Officials from the National Rally (RN) party announced that they would ban headscarves in public if they win next year’s presidential election in France. Under the party’s plan, the measure would be introduced through a referendum and those who violate the ban would be fined.
Debates over headscarves in France took shape from the 1980s onward within the framework of secularism policies in public institutions and education. French civil servants were banned from wearing religious symbols while on duty, while students wearing headscarves in public schools also became a subject of debate during the same period.
The Creil incident changed the legal debate
In October 1989, three middle-school students were suspended for refusing to remove their headscarves in class. The incident, later known as the “Creil headscarf affair,” became one of the starting points of a long-running debate over Muslim religious symbols in French public life.
On November 27, 1989, the Council of State ruled that students carrying symbols expressing their religious affiliation did not violate secularism. The institution held that students could be expelled from school because of their conduct, but not because of their clothing.
A law that entered into force on March 15, 2004, banned students from wearing headscarves in public primary and secondary schools. Face veils were also completely banned in public spaces in 2010, and a fine of 150 euros was introduced for those who violated the ban.
The headscarf ban extended to education and sports
In 2012, a circular was issued banning mothers accompanying school trips from wearing headscarves. In 2013, the Council of State ruled in favor of mothers who wore headscarves, paving the way for the circular to be withdrawn.
During the 2024 Olympic Games, France also applied a headscarf ban to its own athlete delegation. In recent years, far-right circles have reopened the debate by proposing that the ban be extended to all public spaces.
Media’s approach to Islam criticized
In his book “Imaginary Islam: The Media Construction of Islamophobia in France, 1975–2005,” French editor Thomas Deltombe examined how Islam was addressed in the French media between the 1970s and the 2000s, as well as the historical development of the headscarf debate.
Deltombe said that Islam received limited coverage in the French media until the 1970s after Algeria gained independence in 1962. He said that workers arriving from Muslim countries and their way of life later became subjects of news coverage.
Deltombe said that in the 1980s, the French media began to address Muslims through their religious identities rather than their different identities, describing this approach as the “Islamization of the gaze.” In his view, journalists, media executives and politicians used language that reduced Muslims solely to their religious identities.
Deltombe said the 1989 Creil incident became a national debate for months and launched a long-running discussion about the wearing of Muslim religious symbols in French public life. He said competition among private television channels and the rise of the far right also influenced the climate of debate at the time.
The French editor said that a circular banning religious symbols in public schools was issued in 1994. Although the circular did not explicitly mention headscarves, Deltombe argued that it served this purpose, and said the 2004 law made the ban on headscarves in public schools permanent and changed the understanding of secularism.
