Constructing the “North African Problem” in France (1920–1956): A Colonial Genealogy of Migration Security Practices

Abstract Despite its sophistication, most of the literature on the securitization of migration remains presentist in the sense that it has not yet truly integrated the colonial past. This paper seeks to correct this shortcoming, strengthening recent efforts to add historical depth and a postcolonial dimension to the securitization scholarship. In this endeavor, I propose what I call the colonial genealogical approach to securitization. This approach is built around three elements: the target population, the archive, and the normal. In this paper, I apply this approach to the securitization of North African migration to France. Mobilizing archival materials collected at the Centre d'Archives Diplomatiques de Nantes, the Archives de Paris, the Archives de la Prefecture de Police, as well as influential colonial literature on the question of the “North African problem,” I shed light on the construction of North African migration as a “security problem” in colonial France. I identify six nodal points in such construction: the criminal threat, the sanitary threat, the ethnic threat, the political threat, the economic threat, and the clandestine migration threat. Most echo the main tenets of contemporary securitization of migration. This demonstrates the importance of turning to colonial history to understand contemporary securitization processes and its practices.