Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book investigates the Union generale des travailleurs senegalais en France's founding in response to the challenges African immigrants faced in France, initial activities in housing and education, and its later politicization in order to understand the early postcolonial political trajectory taken by African immigrant groups. It explores a large-scale immigrant-led rent strike in Ivry within the context of the growing, diverse, and sometimes unexpected forms of African political activism across the 1960s and 1970s. The book considers the deaths of five African immigrants at Aubervilliers in January of 1970 from several perspectives, looking at the bereavement experienced by the African immigrant community as well as the responses of advocacy groups, leftist political organizations who advocated for immigrants, public intellectuals, and the media. It focuses on surveillance and the ways in which the Fifth Republic monitored the African immigrant community.