be much more generous in that regard. For example, you can qualify for Irish citizenship if something like one of your grandparents was an Irish citizen (again, I'm not looking it up right now). Lots of Irish American citizens turn in the requisite paperwork on that, since it speeds entry to Ireland (and hence the EU), as they can use their Irish passport instead of their US one.

France likewise has a wider variety of "people of French descent born abroad" who qualify for citizenship than does the US. Algeria was a possession of France for a long time, and there are lots of Algerians who qualify for French citizenship and indeed are French citizens.

You find the same thing with, for example, people from Jamaica, India, Kenya and other former UK possessions who qualify for UK citizenship; Indonesians who qualify for Dutch citizenship; and even people from the Goa region of India who qualify for Portuguese citizenship - all based on what can be tediously complex arrangements of lineage and status of relevant ancestors who were living in the relevant territory at the time.

There are some interesting underlying racist principles involved in some of these rules - such as why Guadeloupe is a department of France, but not part of the EU Schengen Zone, or the absolutely nutty problems for qualifying for Caymanian, UK, or EU status for persons born in the Cayman Islands, which is a British Overseas Territory.

If you want really weird - did you know that people born in American Samoa are not US citizens by birth? Seriously. The rule that applies to Puerto Rico wasn't going to be extended to relatively brown people living on a Pacific Island, even if it is part of the US.

All that said, what one can say with certainty, absent an extensive research project into French citizenship law and Algeria is:


1. There are persons born in Algeria who qualify for French citizenship.

2. There are persons born in Algeria who do not qualify for French citizenship.

To give you just a TASTE of how complex this can be, in the early 1900's France extended citizenship to Algerians IF they were Jewish, but not if they were Muslim. So there are people alive today born in Algeria who may or may not qualify for French citizenship depending on what their grandparents' religion was, where their parents may have resided during the course of their life, etc..

Regardless of what the rules may be for a particular country, they are usually not "automatic" in the way that birthright US citizenship (based on birth in the US) is. There are also countries in which simply being born there does not automatically make you a citizen.

We tend to be so used to the US rules, that we often don't realize those are simply the rules used in the US. We somehow tend to assume that US principles of citizenship are "normal", natural, or just "the way things are", without realizing that things like nationality and citizenship are artificial concepts in the first place. They are simply rules that people made up.

Because of these systems, there are people who can actually end up without any citizenship at all - so-called "stateless" persons. There is an international treaty addressing the problem that someone might fall between the cracks, in order to avoid the incidence of stateless persons.

So, here's the deal:

1. Do you have a particular Algerian in mind?

or

2. Are you looking for an answer that applies, in some general sense, to all Algerians?

[CTyankee]

9. No, no. I am really just wondering about all Algerians or any other native of a former

French colony.

[jberryhill]

10. No. All Algerians do not qualify for French citizenship

Many Algerians do. All Algerians do not.

Being really good at playing soccer helps a lot.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algeria%E2%80%93France_relations

One area that highlights both the dependence of Algeria on France after the revolutionary years, as well as the dynamic of inconsistent French policies towards immigrants, is football. Before the revolution, Algerians players who displayed footballing excellence were called up to the French national team and were able to represent France in major competitions such as the FIFA World Cup. They were not allowed to represent Algeria in the FIFA World Cup since Algeria was not recognized as an independent country at the time. However, following the revolution, Algeria lacked the resources and infrastructure to properly develop young Algerian players and levied this responsibility on France and used France as an incubator of some sort. The upside of this dynamic was that Algerian players were able to gain essential football training and experience. However, the cream of the crop of Algerian players as a result were funneled into the French national team. France was quick to exercise the dual citizenship right of these Algerian players since they were of great value. Several Algerian players, including the legendary Zinedine Zidane, have brought much praise and glory to France and France has always been quick to highlight the French identity of these players as they excelled, while ignoring their Algerian heritage or highlighting it when they make mistakes.

[CTyankee]

11. Just wondering about art, actually. In the 19th century, French art had a thing about its

art as it regarded to art. So many French artists were imbued with the art history of their colony and their artists painted art scenes from their sites, such as Delacroix and his painting of a scene from a harem.

Here:

&list=RDMM5kMlQgyz834

It is good now but was once a colonial nightmare for so many people.

[jberryhill]

12. Or Paul Gaugin and French Polynesia

[jberryhill]

8. Here you go:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_nationality_law

French citizenship by birth abroad to at least one French citizen

The child (legitimate or natural) is French if at least one parent is French.

In the case of an adoption, the child has French nationality only under the "full adoption" regime.

Parentage to the parent from whom the French nationality is claimed, must be established while the child is still a minor (under 18).

..

A child who was born abroad and who has only one French parent can repudiate their French nationality during the six months prior to their reaching the age of majority, or in the year which follows it (article 19-4 of the Civil Code).

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So, assuming that Wikipedia is accurate (which is probably an incorrect assumption since there can be innumerable exceptions or special cases with these types of things), it would appear that successive generations of persons can be born abroad, and secure their French citizenship provided that they do so prior to age 18, which is unlike the situation in the US. One would readily guess, in that event, that there may well be quite a number of persons in Algeria who have maintained French citizenship on an intergenerational basis.

Hence it boils back to: there are probably a lot of citizens of former French colonies who are French citizens; and there are a lot of citizens of former French colonies who are not French citizens.

I'm intrigued to know why you are curious, though.

Is this related to the recent story from France in which an immigration official refused to grant citizenship to an Algerian woman who did not shake his hand on religious grounds?

Among the French naturalization requirements is:

"Naturalization will only be successful for those who are judged to have integrated into French society (i.e. by virtue of language skills and understanding of rights and responsibilities of a French citizen, to be demonstrated during an interview at the local prefecture, as well as an ability and/or potential to integrate in the labour market), and who respect the values of French society."

As you might imagine, those sorts of qualifications can end up being highly subjective.