Forced marriages among immigrant women and daughters of immigrants in France

Christelle Hamel, Institut National d'Études Démographiques (INED)

In 2005, the European Commission voted a recommendation urging EU member states to prevent forced marriages and to develop studies on this aspect of violence against women, in order to combat it more effectively. While knowledge of forced marriages is mostly based on qualitative surveys, France has recently conducted a quantitative survey entitled Trajectories and Origins that recorded information on respondents' conditions of marriage, making it possible to identify cases of "non-consensual" marriage. This survey is representative of the migrant and non-migrant population living in France. The survey data were used to estimate the extent of this violence, to describe the characteristics of victims’ parents and the circumstances of their marriage. The results show that, contrary to popular belief, forced marriages among immigrants are decreasing and that premarital pregnancies are frequently the reason why women are coerced into marriage by their parents.