ABSTRACT
The largest and most sustained movement of sans-papiers began in the mid-1990s as a result of a series of legislation introduced by right-wing governments which had the effect of pushing more and more immigrants into a situation of illegality. The violence of the police intervention at Saint Bernard, together with the widespread media coverage it received provoked a wave of public support and demonstrations in favour of the sans-papiers. The movement in support of the sans-papiers gained even greater resonance when at the end of 1996, Alain Juppe's government introduced two new bills relating to illegal residence and work in France. The mobilisation of the sans-papiers has brought to the foreground the issue of illegality and of how people come to be illegal residents in France. The employment of sans-papiers can be seen as part of a more global phenomenon of the re-location of labour, a phenomenon that Terray describes as delocalisation sur place.
