Nantes 140417.indd - EU-MIA

COUNCIL FOR THE CITIZENSHIP
OF FOREIGNERS
CONSEIL NANTAIS POUR LA
CITOYENNETÉ DES ETRANGERS (CNCE)
NANTES
The Conseil Nantais pour la Citoyenneté des Etrangers
(CNCE) is an advisory body whose main objective is
to allow foreign residents who do not have the right
to vote to actively take part in the production of local
public policies, in particular in the field of integration.
More precisely, the objectives of this practice are:
• To match more appropriately local policies in the
fields of welcoming, integration and equality with
migrants’ needs and demands
• To experiment with new forms of civic participation
• To co-elaborate and co-produce specific actions
and tools in the above-mentioned fields together
with beneficiaries themselves, including both
immigrants and all other actors concerned.
containing a request to analyse a problem and/or carry
out a task. The CNCE is committed to respond with
an avis citoyen within a certain deadline. The result
of the CNCE work is presented to the city councillors
who commit themselves to analyse the avis citoyen
together with the municipal departments concerned,
evaluate the feasibility of CNCE proposals and prepare
an articulated answer, which must contain precise
commitments on the part of the Municipality. In
the period 2012-2013 (within the framework of the
project Coprod Migrant) the two main fields of action
the CNCE focused its activities on have been: 1)
welcoming of immigrant newcomers; and 2) ageing of
migrants.
City of Nantes.
The CNCE is an advisory body whose main function is
not simply to give advice to the city councillors, but to
concretely elaborate and produce policies and actions
together with city councillors, municipal departments
and other non-institutional actors. The CNCE work
methodology is currently well-defined and quite strict.
It starts with the saisine or mandat citoyen, i.e. an
official mandate issued by one or more city councillors
The CNCE was created on the 15th of December
2003. The EU-MIA project focused more precisely
on the CNCE activities in the period 2012-2013,
when the EU-funded project Coprod Migrant was
implemented..
This practice is targeted at a variety of actors,
including both migrants and the receiving
community:
• Third country nationals legally residing in Nantes,
as CNCE members (Collège des étrangers)
• The entirety of foreigners living in Nantes,
including EU citizens and undocumented
migrants, who although not directly represented
in the CNCE are equally concerned by local
integration policy
• Specific sub-groups of migrants (i.e. newcomers,
elderly migrants) as beneficiaries of specific
actions
• Local NGOs and associations, as CNCE members
(Collège d’associations) and beneficiaries of tools
produced by the CNCE
• Municipal services and civil servants, that benefit
concretely from CNCE recommendations and
produced tools in their daily job
• City councilors and the Municipality as a whole,
that benefit on a broader scale from the CNCE
as one of the main actors of the local policy
community.
The City of Nantes, Equality Integration and
Citizenship Unit (EIC Unit) promoted the creation
of the CNCE and is responsible for coordinating
its activities. The EIC Unit represents the centre
of a broad network of partners, which includes:
several municipal departments and services; other
institutional actors at city level; national, regional and
departmental institutions; local NGOs and migrant
associations.
The main upcoming developments are:
• Implementation of evaluation activities
• Update of the produced tools
• Improvement of the readability of produced tools
(for migrants who do not speak/read French)
• Expansion of the CNCE activities towards new
fields of intervention consistently with foreigners’
needs and demands (possible priority fields
of action: access to French language courses
and issue of discrimination in the access to
employment/training and housing).
• CNCE members are not representative of their
national community of origin; on the contrary they
represent the entirety of Nantes’ foreign residents.
Their individual contribution to the CNCE work is
relevant in terms of expertise d’usage, i.e. their
first-hand experience as foreigners in Nantes.
They are not elected (to avoid nationality-based
voting) but selected upon self-candidacy by the
EIC Unit. Selection is based on the criteria of
diversity and balance in terms of nationality,
gender, age, socio-economic situation and
neighbourhood of residence.
• A strong and shared cross-party commitment on
the part of both city councillors and municipal
departments.
• ‘Une culture du dialogue citoyen’, i.e. a
predisposition both of the Municipality and of
citizens, foreign residents and associations to talk
with each other, work together and engage for the
well-being of the local community.
• The interaction between the CNCE and the City
Council is strictly regulated by a procedure based
on the saisine: the CNCE is obliged to reply to
precise political mandates (mandat citoyen)
issued by the City Council with concrete proposals/
recommendations (avis citoyen) and the City
Council is obliged to provide in turn a detailed
feedback.
• The CNCE work methodology is based on the travail
d’atelier, with the ateliers playing a crucial role
as inclusive, participatory and dynamic tools of
policy-making. Ateliers are not permanent bodies,
but are established to work on a specific mandat.
Participation in the ateliers is not limited to
CNCE members only: all Nantes foreign residents,
associations and institutional actors concerned by
the issue under discussion can join an atelier.
• The participatory process that takes place in the
ateliers is constantly reshaped: the idea is that of
a ‘custom-made’ participation (participation sur
mesure) tailored to each atelier’s specific theme,
objectives and participants.
• The issue of representativeness: all CNCE
members are educated, integrated and engaged
people, whilst vulnerable and marginal migrants
are inadequately represented and their demands
risk remaining unheard. NGOs often play a
relevant role in mitigating this problem.
• Lack of participation (and representation) of
certain national groups, which is also but not only
due to linguistic barriers. Migrant associations
often play a relevant role in mitigating this
problem.
• Difficulties in coordinating with all municipal
departments and services involved (time
constraints, division of tasks, staff training, etc.).
Please visit the EU-MIA website find out more, including full report & documentary: http://www.eu-mia.eu/cases