The other France: Why Ultramarins are foreigners in their own country
- Written by Jamie McGhee
- Edited by Ruby Russell
- Illustration by Ludi Leiva
France is a far bigger and more diverse nation than even many French people acknowledge. In hanging on to former colonies, the Republic promised its overseas citizens the same rights as those on the mainland. In practice, they suffer from chronic underinvestment locally, and systemic prejudice if they relocate to the center of power.
A single package was enough to throw Julie’s nationality into question. It was her first year living in mainland France, having moved to Paris from the Caribbean island of Martinique. She wanted to send something to her father back home. The problem was the postal clerk. She insisted Julie send it via international mail – far more expensive than domestic rates.
However, Martinique is in France. By law, a lower shipping rate should have applied.
The clerk wouldn’t budge.
“The more I explained that Martinique is part of France, the more she insisted it was not,” Julie recalls. She describes the moment as “shocking,” and adds: “Experiences with administrations, like the post office, made me understand I wasn’t considered fully French.”
Julie’s story reveals a contradiction at the heart of the French Republic. Despite being a shadow of the colonial empire it once was, France still lays legal claim to land from South America and the Caribbean to the Indian Ocean and the South Pacific. France’s overseas departments and regions (DROM) include Guadeloupe, Martinique, Réunion, Mayotte and French Guiana, while its overseas collectivities (COM) include French Polynesia, New Caledonia and Wallis and Futuna. The DROM are fully subject to French law, while the COM, granted slightly more autonomy, can pass their own legislation.
Today, 2.7 million people live in these territories, known as DROM-COM or the Outre-mer – literally “overseas.” The distances are immense. Martinique and French Guiana lie roughly 7,000 kilometers from Paris; Réunion is almost 9,500 kilometers away; Wallis-et-Futuna and New Caledonia are more than 16,000. And yet, these regions are as French as Lille and Lyon: someone raised in Mayotte is a French citizen, just like someone from Marseille. And the French Republic guarantees full rights to both – at least, on paper.
The overseas territories suffer from colonial extraction and chronic underinvestment. Then, when lack of opportunity drives citizens to the mainland, they are reminded again – through bureaucracy, ignorance and outright prejudice – that they are not considered truly French, no matter what their passport says.
In practice, it’s a different story. The overseas territories suffer from colonial extraction and chronic underinvestment. Then, when lack of opportunity drives citizens to the mainland, they are reminded again – through bureaucracy, ignorance and outright prejudice – that they are not considered truly French, no matter what their passport says.
“In mainland France, there is a real difference in treatment,” says Maéva Nobou, who is from Guadeloupe. She moved to Montpellier 10 years ago after an illness required her mother to be hospitalized in the metropole. “We often have to justify our place, explain where we come from, why we are ‘here’ and not ‘over there.’ I’ve been told that I’m ‘lucky’ to come from a paradise island, but in the same conversation, it’s made clear that I am not perceived as a Frenchwoman like any other.” As an author, she now writes about her experiences.
The empire that never ended
The overseas territories have always been subject to differential treatment by those in power,”
Residents of the DROM-COM are called Ultramarins, referring to their origins “beyond-the-sea.” In the 17th century, French ships sailed to the Caribbean and Indian Ocean in search of land and profit. Martinique and Guadeloupe became sugar colonies worked by enslaved Africans. Réunion, east of Madagascar, was transformed into a plantation economy producing coffee and spices. French Guiana was used as a penal colony, infamous for Devil’s Island.
Slavery underpinned the whole system until its abolition in 1848. But even after emancipation, the territories remained locked in a colonial relationship, exporting raw goods, importing French-manufactured products and relying on political decisions made oceans away, in Paris.
After World War II, in 1946, Guadeloupe, Martinique, Réunion and French Guiana were transformed into overseas departments, while the collectivities followed in 2003. The idea was assimilation: they would no longer be colonies, but rather part of the Republic itself. In theory, this guaranteed equality. But this equality never came.
To this day, investment in the Outre-mer flows unevenly. Infrastructure remains weak. Jobs are scarce. “The overseas territories have always been subject to differential treatment by those in power,” says Gregory Abelli, a representative of the anti-racism organization SOS Racisme. “This, beyond geographic distance, has placed them on the periphery of the nation. These differences in treatment have led to inequalities in access to education, public services and investment.”
In 2018, unemployment reached 35 percent in Mayotte, far outstripping the nine percent recorded in the metropole. Everyday life is more expensive – food costs 38 percent more in some regions – while wages remain significantly lower. Health and social services lag as well. Residents face a higher prevalence of diabetes, as well as infectious and parasitic diseases, compounded by shortages of medical staff and infrastructure.
“Growing up in Guadeloupe, you understand very well that being French in Guadeloupe and being French in Paris, or even in Corsica, is not the same thing,” says Mélody Shillingford, who moved to Lyon in 2023 to study psychology. “The social and societal inequalities are glaring. In Guadeloupe, you can feel neglected when you experience a high cost of living, water and electricity cuts, corporate monopolies by the békés.”
Békés are the white descendants of slave-owning families who still control disproportionately large sectors of the economy in Guadeloupe and Martinique. Land ownership, agribusiness and import monopolies often remain concentrated in their hands, with the support of French state structures.
Altogether, the result is a structural dependency: the peripheries – DROM-COM – continue to feed the center – mainland France – through labor migration and consumer markets, while the center offers limited reinvestment. Educational pathways funnel the most ambitious students into the metropole, draining talent from the islands.
Leaving the Outre-Mer
Mélody says coming to mainland France when she finished high school “was both an ‘obligation’ and a choice. My chosen field of study for higher education is not available in Guadeloupe.”
Clémence B., who now lives in Montpellier, made a similar decision. “I left Guadeloupe because I had no choice if I wanted to continue my studies and become a lawyer,” she explains. “All the law schools are in mainland France. There are none in the overseas territories. This means you have to leave.”
In mainland France, she was struck by how little people knew of the Republic beyond European shores: “I have often noticed a crass ignorance about overseas territories, which are reduced to exoticism. The islands are confused with each other, and few people know where to locate Guadeloupe on a world map.”
“I’ve been asked whether Guadeloupe is really part of France, whether they use the euro or the franc, whether they have running water, roads, electricity. People have also regularly questioned my qualifications,” Clemence adds.
“I’ve been asked whether Guadeloupe is really part of France, whether they use the euro or the franc, whether they have running water, roads, electricity."
This ignorance is systemic. According to Clémence, French schoolchildren on the mainland may spend years studying the Revolution of 1789 but learn little about slavery in the Caribbean. “We didn’t have the same history lessons,” she says, “as the history of slavery is not really taught in mainland France, whereas it is obviously an integral part of the curriculum from primary school onwards in the Antilles. I find this appalling, given that this history concerns two million fellow citizens in the overseas territories – and even more so when you count the overseas citizens living in mainland France.”
This contradiction exposes a deeper fault line in French universalism. The Republic prides itself on supposed indivisibility, claiming color-blind equality. Yet in practice, there are two Frances: the France of the metropole, and the other France of the overseas territories, whose people are constantly reminded of their second-class status.
Moving from the Outre-mer to the mainland offers opportunities – but not on a par with locals. In 2021, French researchers conducted a large-scale study by sending out identical résumés for job applications in Paris. The only difference was the candidate’s place of origin. The results were clear: candidates from overseas departments received 20 percent fewer positive responses than their metropolitan counterparts.
SOS Racisme conducted a similar experiment in housing. They sent out 775 nearly identical applications to landlords across the Ile-de-France region, which includes Paris; again, the only difference was each applicant’s origin. And the results were even starker: prospective tenants of overseas origin were 40 percent less likely to be offered accommodation than long-established metropolitan French applicants.
Gregory says the police are also guilty of racial profiling – with dangerous consequences. “As a predominantly Black population, Ultramarins are particularly exposed to police violence, which takes multiple forms, such as systematic racial profiling,” he explains. “These practices reflect a persistent racialization of law enforcement, where skin color determines the likelihood of being perceived as suspicious or dangerous, and therefore controlled or violently repressed.”
Maéva feels this prejudice as a constant state of exclusion: “The accent, skin color, stereotypes about the Caribbean… all of this creates a kind of invisible barrier.”
Caught between two worlds
Compounded by the sheer distance from home, this can take an immense psychological toll. “Being more than 7,000 km away from one’s family is no small matter,” says Clémence, describing how rarely Ultramarins see their families. “This causes real unhappiness and homesickness, and a significant proportion of young people from the Caribbean who come to study fail because of this, or experience periods of depression.”
Parents from the furthest territories, such as New Caledonia or French Polynesia, make especially high financial sacrifices to cover airfare, deposits and tuition to give their children the educational opportunities that just aren’t available locally. But if migration is shaped by underinvestment overseas, identity is shaped by contradiction.
Despite having moved thousands of kilometers away, Ultramarins in mainland France often describe their ties to home as stronger than ever. “I feel Guadeloupean first and foremost,” says Maéva. “Of course, I am French on paper, but my heart, my culture and my way of life come from my island. My overseas identity is what defines me the most, even before my ‘Frenchness.’ Sometimes I feel caught between two worlds: French, but not perceived as such; Guadeloupean, but far from my island.”
Mélody, too, feels “Guadeloupean first, before being French.” After three years in Lyon, she says she doesn’t “feel particularly attached to mainland France as such.” In part, this is a paradox of distance. “The farther away you are, the closer you feel to Guadeloupe, because the longing and the awareness take on their full significance. My attachment to Guadeloupe and my Caribbean identity keep growing,” she explains.
Neither Mélody nor Julie sees a long-term future in mainland France. “I plan to return to Martinique as soon as I finish the internships I have to do here,” Julie says. “I prefer my life there, my family, the climate.”
Clémence is more tentative. She has secured a position at a reputable law firm and lives with her partner near the Mediterranean. “I have thought about returning several times in the medium or long term (five to 10 years). Now that I have found professional and emotional stability, this plan has faded a little, but I haven’t given up on it. It remains an option that is still unclear.”
By carrying their culture across the ocean, Ultramarins challenge the narrow boundaries of what it means to be French.
The story of France’s overseas citizens is inseparable from the story of colonialism. The territories still bear the scars of extraction and neglect, and those who leave for the metropole often find themselves confronting the same hierarchies that once defined empire. However, by carrying their culture across the ocean, Ultramarins challenge the narrow boundaries of what it means to be French. Their presence is a reminder that the Republic cannot erase its colonial past – nor should it ignore those who will shape a more egalitarian future.
About the author:
Jamie McGhee is a novelist and historian. Her work has been supported by Harvard University, MIT, Zurich University of the Arts and Instituto Sacatar.
What are ultramarins? How many colonies does France have? Do people in French territories have French citizenship or nationality?
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