From IHT:

As one of eight children born to parents who came to France from a mining area in the south-east of Morocco, I grew up in a housing project near Valence, in the kind of high-rise blocks that everyone saw in the scenes of torched cars and street battles on television in the rioting in 2005 and again a few weeks ago. In both instances, the unrest was sparked by allegations of police harassment but exclusion and joblessness were also key factors.

The paradox is that the rioters, for all their alienation, behaved in a very French way. Like farmers and union members who go readily into the streets, they wanted to be listened to.

What is dangerous is that people have reached a point where they see violence as the sole way of calling attention to their misery and, while I am horrified at the violence, I understand the hopelessness and anger behind the riots.

You need to look at the realities of life in the tower blocks of the urban periphery. Here there are three basic sources of income: what was known in my family as “the fruit of your labor,” i.e. staying in school to get the education that would lead to earning a good living; relying on welfare benefits; or getting into the underground economy of drugs and crime.

There will always be people who slide into the last two alternatives. The real problem comes when working hard and getting qualifications doesn’t lead to being able to earn a decent living.

In the high-rise districts around Paris and other cities the figure for unemployed youth can be as high as 60 per cent, and it’s not just school-leavers with few or no qualifications who can’t land jobs. Moreover, many of the jobs that are available to young people, even highly skilled ones, tend to be short-term and poorly paid.

My family saw education as the path out of the ghetto. My father always said, “You are the needle and your brothers and sisters are the thread. If you succeed, your siblings will follow through, so get every qualification you can.”

My parents gave me the motivation and the discipline to work hard, and taught me to believe in the system. It was only when I graduated with three degrees in economics, and was turned down for every job I applied for, that I started having doubts. When I applied for graduate work, I was turned down. I was told that while I was well qualified for the course, I would never get a job afterwards as …..

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