Declaration in line with the Master Thesis Regulations for the Master Program
International Migration and Social Cohesion (MISOCO)
and the Examination Regulations for the Master Program International
Migration and Intercultural Relations (IMIB) (Art. 19 (6))
I hereby declare that I have developed and written this thesis on my own and without the use of any other than the cited sources and aids. I have also been informed of the completion and assessment rules of the MISOCO Program.
Date:
Signature 29.04.2015
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‘Nu avem de ales’: How the French Public Housing System Evolved to Exclude
Certain Migrants
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- A case study of Roma in Paris -!
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Radu-Mihai Triculescu !
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May, 2015 !!
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Prof. Dr. Andreas Pott!
University of Osnabruck !
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Sebastien Chauvin, PhD Edurne Bartolome, PhD!
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For the entire Roma community in Europe, ! particularly in Romania. !
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Mulțumesc Mami, Tati, Ana și Dodo pentru! tot sprijinul acordat dealungul acestor 2 ani.
Table of Contents
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Table of Contents……….I Abbreviations ……….………..…III
1. Introduction ……….……….1
1.1 Why France? The fallacy of immediate integration………..3
2. Theoretical Framework………..8
2.1 Equality and Non-Discrimination………..8
2.2 Roma as a Vulnerable Group…………..………..12
2.3 Bureaucratic Implementation………..15
2.4 State of the Art………16
3. Methodology……….21
3.1 Mixed methods within strictly quantitative studies……….22
3.2 Interviews……….………26
3.3 Policy Analysis……….27
3.4 Public Discourse………..27
4. Results………29
4.1 The Roma in Paris………29
4.2 The HLM and OPH………..32
4.2.1 History of the Policies………..33
4.2.2 HLMs today……….36
4.2.3 Politics and Public Housing……….39
4.3 Bureaucratic work in the OPH system………41
4.4 Roma in the Public Housing System………42
4.4.1 Rue de Flandre, 19th District………42
6. Conclusion………50 Bibliography……….51 Annex I ………58 Annex II ………60 Annex III………61 Annex IV..………..62
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IIAbbreviations:
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HLM: Habitations à loyer modéré [Low rent housing]
“We don’t have a choice. Back home we have nothing. My family was beaten twice, all of us. They came over us in our home. Staying here, on the street, is better than being [in Romania]. We don’t have a roof over our head, yeah, but we aren’t too scared. Even the cops here treat us better than the Romanian ones. If they beat us, they only hit once or twice. Back home they hit you until you faint. We have no alternative.” 1
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1. Introduction
For years now, the issue of migrants of Roma ethnicity around Europe has stirred quite intense feelings from the entire spectrum of social attitudes. Every opinion, ranging from extreme xenophobic to one of an idealistic utopia has been voiced, and many times politicised. The rhetoric surrounding this topic, for this reason, is one which is quite charged. But the facts of the issue don’t change: Roma migrants are still European citizens, yet they are by all apparent purposes treated as second class citizens. In November, 2014 the French presidential candidate Francois Fillon has claimed that he has no intention of allowing Romania into the Schengen Zone because “that’s where the Roma come from,” (Focus 2014). Earlier this same year, a gang of French youth beat nearly to death a teenage Roma for what they considered to be involvement in criminal activity (Mulholland 2014). These actions are carried out while the respective government engages in the practice of voluntary deportations, the practice of the government encouraging people of this ethnicity to leave France in exchange for a fixed sum of money. Marinaro (2003) writes of similar trends in another countries as well, and shows examples of political leaders that have implemented as she calls it, a “criminalising strategy of exclusion,” (203). But for all this discussion and apparently widely accepted discrimination against this group, there is still very little done to understand where the problems associated with their presence within a society come from. Beyond the historical explanations, there is a systemic institutional discrimination against them, and without
understanding and addressing this issue the so called ‘Roma problem’ will only perpetuate itself.
Quote obtained from a conversation with the father of a Roma family of 6, living in a tent in the vicinity of Gare du
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One illustration of this is seen in the public housing market of France, specifically in the Paris region. Habitation à Loyer Modéré (HLM) is a system established in the 1950s-60s as a way of eliminating the large number of slums that were accumulating in the low end areas of different regions, and provide quality housing to workers in the public service sector, students, or other demographics that might need it. Immigrant workers were also largely dependent on this system, with a large portion of available units given to North African and Middle Eastern immigrant workers (Sotison 2010). Despite what appears to be a wide net cast over the range of possible beneficiaries of the HLM program, Roma migrants are noticeably absent.
What then, are the institutional forces which push Roma migrants away from public housing schemes and toward the makeshift camps which cause an insurmountable level of controversy? I want to understand how the decision making process around public housing takes place, and where along the chain do certain minorities get excluded. Is there a synchronised effort to discourage certain migrants from seeking this kind of housing, and if yes, are Roma migrants included in this group? For this there is a need to unfold the decision making process of public housing bureaucrats, and understand what factors play a role in their judgements. It is my belief that while on paper equality is enforced — through the colour blind approach to policy creation implemented in France since the 1950s — , in practice it is not, and this is not the result of individual bureaucratic
decisions, but rather of an entire system which forces decisions a certain way. I expect, however, to notice individuals involved in the decision making process as creating justifications for any
apparent institutional discrimination. Using a policy analysis of the HLM model, combined with semi-structured interviews with people familiar with the workings of the Offices Publiques de l’Habitat (OPH), I will show that bureaucrats making the decisions regarding beneficiaries of public housing enforce the institutionalised discrimination spelled out by policy. I also believe to notice a lack of self-reflection on part of the bureaucrats, a fact I will look at within the paradox of expertise concept proposed by Paul E. Johnson. The three hypothesis I propose in this thesis are:
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H1: Roma migrants are rejected by bureaucrats when applying for public housing, H2: Policy structure is discriminatory, forcing bureaucrats to make decisions against certain groups, and
H3: Bureaucrats try to justify the decisions they make, without showing much self reflection on the values promoted.
H4: The process of exclusion from Public Housing in a perpetual one, and at one point or another a group of migrants is always left out.
The first section of this thesis will deal with the theoretical framework and conceptual approach, focusing largely on the paradox of expertise and the concept of non-discrimination without equality. Following this, I will describe the methodology employed, discussing first the merits of mixed methods, and justifying the reasoning behind my implementation of the specific approaches I use in relation to the concepts I want to study. I will then give a short background and context to the plight of the Roma migrant, specifically in Paris, followed by an overview of the policy that I argue excludes these migrants from accessing HLM benefits. This description will spill over into the results of my policy analysis and expert interviews, and finally lead to a discussion of my findings, placing them in the larger context of public discourse and anti-discrimination
paradigms.
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1.1 Why France? The fallacy of immediate integration
Analysing the current literature which addresses the issue of integration, one can see several trends. All these, while usually discussing the ‘process of integration,‘ treat it as one which does not start with the migrant not being integrated. Rather, the process of integration in most literature today focuses on migrant’s ability to alter his or her level of integration. Looking at Zhou’s work, for example, we can see the process of assimilation (or integration) she describes. According to her,
the perspective that has dominated the field is that “there is a natural process by which diverse ethnic groups come to share a common culture and to gain equal access to the opportunity structure of society; that this process consists of gradually deserting old cultural and behavioural patterns in favour of new ones; and that, once set in motion, this process moves inevitably and irreversibly toward assimilation,” (Zhou 1997). From this description, we can make a very important deduction. An immigrant’s integration process begins once he or she has decided to leave her country of origin in the first place. If integration starts when the decision to start deserting the old ways, what better indicator is there than migrants deciding to leave their home countries behind, regardless of the reason they choose to do so for.
For most migrants this means that integration is, in fact, instantaneous. As soon as they reach a new home, their status decides at which ‘level,’ so to speak, they integrate. For example, the high-class leisure migrants of St. Barts are immediately deeply integrated into the country’s society because their status as super-rich coincides perfectly with the nations economic structure: real estate, construction, food retail and transportation (Cousin and Chauvin 2012). Poorer immigrants in other societies are also integrated, but at a different ‘level,’ so to speak. Children of immigrants coming from low class backgrounds, for example, have been proven to have a much harder time in school, and more likely to fall into a cycle of poverty (Zhou 1997). Of course, as Zhou points out, this very argument has several critics. The biggest ones respond to the implied assumption that the country or society that migrants enter has an unified structured core, which immigrants must strive to assimilate into. “What is being debated, though, is not whether assimilation eventually happen among contemporary immigrants, but whether the assimilation framework is applicable to their [respective] experiences,” (Zhou 1997). Others go to even further extremes, and argue that assimilation is not only an inevitable process, but it’s an event which happens at once. The multicultural proponents argue, in the context of migrants in the United States of America, that migratory groups are immediately a part of U.S.A.’s societal structure because immigrant cultures
are integral to it’s society. While it is true that most migrants go through this process, the literature suggests that all migrants do so. It needs to be pointed out, however, that certain migratory groups to not fit the characteristics of a group going through a process of integration, nor do their host societies fit the definition of a society accepting of that certain group entering its ranks. As I will show, the Roma are a perfect example of such a group.
First, we must know exactly what we are looking for when analysing level of integration, or whether integration it is taking place at all. It is first important to point out that integration can be divided into two dimensions: structural and cultural. “The structural dimension points at the increase of social participation of individuals and groups in a larger society, basically at an
institutional level. The cultural dimension points at processes of value orientation and identification of immigrants,” (Entzinger and Biezeveld 2003). From here, we can see different measurements that can fall within either of those categories: residency rights, legal protection, equal opportunities, redistribution of social funds, presence of a specifically related policy on housing, law and order, and multicultural education, support and funding of cultural or ethnic institutions and groups, among many others. These are just some examples of what ‘thresholds’ we must expect migrant’s experiences to go through in order for them to be considered integrated (Favell 2003).
Over the past 10 years, since EU started demanding that members states rev up efforts of integration of Roma minorities, little has been achieved. The persistent problems which must be addressed, according to the European Union, are: access to education, employment, housing, and healthcare (European Commission 2011). These problems as we can see are solely problems at an institutional, structural level. Not only are these problems persistent in the communities, but they are also out of the hands of the migrants to solve. Policy that would help Roma migrants better access these basic requirements must be initiated from within the society; a society within which the Roma have not been integrated. This is where the difference between integration and acculturation comes in. To Entzinger and Biezeveld (2003), this growing participation in institutions of society is
a sign of integration, while acculturation refers to the phenomenon that immigrants gradually take over certain major elements of their surrounding cultural environment, without completely
abandoning their original cultural identity,” (Entzinger and Biezeveld 2003). The cultural aspect, while also important, is obviously much more dependent on the migrant himself. It is up to him or her to choose which traditions or values to discard and which to acculturate to. This would show, therefore, that in addressing the problems and needs that the EU has defined for the Roma
community, the burden of action is mostly on the state, not on the migrant; and within a state where discrimination against the group runs rampant, integration processes are halted altogether and the migrants attempt at integration (and acculturation) rejected.
No country exemplifies this problem more clearly than France. Up to this point in the paper one can argue that in fact Roma, like any other migrants, will still be integrated, just at a slower pace and in more ‘peripheral‘ locations within society (i.e. as outcasts). But as the results section of this thesis will emphasise, France’s policy toward the Roma has showed that not only are migrants not integrated as fast as other ethnic groups, but they are actually not being integrated at all, nor is there a high political request for it. Even the former “president, Nicolas Sarkozy, could count on shoring up his popularity when he decided to deport thousands of Roma to Romania earlier [in 2010],” (Daley and Minder 2010). This kind of thinking has dominated France’s Roma oriented policy since 2009. During 2013 alone, more than 10,000 Roma had been evicted and mostly deported from living camps (Spiegel 2013). Integrated groups are discriminated against constantly, yes, but very few of those are round up by the thousands and removed from the country.
While many migrant groups can claim to be immediately immersed in the process of integration, current rhetoric in the field of migration makes the erroneous assumption that all migrants fall under this category. As will be shown by the Roma example, there are distinct ways to demonstrate that not all migrant groups integrate into their host societies, and often times host societies demonstrate clearly that they are not willing to allow one group to assimilate. In order to
better understand this topic, the research in this field needs to start directing rhetoric into accepting the unusual event of non-integration. By incorporating more interdisciplinary research methods, as well as addressing the vague terminology regarding levels of integration, we can start pin pointing how and why exactly it happens that migrants do not integrate and how can we address this issue, thus taking away form the vulnerability that these migrants have by not belonging to a societal structure. Looking at France, a society where this seems to take place, we are not likely to be able to address all aspects of integration. But by looking at one particular one, specifically the access to public housing, we can show the flaws in the idea of immediate integration, and continue the discussion on this topic.
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2. Theoretical Framework
The endeavour on which this study embarks is one where concepts and methods are very much intertwined, something that is often the case. We see, therefore, that much of the conversation regarding the present thesis’ conceptual approach also includes a great deal about methodology, even though an entire chapter will be dedicated to this topic as well. This relationship should be expected. After all, it is based on the theories which explain phenomena that we can built
appropriate methodologies for testing. This is why I will discuss the concept of telic and deontic principles, and the specificity of Roma vulnerability, and how these two will dictate policy analysis, while the concept of ‘paradox of expertise’ will be used to describe how to best unfold the decision making process of those that interpret and implement the written policy. Striving to place this discussion into a larger debate about discrimination in regards to Roma minorities and/or housing policies, I will end this section by providing a brief summary on the general state of the art of the discussion which encompass these topics.
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2.1. Equality and Non-Discrimination
The core of my conceptual approach revolves around the arguments made in two papers published in the Modern Law Review in 2003 and 2005 respectively, works which show us the link between equality and (non)discrimination. Elisa Holmes (2005) writes that “anti-discrimination rights are deontic equal treatment norms, and that anti-discrimination rights are instrumentally aimed at achieving telic equality. . . as a conceptual matter, anti-discrimination rights are not equal treatment norms: they do not require that all people (perhaps in a certain category) are treated the same,” (175). Hugh Collins (2003), echoes the same thoughts in his work. He points out that structural or institutional discrimination requires the combination of two elements: acceptance of the fact that some groups’ social position leaves them in worse positions relative to the rest of society, and that society is arranged in such a way as to perpetuate these outcomes (26). When
discussing institutional discrimination, therefore, one must without a doubt take into account the structural inequality faced by those who are discriminated against, and their relative position in society to the mechanism that discriminates against them.
But what exactly makes this concept so relevant in this study? Some works have been carried out on the issues faced by Roma minorities, either as migrants or as locals, of which I will provide some examples at a later point. But what lacks from these studies is not the realisation that Roma minorities occupy the lowest strata of society; these studies lack a perspective that does not make the assumption that non-discrimination rights apply evenly to all levels of society — or at least that they are designed to apply evenly. The possibility that non-discrimination rights are not egalitarian in nature is almost never considered (Holmes 2005). This is best exemplified by the difference between telic and deontic principles of egalitarian action. Telic princples are those that promote egalitarianism, while not necessarily practicing it; in other words, telic principles require that said principle be promoted, but not necessarily honoured. Deontic principles, on the other hand, are those that honour the principle, regardless of the outcome (176). When another aspect is
introduced, that of action-regarding and non-action regarding principles, one can start to map out the way in which policies that are meant to be non-discriminatory actually promote equality, or how position in society affects the beneficiaries of non-discrimination laws. Action-regarding principles make explicit reference to something done, while non-action regarding principles refer to those which do not need reference to any action. Table 2.1.1 shows how telic/deontic and action/non-action regarding princples interact when it comes to egalitarian policies.
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Deontic Telic
Action Regarding Treat all subjects equally Do that action by which all subjects end up being treated equal.
(Hollins 2003:178)
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Notice firstly that there are no non-action regarding versions of deontic principles. That is because working within this framework means that the only way to honour a certain value, is by promoting it (177). Secondly, as mentioned earlier, non-discrimination rights are usually shaped by telic principles - what this research should uncover is whether specific policies employ action or non-action regarding modes of implementation. This is important in understanding the real policy orientation, and therefore its implementation at the bureaucratic level.By employing this analysis, we are therefore assuming that in the eyes of housing policy, all those targeted are seen as one population, since they all fall under the definition of program
beneficiaries. Unless a different policy is created for the access of each different group to public housing, than the above assumption must be true. But for an analysis to derive from this, we must then define what exactly is equal. “Except with abstract ideas, such as numbers, there is no such thing as pure equality, equality per se . . . A and B, if they are equal, are equal with respect to some specific property or properties . . . so statements of equality must answer the question: Equal What?” (Pojam and Westmorland 1997:2). Within this understanding then, we must keep in mind when analysing a policy that equality and non-discrimination are neither interchangeable nor are they a requirement for one another to be achieved. But what exactly are we using as a measuring stick for either of these? Are beneficiaries of the specific policy analysed here those that access the benefits of the policy, or those which need its benefits, regardless of ease of access? These are
Non-Action Regarding No deontic version Do that action by which all subjects will be situated equally, regardless of treatment.
questions which the concepts will help us understand, and which will be specifically addressed in the policy analysis section of this work.
But while the analysis conducted by Elisa Holmes does create a perfect framework of analysing policy, there are some shortcomings which should be pointed out. While she does say that perfect egalitarian policies are impossible, and this can be a result of both deliberate or
unintentional actions (188), she does not account for divisions within divisions. Her treatment of policy application assumes that beneficiaries are all from the same stock. The examples used, such as white or black college applicants, or children allowance dependent on their location, assume that these factors define one’s societal location, or at least exemplify it. It doesn’t take into account stratifications within these groups, or outliers which might not fit in those preconceived categories (i.e. a child might live closer to home, therefore receive a lower allowance, but might suffer from a chronic illness which requires for him to have more money than another child that lives abroad, but does not need any outstanding expenses.) This means that even groups that might be seen as
advantageous in society might have fringe groups within them that face indirect discrimination (Holmes 2003:17). If we therefore assume that, as Holmes said, perfect egalitarian policies are impossible, deviations from egalitarian practices must be allowed — maybe even encouraged sometimes, specifically in relation to reduction of barriers permitting access to resources, results, or opportunities (Holmes 2003:17). The aim of a non-discriminatory policy therefore should be
analysed not only from how equal it treats those it serves, but also for how it justifies any deviations from egalitarian principles. The relation between deviations from egalitarian principles and 2
stratifications within minority groups is discussed in the next subchapter on vulnerability and the application of the minority rights model.
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Up until now the assumption has been made that the French public housing policy is non-discriminatory. In the later
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section of Policy Analysis I will give my reasoning for considering this policy as such, according to a definition proposed by Elisa Holmes.
2.2 Roma as a Vulnerable Group
Up until now the discussion has focused on what concepts can and should be used to analyse the topic at hand. With proper argumentation, however, many concepts or paradigms of
understanding can be applied. The Roma, for example, fall perfectly within the operational wheelhouse of vulnerability studies. But while the concept of vulnerability is a broad one, and its specifics add no additional value to the discussion of this study, the specific vulnerability of the Roma must be addressed. A further section will discuss in more details the history of discrimination faced by the group in Europe generally, and Paris specifically. What should and will be adressed now is the limbo in which Roma minorities in Europe seem to find themselves, largely because of the the resulting situation that happens when protections they are legally entitled to clash with societal perceptions.
For indigenous peoples, the right to use and enjoy their land is safeguarded. And, the right to have rights is assured to individuals whose putative states refuse to
acknowledge them. Imagine, though, a vulnerable group that escapes this
supplementary protection: minorities who are not ‘minorities’ ; indigenous peoples who are not ‘indigenous’ ; ‘refugees’ who are not refugees. (Yuille 2007:391)
Roma are not considered indigenous, however, due to most definitions of the term -- put forward by both the European Union and the United Nations -- link those who can be labeled as such to the ethnic population inhabiting a land before colonisation, something the Roma population which lived in Europe for centuries never endured (Yuille 2007). And while some scholars do make the
argument that territorial occupation is not the only requirement for colonisation, and their image as nomads is a result of perpetual exclusion and discrimination, legally they are still far from falling under the protections awarded to those labeled as indigenous (407-409).
The same problems come with their being viewed as refugees, and offered the protections that come with that. Legally, as European citizens, this minority is not labeled or accepted as a refugee population. The Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, Article 1, section A, subsection 2, defines a refugee as that person which,
Owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion,
nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion, is outside the country of his nationality and is unable ... to avail himself of the protection of that country; or who, not having a nationality and being outside the country of his former habitual residence, is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to return to it.
By this definition, Roma populations are not able to qualify as refugees because they do not have the required relationship with a territorial, sovereign state: in other words, they do not have a kin state and the protections entitled by this (Gilbert 1999). Despite this requisite, however, many Roma minorities face the repercussions that the definitions tries to address: denial of citizenship rights in countries such as Slovakia or Czech Republic, education and labour market exclusion in Hungary, and second class citizen status in western countries such as Germany and France are just some examples of the motives for which Roma could, in any other situation, be classified as having refugee status (Yuille 2007:412).
What is important for our analysis of policy however is not the definitions within which claims to rights make least legal sense (i.e. refugee or indigenous status), but rather how this matters when it comes to policy creation which also affects them. Given ten the inapplicability (or difficulty in proving so) of the refugee or indigenous models, the Roma community has adopted a minority rights model of advocacy. This is important for our case, because it is in this instances that international and national policies tend to diverge the most, as existing mechanisms for minority rights are largely built for the protection of citizens who share continued ethnic and cultural ties, as well as ties and solidarity to another state. The Roma, lacking the cohesion required for these
protections, usually fall outside of the regime of rights guaranteed to minorities (Yuille 2007:413). Despite this, this model still has proved to be the most fruitful of the three, prompting actions from both the European Union and the United Nations, as well as individual country parliaments (414). It is here that the stratification within minorities groups become important, an issue which was
discussed in the preceding chapter.
What exactly does this all mean in terms of analysing policy, however? The concepts discussed in the first and second subchapters of this sections give us a good frameworknot for measuring discrimination in a policy, but rather for identifying it. Following Elisa Holmes’ claim of policies being aimed at telic principles, and the knowledge that Roma communities employ a minorities rights approach to advocacy, we know that a policy must promote egalitarianism, regardless on whether or not it is being honoured. Knowing what we know about the specific case of Roma vulnerability, we must not look at what protections are missing from policies (i.e. if
egalitarianism is being honoured) but we should see if the policy promotes egalitarianism regardless of the specific actions it refers to.
For this entire analysis to make sense, there needs to be more than just a policy analysis: we must look at concepts that deal with bureaucratic work, and how the policies are implemented. Policies may call for a certain action with a reasoning, or justification, behind said call. But it is the interpretation and application of policies that translate the abstract law to observable outcomes. While the methods will specifically be discussed at a later point, we must understand that the general aspect of a law does not mean implementation is done generally as well. Individual real world cases exist and how a policy is written does not give us insight into the specifics of the policy’s implementation. A bureaucrats job and decision making process, however, does.
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2.3 Bureaucratic Implementation
The distinction between telic and deontic principles, and the specificity of Roma vulnerability help analyse the theoretical, or intended, results, but policy is not policy until it is implemented. To analyse and evaluate implementation of a policy therefore means to complete an accurate policy analysis. Doing this requires for us break down the decision making process of bureaucrats. But what theories describe this process, and based on what should the unfolding of the decision making process be carried out. Experts in certain fields are important tool for analysis of said field. They carry out their tasks as required by the context (e.g. within the framework of policy), and it is in their expertise that we find the values and implementing mechanisms that practitioners use to implement policy (Johnson 1983).
What we must first see is how experts become experts, and complete the process that leads them to the ‘paradox of expertise,’ a concept which will be of use for the present study. Experts get to be such by undergoing a three phase process of learning. Phase I is when an individual learns from instructions and observation, Phase II when the observations and knowledge from before are applied, and finally in Phase III the actions learned become mechanised, where the work becomes mechanical and done without much thinking (Neves and Anderson 1981, Shiffrin and Dumais 1981).This last Phase is what leads experienced workers, which have become experts in their field, to not experience any self reflection or conscious awareness of the work they do, thus creating the ‘paradox of expertise,’ (Johnson 1983, Agarwal and Tanniru 1990) . This means that when dealing 3
with experts, we will see the end result of a process which does not allow these individuals to carry out any self-reflection regarding the discrimination that might be perpetuated by their mechanic work. Based on this concept, discrimination cannot be assumed to be a result of policy
implementation, but rather policy interpretation.
It is referred to as a paradox due to the fact that for experts to maximise their efficiency and output, they
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For those with an interest in understanding expertise, it is unfortunate that practitioners can seldom describe what they know. For it is through conscious awareness of one's own problem solving processes that, for example, the means used to successfully perform some task might be conveyed to others. But even if a practitioner were aware, in some sense, of the totality of his experience, this knowledge would be likely to be contextually stimulated (Johnson 1983:80).
We must assume, therefore, that while en expert practitioner might be very much prepared to justify his or her actions in a specific situation, but only based on the learning process, not on any
conclusions derived from the expertise per se (Simon and Simon 1978, Voss 1979). The task of unfolding the decision making process therefore is even harder, as it must uncover information that experts are not even consciously aware — or thinking — about. If discrimination is perpetuated through bureaucratic implementation, it’s source must be uncovered from how the textual policy is interpreted and applied in Phase I and II of the expertise process, and mechanised during Phase III. This is specifically done by what Johnson (1983) refers to as ‘reconstructed methods,’ or identifying the rules that dictate what might seem as acceptable course of action to a group of practitioners, rules which are often vague and general (81). In the specific case of this study, analysing how housing policy is implemented in Paris requires us to see how the policy text dictated the rules by which bureaucrats make their mechanised decisions.
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2.4 State of the Art
Studying the vulnerability of minorities and migrants in relation to housing is a topic which, in one way or another, has been touched upon by other researchers in previous academic studies. One aspect, however, has not been directly addressed, and it is one which in this present day and age seems to be very relevant to the discussion of Roma immigration: the relationship between the
housing policies implemented in Paris, and how this contributes to the (lack of) integration of these migrants in the housing market, or social housing schemes — the question I hope to begin
addressing in the present paper. Many articles have addressed the issue of the link between public housing and segregation in France in general. Gregory Verdugo, for example, examines this issue in his article “Public Housing and Residential Segregation of Immigrants in France, 1968-1999.” In this work, Verdugo tracks the evolution of residential segregation across France by analysing census data from the mentioned time period. He concludes that despite residential segregation decreasing in urban areas, within neighbourhoods we have seen an increase in segregation based on country, or region, of origin. This, however, while insightful particularly to the way public housing is set up in France, does not focus on Roma as migrants, but rather analyses immigrants based on country of origin, and neither does it give a detailed account as to the mechanism that lead to said segregation.
What works such as Verdugo’s touch upon, and what I have discussed and addressed as the centre concepts of my thesis, are the issues of institutional discrimination and structural inequality. Brian K. Obach writes about these concepts in his paper “Teaching about institutional
discrimination and the controversies of affirmative action.” As it became obvious during my research, much of the research involving these two concepts is centred around the issue of
affirmative action in the United States, and while this might seem like a setback, it actually provides great insight. The characteristics of Roma vulnerability, in respect to the vast mosaic of identities applicable, are very much similar to those of minorities in the U.S.; in this case it makes even more sense to place this study in the discussion of the institutional discrimination encountered within American non-discrimination policies (Yuille 2007: 391). As Obach writes, we “must first
understand that inequalities can be embedded in the structure of society,” (2000:50), and this can be understood by looking at the access offered to any kind of government assistance. Other authors use the same concepts in analysing their particular cases. Devah Pager and Hana Shephard, for instance, write about the same subjects in “The Sociology of Discrimination: Racial Discrimination in
Employment, Housing, Credit, and Consumer Markets.” The two authors place great emphasis not only on individual levels of discrimination, but, more importantly to my thesis, on structural and institutional ways. Even more helpful to me, they offer a way of measuring such phenomena, as they claim that in today’s world they are both more overt and harder to pin-point. The authors here develop, or at least explain, how perceived discrimination may be measured through interviews or surveys, and how reports by discriminators provide further insight into the matter (Pager and Shephard 2008:182-183). They determine that measuring discrimination is very much aided by recording when racial considerations come into play in decision making for the prominent groups of society. This conclusions of theirs fits perfectly with my expert-interview approach, as it is their perceptions which matter most in the decisions regarding public housing in Paris. There are plenty of other scholars that follow the same research lines as the scholars mentioned above: Flam and Lloyd (2008), Kamali (2009) — further discussed below —, Estes (1978), Alvarez and Lutterman (1981), and Ezeala-Harrison and Glover (2008), whose works allow me to confidently insert this work in the general discussion on these subjects — be they taken individually or in relation to one another.
Besides these main theoretical concepts, there are others which define the scholarly
paradigm of Roma migration and vulnerability but also the sociology of institutional organisation. While discrimination and structural inequality might provide insight into decision making
processes, the institutions themselves might help even more. Theories of decision making within institutions and public administrations must be considered, such as those analysed by Mahler (1987), Simon (1965), and Blackorby et.al. (1974). These writers focus largely on the same
questions, which one way or another can be defined as the Nominal Group Technique: the idea that efficiency is heightened by group decision making — as it works in public institutions. But the authors focus on the downsides as well, specifically if this leads to any self-reflection on part of individual group members, or if any of them question the decisions made on any basis (Mahler
1987:336) . Furthermore, plenty of theoretical work has been published regarding the workings of 4
public administration in general, either as a field of study (Henry 1975), within the context of globalisation (Farazmand 1999), or the overall sociology of organisation within public
administration (Flingstein 2008, Lammers 1975). These are all concepts which I will have to keep in mind during analysis, so as to not deviate from the already pertinent discussions on the topic. Only this way can an understanding be gained into what will likely turn out to be a cause and effect relationship, in which the effect is the institutional discrimination and structural inequality my thesis aims at uncovering -- or at least identifying.
A section on the state of the art of this topic would not be complete, however, without looking at the literature of Roma migrants as well, not just the institutions within which they live their lives. While specifically in relation to housing markets not a lot of research has been
conducted, many scholars from the fields of sociology, economics, political science, and others have discussed the situation of Roma migrants in Europe. Nando Sigona is one of the most prominent of such scholars. His work has focused extensively on identity related questions in particular, but also on the more practical issue of Roma migrants in Europe, with emphasis on those residing in Italy. He talks about the labelling on Roma migrants, particularly on the conflict between being seen as a ‘nomad’ and a ‘refugee,’ (Sigona 2003). He develops this topic further in analysing the relationship between these labels and the practical approaches to so called ‘nomad camps,’ in Italy (Sigona 2005). He also describes the entry of the Roma in Italian society, and the perceived ‘invasion,’ of this group, particularly in the housing sphere of the issue (Sigona 2002). But despite of his being a prominent scholar on the topic, and his work on housing and ‘nomad camps’ being very similar to the work I am trying to build here, it is worth mentioning that a great deal of his work focuses on the Roma migrants in Europe before the two major sending states (Romania and
Not all of these writers mention NGT specifically, but the studies revolve around the same issue of institutional group
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Bulgaria) entered the E.U., and received full migratory rights. It is this issue that motivated me to pursue this topic, seeing as on first glance there seems to be no other group facing the level of discrimination faced by Roma migrants, particularly does from the previously mentioned two countries . 5
Finally, one final work should be mentioned, one which sheds light specifically on French institutional (and political) discrimination, although the focus of the study is mostly on Muslim immigrants. Racial Discrimination: Institutional Patters, written by Massoud Kamali seems to be one of the few works which explicitly supports the hypothesis I have proposed in my study,
although from a different perspective. The author of this book claims that political and institutional discrimination is rampant in France, manifested by exclusion from social benefits, as well as the rise of right wing parties which constantly characterise immigrants as unadaptable to the French way of life (Kamali 2009). This work however has been met with some criticism, citing the 6
shortcomings that resulted from using a large group of countries for the study at hand. Some have argued that, because of the generalisable nature of the book. Kamali fails to take into account historical and political realities of each country. This is the gap I plan on filling in such studies: addressing the bureaucratic work within the political realities that guide Roma migrants’ integration in the public housing system.
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The ‘level of discrimination’ mentioned here is only an assumption on my part. But given the great deal of effort
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European Union officials have put in addressing the problems of Roma integration — however this integration is defined — this would seem to support my assumption that there are not many groups that are treated the same way Romas are (at least not European citizens).
Kamali’s study, it should be noted, focuses on 7 other countries other than France: Austria, Great Britain, Poland,
3. Methodology
The project of this thesis started from one small, yet significant assumption: if Roma minorities are not present in the Paris public housing system, this means there must be an institutional mechanism, implemented at the bureaucratic level, which perpetually rejects any attempt by such minorities to access public housing. As my preliminary research developed,
however, it became apparent that my initial assumption was wrong. Roma minorities are not turned away at the bureaucratic counter: they never even apply. It is because of the initial presupposition that the expert interviews were conducted. My finding, that Roma minorities don’t apply,
invalidated the weight that these interviews are to have on the results of my study. It was decided, nevertheless, that these interviews should still be used. The ontological process through which the focus of my thesis has changed is equally important to the findings themselves. It shows us the assumptions which guide decision making processes, be it in academia (as is this case), or public institutions, and how these assumptions, when wrong, must be changed in order to secure a more adequate approach to full integration of minorities in social welfare programs, specifically in this case in the public housing scheme of Paris. The original methodology of the project was not changed. As I will show, a triangulation of methods will be employed. The importance given to these methods, and the results yielded by them, will be different from what I originally started with. As the researching and writing process evolved, the expert interviews with bureaucrats went from being front-and-centre in the data gathering endeavour, to simply providing background information upon which other methods will build on. I will discuss this evolution further in this section, but first I will address the merits (and in my case need) of using mixed-method research, and why each of these methods compliments each other perfectly.
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3.1 Mixed-methods within strictly quantitative studies
Before discussing how the methodological approaches were handled, I must first pin-point what this question requires me to do from an empirical point of view. In order to gather knowledge that can help me answer and solve my ‘puzzle’ the most suitable approach would be to deconstruct the decision making process of public housing bureaucrats, while keeping in mind the policy framework within which they must make such decisions. But as I have discussed previously, this is not enough. I must also deconstruct what I can only refer to as a ‘constrained institutional decision.’ I use this term because bureaucrats, while making the decisions that the policy forces them to make regarding access to public housing, cannot control who can or cannot apply. These decisions are made for them by the structure and demands of the institutions within which said bureaucrats work, and they exclude minorities before they even apply. This means that the decision making process of the bureaucrats is just one layer of deciding who does and does not get public housing. This
decision is sometimes made for them, by policy requirements which do not even allow certain minorities to try and access them in the first place. This process of constrained institutional 7
decision is best described by the theory of new institutionalism, and those who believe this theory to be incomplete understand the factors that must be taken into account in order to account for societal change:
By setting up a model that explains institutional constraints on decision makers, the new institutionalism correctly points out the limits of a rational choice framework of
economic decision making. However, by failing to explain the sources and avenues of modifications of those constraints, the new institutionalism is unable to provide a satisfactory explanation of change. Instead, we find a patchwork of exogenous factors, such as technology, culture, and ideology, which feed into institutional change in
At this point, this assertion seems to be simply an unfounded assumption. As I will discuss in the results section,
unclear ways. This paper reaches the conclusion that those factors for change should be examined directly, rather than through the proxy of institutions. (Hira and Hira
2000:267)
To understand this we must place the analysis in the context of modern-day public discourse, as to try to understand where the gap between social policy and real life bureaucratic practices happen - or where it has happened in the past and it is being perpetuated today. The best solution is to rely on a three-prone methodological approach, one which employs a policy analysis methodology, coupled with semi-structured expert interviews, as well as discourse analysis. It is true that this strategy might seem like a lot to get at for a project such as this one, but I will show why the three methods will most of the time overlap with one another as far as methodology goes.
Before delving into the actual methodological practices I need to address the literature on the merits of using a mix-methods approach. Unfortunately, much of this literature looks at mixed methods from a qualitative-quantitative perspective, not giving much room for discussion of mixed methods within each of these empirical approaches (in this case, qualitative). The results can often times be extrapolated from these studies, and applied to any mixed methods, far beyond the usual qualitative-quantitative academic discourse. This is because vast amount of literature which does address this issue looks at the merits of mixed methods as a whole, rather than the specific attributes of qualitative or quantitative methods. Greene et.al (1989), for example, do not only praise the use of mixed methods, but they actively promote the idea that program evaluations — such as public housing programs — demand that mixed methods be used. “The inevitable
organisational, political, and interpersonal challenges of program evaluation,” they write, “mandate the use of multiple tools from evaluators’ full methodological repertoire,” (255). For them, mixed-methods approaches provide the best solution for such studies because of their tendency to complement and triangulate information, a term most suited to my thesis due to the three-prone methods I propose. Other scholars point out that the unobservable characteristics of a sample can
also be best described by employing mix-methods approaches which, to rely on the terminology of Greene el.al once more, triangulate the information, and provide different angles form which a phenomenon can be perceived (Gerring 2011, Lingard et.al 2008, Axxin and Pearce 2008).
The argument that mixed-methods complement each other and triangulate information is hard to argue with in general, and even more so in the context of my study. As stated above, the unobservable qualities of phenomena are just as important as the observables ones, and in my case can provide valuable insight into what seems to be an institutional culture of discrimination. For all their merits (and they are many), interviews also have their limitations, limitations which can be mitigated by complementing them with other methods of analysis. These limitations are the ‘the paradox of expertise,’ a term which I defined in the theoretical section of this paper. As individuals become experts at certain activities, they are less and less aware of the cognitive processes involved in their performance, and thus are less likely to see their decision making process as anything other than mechanical work (Agarwal and Tanniru 1990). Furthermore, while “elite interviews offer political scientists a rich, cost-effective vehicle for generating unique data to investigate the complexities of policy and politics,” (Beamer 2002:86) they also fall trap in their own design. Relying on interviews can give researchers a blind-spot, as the knowledge recovered is acquired through the filter of those providing it, either because of ignorance to their cognitive process, as Agarwal and Tanniru point out, or due to a conscious effort to not criticise the institutions within which they operate. For this reason, policy analysis approaches can help fill in the gaps that expert 8
interviews leave behind.
Early proponents of policy analysis studies claim that it is a method to speak truth to action; that is, allowing people that are literate in both politics and academics to provide unbiased analysis and separation of relevant and irrelevant policy conversations, as well as articulating the link
This is especially true in this case, as those interviewed work in the public sector for an organisation headed by an
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between values and actions (Lynn 1999) — something that addresses the blind spots posed by relying on interviews alone. Post-positivist critics, however, claim that policy analysis focuses on analysing ends without focusing on means and historical context (May 1989). Beyond other flaws in the postpositive reasoning for distrust of policy analysis, these are issues which can be
addressed by employing the mixed-method approach I propose. “Policy analysts had learned that educators, doctors, civil servants, . . . even generals are knowledgeable, necessary, and not always wrong,” (Lynn 1999:414). By giving voice to those involved in policy implementation (educators, doctors, generals, and in my case, civil servants), the means of policies are addressed, nullifying the criticism employed by skeptics of the methodology. But policy is fluid — it does not remain constant over time, nor does it always address the needs of the same group of people. In this case, policy analysis of the same policy as implemented in the 1960s will yield a different result than an analysis of the same policy today. The post-positivist critics do make some sense in this regard, and only by complementing this analysis can we address this issue.
This last point raises the question of historical context. This is where public discourse analysis comes into play. For the purposes of my study, however, discourse analysis does not matter outside of the institution within which public housing decision are made, or within which policy is created. Naturally, political statements and public opinion matters, and it will be taken into
consideration, but it only matters if and how it influences the decision making process of bureaucrats and the constrained institutional decision defined above. Interviews should answer these questions, therefore the discourse analysis is highly imbedded in this methodology: I want to understand how these bureaucrats perceive the rhetoric, and how it influences them, not what said rhetoric is in itself. This same reasoning can be applied to the creation of policy, and how this context influences those who the policy is supposed to cover and those it leaves on the outside looking in. Policy analysis itself implies certain discourse analysis, as ideas and values guide policymaking, and discourse is therefore reflected in the policy itself (White 1994). Employing
discourse analysis does not mean a whole new method has to be implemented. It rather means that discourse must be taken into account when conducting interviews or analysing policy.
Bayazit compares research subject with artists creating a masterpiece. “An artist’s practicing activities when creating a work of art or a craftwork cannot be considered research. Yet it
is possible for an external observer to do research into how an artist is working on his or her work of art to make a contribution to the common knowledge,” (2004:16). In my thesis I plan on breaking down the process of the public housing ‘craftsman’ in order to understand the craftwork he or she is creating. The craftwork here is the public housing landscape created by the decision making process of the bureaucrats. The best way to understand this process is through direct interviews that help conceptualise how decisions are reached, but also by placing said decisions within the policy framework they must be made in, while accounting for the public discourse which guides their rationale.
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3.2 Interviews
The context of this research is widely defined by the interviews conducted with public officials that operate in the system of allocating public housing. These interviews were conducted over a span of two weeks, in English, at locations removed from the work environment. I believed that conducting these interviews away from earshot of coworkers or supervisors would lead to more honest, self-reflecting answers. The questions were semi-structured: that is, a list of questions to ask was developed ahead of time, but in most cases that list became irrelevant, as follow-ups began
dominating the discussion (See Annex I). A total of 5 bureaucrats were interviewed, four of which were directly related to the OHP, and one worked in the Ministry of Interior. The information 9 10
The interview with the worker from the Ministry of Interior was used to set a context regarding the general work
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environment of public service employees.
The interviewees requested full anonymity to be maintained. They specifically requested that no recordings be kept,
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no names mentioned, and in general no details that might link their answers with their identity. For this reason in this thesis I will not make any direct quotations, but rather summaries of the interviews based on field notes from my time in
gathered as a result of these interviews was complemented with field observations of actual social housing projects in Paris, specifically the large array of such housing units along Rue de Flandre, in the city’s 19th district.
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3.3 Policy Analysis
While the entire project can be considered a policy analysis, triangulating information so as to pin-point the effects that social housing policy in Paris has on Roma migrants, part of the
methodology involves actually looking at the written (or implemented) policy itself. Here several results were expected. One, a description of what the law actually is: i.e. who is it targeted for, brief history of it, and how has it evolved over time. Secondly, there is a need to look at outside analysis and reports of this law. Reports conducted by outside organisations are analysed, such as human rights NGOs or organisation dealing specifically with problems of Roma migrants in France, coupled with any internal reports put together by the government agencies with a vested interest in the policy. Lastly, this information needs to be brought together, and put in the context of the telic - deontic principles discussed earlier in this paper: are anti-discrimination rights, in this case
regarding Roma minorities, honoured, promoted, both, or neither?
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3.4 Public discourse
The public discourse analysis is the most general way to gather information for my topic, but also one which will help understand and contextualise the problem at hand. Political discourse as related to the evolution of policy implementation is very important, as is the demonisation of any groups in the national debates. By this, I intend to see if certain groups have become so politicised that their options within the welfare state have been limited depending on public opinion polls and the political group in power. Levels of hate crimes or hate speech against Roma migrants is very important as well, to understand the reality of being a Roma in today’s France. Records of crimes
against this minority, declarations made by public officials, and public opinion polls are some of the tools that this methodology requires us to analyse.
Using public discourse is, in my opinion, crucial to linking the information from interviews (and field notes) with the policy itself. If there is indeed discrimination at an institutional level, and if there is such a thing as “constrained institutional decision,” only by looking at the larger context will we be able to bridge the gap between decision making (implementation) — be it by the process or by the bureaucrats — and the intentions spelled out in the policy itself. The question of
discrimination against Roma migrants in social housing policy must be looked at from a political lens, especially since the office is ran based on elections and federally mandated rules, as spelled out by the “Ordonnance n° 2007-137 du 1er février 2007 relative aux offices publics de l’habitat,” essentially defining the OPH as a public institution with scrutiny as wide as that of an elected official . 11
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4. Results
The results achieved during the course of this research has, at least in parts, disproved the hypothesis which I originally proposed. While I will discuss why this is in the discussion stage, it became clear that in order to understand the decision making process the relevant data is that of the evolution of the institution which I am analysing, the institutional constraints of this institution, but also the larger context of the situation of Roma migrants in Paris. The interviews and policy
documents helped unpack these topics, and the results were in some parts exactly as expected, while others surprisingly different from the originally proposed predictions. The policy developed over several decades, as did its purpose, or the groups most targeted to make use of the available housing units has changed, leaving one group or another on the outside looking in at all times. Bureaucrats seem to be aware of the disadvantage some groups are left with, proving self-reflection on their part, as they are also very much aware of the little power they have in actually making decisions in the work they do. It also became quite clear that Roma migrants choose not to even attempt to enter the pubic housing system, seeing as they are already skeptical as a result of the situation they already face in France in general, and Paris in particular.
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4.1 The Roma in Paris
Understanding how Roma migrants fit into the system of social housing, one must first and foremost understand what it means to be a Roma migrant in the society that runs said social housing system. Reports and data show, in fact, that to be a Roma in paris is not only hard (from an
economic perspective), but also very dangerous. Numerous reports discuss number of evictions faced by thesis minority in particular, number of violent attacks, and many other indicators of hardship and vulnerability. These findings, while not derived from direct policy analysis — i.e. not resultant from any information directly related to the law which defines social housing equally important in determining the workings of the policy. Many have actually argued this point, showing
that one must look beyond the rules and laws that govern certain systems in order to understand said systems (see Waterman and Wood 1993, Lindblom 1958, Mead 2013).
The most detailed report on the conditions endured by migrants such as these was published by Romeurope National Human Rights Collective 2010. This report confirms that the vast majority of Roma in France are migrants (over 85%), and of 9 out 10 of those is form Romania. This means that by birth they are not entitled to French residency papers, but have to enter an entirely separate process to obtain these as immigrants (Romeurope 2010:14). The view of them as impossible to be integrated because of their nomadic lifestyle is immediately debunked by this report as a great fallacy. “If they travel around in France, it is usually under the pressure of evictions. If they return periodically to their countries, it is as with other migrants to maintain kinship ties (family visits, celebrations etc.), to temporarily withdraw from police harassment in France, after eviction from their place of abode or following the implementation of a deportation order,” (16). Their migration is also in no way to be viewed as one en masse: in other words, they are not pouring into France and leaving Romania in mass numbers (16-17). The excuses used by politicians in discourse to justify anti-roma stances (something I will discuss in greater detail at a later point), is therefore based on untrue information. This leads straight into the problem at hand now: housing.
It is no doubt that the Roma migrants that do not find a home to live in end up occupying space that cannot fall under the definition of adequate housing. We work here from the definition proposed by Andre Gachet: "Having a home means having a fixed space adapted to the individual
or family, it is also a space to maintain personal and social relations and lastly, is a space secured by contract or ownership. Three conditions that fall within the physical, social and legal domains. When these conditions are not met, we talk of sub-standard housing.” (Gachet 2009). Despite
access to a kind of home described above is required by law, evictions from shanty towns and what have been described as subpar living conditions have taken place regularly, without providing access to an alternative living condition. The table below shows that of all the regions in France, Ile
de France, the region in which Paris in located, sees the highest number of evictions, largely disproportional to other regions:
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(Ligue des Droits 2014) 12
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The Ligue des Droits de l’homme concludes that, despite eviction taking place all over the country, the Paris and Lyons (Ile de France and Rhone-Alpes) regions show greatest indicators of
harassment (2014:5). Paris is by far the worse, where 120% of the censed population was evicted — in other words, 1.2 evictions per every person living in a slum. While the percentage is much higher in Rhone-Alpes (199%), the gross number of evictions is significantly lower.
These evictions should be put in the larger context of wide discrimination against the group the target, not only from the population at large, but also from some elected officials (or officials that are seeking public office) and law enforcement officers. In early 2014, for example, Paul Marie Couteaux, running for councillor for Paris’ 6th district suggested in a blog post that Roma migrants should be concentrated in camps (Le Monde 2014). Later the same year, a police memo from the same district as mentioned above surfaced, in which it called to systematically evict Roma families from the street, followed shortly thereafter of evidence that police officers were stealing the
belongings of some of those they evicted (Fouteau 2014). This is not to mention the discussions and
Region Number of Persons Evicted Settlements destroyed Censed Population Settlements % Evicted population/ Censed population Ile de France 9061 71 7486 151 121.0% Rhone-Alpes 2300 28 1156 39 199.0% Haute Normandie 100 1 145 5 69.0% Champagne Ardenne 20 1 39 2 51.3%
For full table see Annex II
language being hurdled at the national level, exemplified by the comments Jean Marie le Pen made in 2014, comparing Roma to ‘thieving birds’ (RFI 2014), and comments made by presidential candidate in which he states that because Roma come from Romania, this is a good enough reason for denying the country entry into the Schengen zone (Focus 2014). Such behaviour by elected officials and other state employees, combined with the large numbers of societal discrimination (Ligue des Droits 2014: 7-8), has been noticed by monitoring organisations. The National
Consultative Commission on Human Rights has warned the Prime Minister that anti-Roma racism is on a worrisome rise (CNCDH 2014), the Pew Research centre found that 2 out 3 french
respondents have unfavourable opinions of Roma migrants (Pew 2014), and the Council of Europe Commission for Human Rights has identified France and Greece as the most hostile countries to minorities, specifically Roma migrants. Why this context is important to analysing how Romani migrants are left out of social welfare programs, specifically public housing, will become evident in later sections, specifically in the Discussion.
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4.2 The HLM and OPH
Now that we have seen a general overview of what it means to be a Roma in France,
specifically in Paris, we should understand what exactly the police which defines public housing is. It is important to track the historic development of this policy, and see where it is today as well as how it got here, before we see how bureaucrats act within the frameworks of this policy. We should also track the effects of politics on the workings of this system. I will show that according to some of the bureaucrats interviewed, the aspect that has a much larger impact on the efficiency and the speed with which they keep the process moving is the government in power: in times of left leaning governments, they are pressured to put more and more people in the public housing systems, but in times of right wing governments, they are asked to slow down the rate of placement and turnover. This section will show that depending on the time period in which we look at the effects of the
