2016年考研英语阅读材料:Ethnic minorities
BY LAW, French authorities cannot collect ethnic statistics. All citizens are considered equal. Differentiating them is felt to imply stigmatisation, or even worse to echo the singling out of Jews that took place under the collaborationist Vichy regime in the 1940s.
Yet however strong the historical reasons, this approach makes it difficult to tell whether French people of different backgrounds really do fare as well as each other. A new study suggests they do not.
It comes, surprisingly, from an official source: France Strategie, the government's economic-strategy unit, which is run by Jean Pisani-Ferry, an economist. The authors get round the ethnicity taboo by using census data on national origin. Several decades after mass immigration began, enough long-term data exist to see how the generation raised in France by parents from other countries has done.
In a word, badly. Youth unemployment of 32% for French-born citizens whose parents arrived from Africa, including sub-Saharan countries and those of the Maghreb, is twice as high as for those with no immigrant background. Fully 30% leave high school without any diploma or qualification, against 16% of those without immigrant parents. French people with parents from Africa have less stable working lives, and are more likely to live in poor neighbourhoods, than those with non-African immigrant backgrounds, the report finds.
Other studies use the data to reveal further differences by national origin. French-born citizens with parents from Morocco orTunisia, for example, seem to do better at school than those with parents from Algeria or the African Sahel. Only 10% of French men aged 25-35 with Algerian-born parents, and just 9% of those with parents from the Sahel, have a degree, against 19% of those with Moroccan or Tunisian parents and 23% of the non-immigrant population. (Among those with south-east Asian roots, the figure tops 30%.)
Girls also seem to do better than boys. Just 49% of French-born men aged 20-35 with Algerian parents have passed the baccalaureat, the national school-leaving exam, compared with 58% of women (and 68% of the non-immigrant population). Those with parents from the Sahel do little better: 63% of young French-born women have the bac, and 51% of men. Interestingly, when the sexes are combined, young French citizens born to Moroccan or Tunisian parents do better at school not only than those from Algeria or the Sahel but also those born to parents from Portugal.
Such divergent patterns mirror those found in other European countries. British-born Bangladeshis have pulled away from British-born Pakistanis in terms of school results, for instance, and now perform better than white British children.
What explains the French pattern? History may play a part. The bloody war forAlgeria's independence may have created feelings of hostility to the French system, and general alienation, which are slow to disappear. Poverty and discrimination clearly play a role. Many French immigrants came from countries with very low living standards, like Mali, Mauritania and Niger. And coming from a poor family background, notes the France Strategie study, seems to have a stronger impact on school performance in France than it does in other comparable countries.
参考译文:
根据法律规定，法国官方部门不可以收集少数民族的统计资料。所有公民一律平等，对其进行区分可认为是有意歧视，严重者，可唤起20世纪40年代维希卖国政府对犹太人迫害的记忆。
然而，无论历史的作用多么强大，禁止的方法让人难以发现法国不同背景的人们是否真的个个表现良好。一项新的研究表明，并非全然良好。
出人意外的是，该项研究竟出自官方之手：由经济学家Jean Pisani-Ferry经营的政府经济战略研究单位France Strategie。研究作者使用原籍人口普查资料，以避免触犯民族禁忌。人口大规模迁入的几十年来，存取了大量的长期数据，足以用来研究第二代移民的表现。
一言以蔽之，糟糕透顶。对于来自撒哈拉以南以及马格里布等非洲地区的第二代法国移民，其青年失业率为32%，是无移民背景人群的两倍。高中毕业时未获得任何学位或文凭的人数比率高达30%，而无移民背景人群所占的比率为16%。研究报告发现，与无移民背景的法国人相比，第二代非裔法国移民的工作生活不稳定，在贫穷社区生活的可能性更大。
其他几项研究通过这些数据进一步揭示了来自不同国家的移民之间的差异。第二代摩洛哥裔或突尼斯裔法国移民在学校的表现似乎优于第二代阿尔及利亚裔或非洲萨赫勒裔法国移民。25岁至32岁的第二代阿尔及利亚裔法国移民中，只有10%的人拥有大学学位，第二代萨赫勒裔法国移民的比率为9%，而第二代摩洛哥裔或突尼斯裔法国移民的比率为19%，无移民背景的人口比率为23%。(第二代东南亚裔法国移民的比率为30%，数量最多。)
女孩儿的表现亦似乎优于男孩儿。20岁至35岁的第二代阿尔及利亚裔法国男士在全国学校毕业考试―高中毕业会考中的通过率为49%，而女性的通过率为58%(非移民人口的通过率为68%)。第二代萨赫勒裔法国移民的表现稍好一些：年轻女性的通过率为63%，男性的通过率为51%。有趣的是，如果不分性别，摩洛哥裔或突尼斯裔法国移民在学校的表现不仅要优于阿尔及利亚裔或萨赫勒裔法国移民，而且优于葡萄牙裔法国移民。
这些大相径庭的结果映射出欧洲其他国家少数民族的发展趋势。第二代孟加拉国裔英国移民的学校成绩远不同于第二代巴基斯坦裔英国移民，如今超过了英国白人儿童。
何以解释这种法国模式?也许有历史的原因。因阿尔及利亚独立引发的血腥战争产生了对法国体制的敌视情绪，以及普遍的疏离感，这些皆不易消失。贫穷和种族歧视也具有明显的作用。法国很多移民来自生活水平极低的国家，如马里、毛里塔尼亚、尼日尔。据France Strategie的研究显示，在法国，出身贫困对学生在学校表现的影响似乎大于其他类似国家。
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