Book seminar on A Political History of Immigration in France: From Colonial to Global, and Back by Angéline Escafré-Dublet (Hybrid Event)

Speaker: Dr Angéline Escafré-Dublet, University of Lyon

Chaired by: Dr Timothy Peace, University of Glasgow

Hybrid Event

In-person venue: University of Edinburgh, 19 George Square, Room G.02, Edinburgh, EH8 9LD. If you wish to join in-person, please choose the In-person Attendance Ticket.

Option to join online is also available. If you wish to join online, please choose the Online Attendance Ticket. Joining information will be emailed to you on the day of the seminar.

Time: 12.30pm-13.30pm BST, 2 September 2026

Co-organised by Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power, University of Glasgow Political and International Studies, and the Citizenship and Migration Research Network (CMRN) at the University of Edinburgh.

A Political History of Immigration in France is an enquiry into the making of a ‘country of immigration’ and how a demographic statistic can become such a controversial issue that occupies the top of the political agenda. The book starts from the overlooked fact that even though France became a country of immigration as early as the mid-19th century, because of its lagging population growth, it was only in the late-20th century that French people started to think of themselves as living in a country of immigration. The book is about this change in identity and the ways in which the politics of migration - a much broader and globally connected process - came to redefine France in the second half of the 20th century.

Angéline Escafré-Dublet

Angéline Escafré-Dublet is Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Lyon, France. She is a historian of immigration in France, with a particular interest in the way it relates to matters of politics and culture. She is the author of Immigration et Politiques Culturelles [Immigration and Cultural Policies] (2014) and A Political History of immigration in France: From Colonial to Global and Back (2026). In 2019, she co-curated the exhibition, Paris-Londres. Music migration, 1962-1989 at the National Museum of Immigration History.

Description supplied by the event organiser.