The proposed bill would have to be approved by the leader of the French parliament in order to be put on the parliamentary agenda in October. Behind the word discrimination are the real stories of people who have the right qualifications and skills but don’t get the job because they don’t have the so-called ‘right’ hair.” “Natural afro hair is seen as not styled, it’s not understood or accepted, comments are made about it. Joëlle Dago-Serry, a French career coach and TV commentator, told a chatshow on RMC radio: “Of course there is discrimination … my mother first straightened my hair when I was seven or eight … I’m of the generation where our hair was very much straightened using dangerous products in order to pass the barrier of a job interview, or to move up in a career. When Macron’s former adviser Sibeth Ndiaye became spokesperson for the French government during Macron’s first term in office, her natural afro hairstyle was targeted in racist commentary on social networks. He cited a study funded by Dove and LinkedIn that found that two-thirds of black women in the US had felt obliged to change their hair for a job interview.

Serva said that because France did not count data based on ethnicity, there were no studies on the extent of hair discrimination against black people in France, but he said it would be similar to the US or UK. He said the law would ban any form of hair discrimination, including towards women and men with afro hairstyles or braids, as well as stereotyping against bald men or women with blond hair. He said black women were taking health risks to straighten their hair with chemicals because of discrimination in French society and in the workplace.

Serva said Traoré’s long legal case showed that there was a gap in the law and specific legislation should focus on hair discrimination.

After a legal battle lasting more than a decade, France’s highest appeals court found in Traoré’s favour in November last year, ruling that the company authorised female staff to wear braids and so could not ban the hairstyle from male staff. Serva said the case of a black flight attendant for Air France who took his employers to an industrial tribunal because of discrimination over his braids had showed how France needed to tighten up legislation with a specific text on hair discrimination, and also increase awareness in the workplace and broader society.Īboubakar Traoré, an Air France steward who had changed his hairstyle to braids worn tied back in a chignon, had been refused access to a flight because his hairstyle was said not to conform to the rules in the flight manual for male staff.

French braid a novel