“Unmasking Racism”: A Critical Analysis of the Burka Ban Law in France

By: Farinaz Basmechi

Since the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, the issue of mandatory face-coverings in public places has become the center of attention of debates worldwide. However, it is not the first time that legislation regarding face coverings has been enacted. In 2010, the French Parliament passed their first law banning face-covering in public places, with the stated purpose of increasing public security and women’s equality and freedom in society1 . Although this law applied nationally and did not specify any religion as a target, their primary target was Muslim women wearing face-coverings (burka or niqab) in public places. Muslim women wear the burka as an indication of modesty based on their sharia beliefs. The banning of face-coverings in law has become famous

1 The face-covering ban in public law passed in 2010 in France created two new punishable offenses: First, wearing clothing that designed to cover one’s face in the public sphere is punishable by either requiring taking a class on the meaning of citizenship or by a maximum of € 150 fine, or both; Second, forcing a woman to wear a face-covering is punishable by a €30,000 fine or one year of imprisonment (Legifrance, 2010).

as the “burka ban” law because, as stated above, it targets the removal of burkas or niqabs from the French public sphere. Despite disagreements and protests at the national and international level over passing such an Islamophobic law in France (The Guardian, 2011), this law has been established in other countries2 to maintain national security and gender equality. To legitimize the burka ban law, the approach of the French Constitutional Council has been to argue that hiding one’s face in public does not comply and respect the minimal necessary requirements of being involved in social life (McCrea, 2013). During the pandemic, wearing a face-covering became essential for entrance into public places. Many have pointed out the contradiction between the burqa ban law and the mandatory face-covering globally enforced due to the coronavirus pandemic (Eli, 2020; Ricca, 2020). While wearing a face mask during the pandemic was justified due to public health and safety concerns, countries used the same justification of public safety to prevent Muslim women from wearing a religious face-covering. A critical question arises from this paradoxical situation: security and freedom for whom? This article examines the burka ban law in France after ten years of its implementation and in the era of mandated face masks. In this paper, I argue that, despite the initial goals of increasing national security and women’s equal rights and freedom through the face-covering ban law (burka ban), the law has had a direct negative effect on Muslim women’s lives and does not increase their freedom or national safety.

Increasing national safety was one of the central supporting claims brought up by burka ban law advocates, who focused on the fact that face-covering prevents the clear identification of the individuals in society (Heidar, 2012). Since 2010, Muslim women were the main population in France who wore face-coverings due to their religious beliefs and many argued that the ban was aimed at eliminating niqabs or burkas worn by Muslim women from the French public sphere (Heider, 2012; Nanwani, 2011; Spohn, 2013). The burka ban law in

2 The following list is the name of European countries that implemented the Burka Ban law in public places in chronological order: France (2010), Belgium (2011), Bulgaria (2015), Austria (2017), Denmark (2018), and Switzerland (2021) (BBC News, 2018; BBC News, 2021).

France should be seen as a transparent policy that implements intersecting surveillance on Muslim women’s bodies, which leads to the over-marginalization of this population in French society. Since September 11, 2001, Islamophobia has been on the rise. Muslim individuals have been targeted for racial surveillance (Brown, 2015), where police performed more ID checks on the Muslim population. For instance, in 2013, at least 423 women who wore full-face veils were stopped for identity checks (Bouteldja, 2013). Also, a study conducted in 2019 by a collective against Islamophobia reported that Muslim women had experienced a higher level of physical and mental insecurity due to intersecting surveillance in France. According to this study, sixty percent of discriminatory Islamophobic hate acts and speech were directed at veiled Muslim women (Time, 2021). Furthermore, France mandating face masks due to public safety in 2020 is an indicator of the arbitrary nature of the face-covering ban law in 2010 as it legislatively mandated what was previously banned in the name of public safety. While many believed that mandatory face mask laws would end the burka ban, France’s Interior Minister confirmed that the burka and niqab bans would remain in effect (CBS News, 2020). Ironically, though wearing a face mask due to COVID-19 hides people’s identities and impedes the logic of living together in French society, Muslim women are still banned from wearing their religious face covering. The hypocrisy of the law becomes evident after this incident since it shows that the burka ban is not about public safety. Interestingly, a Muslim woman wearing a niqab cannot ride a bus, but one with a face mask on can.

Maintaining gender equality for Muslim women in France was another primary justification for the burka ban law. However, the state’s restrictions on women’s dressing undermines gender equality because it presumes a universal, unilateral perspective on achieving gender equality by assuming that the same formula works for every woman. Considering a burka as a piece of cloth instead of a significant religious garment is evidence of bias against non-Western religions. Moreover, it seems that this point of view is coming from a colonial perspective that considers anything outside of the colonial lens as unacceptable, dangerous, and needing to be removed from the social arena. This perspective

is problematic since it does not take Muslim women’s agency into account and considers the mainstream French culture as the superior culture that everyone should follow in public. This positions the Muslim culture of face-covering as inferior, worse, and one that should be hidden from the public eye. This suggests an understanding of gender equality from a single lens, which has not empowered all women but has marginalized some women who believe in other forms of appearance, dressing, and equality. According to such a point of view, Muslim women are vulnerable people who are not accountable for their choices, including their ways of dressing; they do not have any agency of their own and need politicians to hand them their equal rights in society by outlawing their ways of dressing. However, Muslim women who used to wear burkas before the ban still find gender equality in a way in which they could choose their way of dressing, and most of them continue to wear their choice of dressing (Bouteldja, 2013) as a form of resistance to the law (Mahmoud, 2005). In 2020, the French government decided to legislate a mandatory face mask law due to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, they did not reverse the burka ban law. The justifications behind the burka ban, namely gender equality, were reaffirmed, yet, the ban continues to demonstrate governmental bias and the use of a colonial lens in understanding women’s rights. Still, the state is reluctant to include visible Muslim women in French society and accept them as a part of the French national identity.

Russo (2019) provided a critical analysis on the concept of a “savior” that has been used to strengthen the subject positions of subordination and dominance, which reproduce the binary of us (who are saviors) and them (who need saving) in the name of empowerment. The same logic has been introduced and used in establishing the burka ban law. White supremacists in a patriarchal system introduced themselves as the savior of Muslim women who need saviors to pass a law that saves them from wearing a burka. Therefore, one of the primary justifications of the burka ban law is promoting freedom for Muslim women in French society. Yet, by banning burkas and niqabs in the name of women’s freedom, Muslim women in France who wear face-coverings as part of their spiritual-religious identity became subjects of violence and subordination. Therefore, they are condemned to be present in public in a way that French society is comfortable with them appearing. According to Bouteldja (2013), Muslim women reported less freedom to go out into public spheres because they are uncomfortable in a social environment without their niqab or burka. The burka ban law seems to have implicitly legitimized the abusive treatment of veiled women, which leads to the marginalization of Muslim women and them experiencing less freedom in France’s public sphere. However, in the era of mandated face masks, although the ban on wearing a burka or niqab is still in effect, some Muslim women who wear face coverings because of their religious beliefs feel more comfortable being in public. The mandatory face mask law allowed Muslim women to cover their faces in public without a high level of negative stigma toward them. However, they are still not allowed to wear their own choices of dressing (burka or niqab) in public without harassment and stigmatization from the perspective of their saviors.

I have argued that the face-covering ban only targets Muslim women in French society by putting them at the intersection of intensified racialized gendered surveillance (intersecting surveillance) and does not increase national security. By implementing the burka ban law, the French Senate normalized the heteropatriarchal white supremacist approach in French society in the name of national safety, gender equality, and Muslim women’s freedom. On the other hand, in 2020, the French government mandated wearing a face mask while in public due to public health and safety, but still condemned Muslim women for wearing a burka or niqab for the very same reason, showing the hypocrisy of the burka ban law after ten years of its implementation. Despite its objective of engendering gender equality, the burka ban law has failed to improve gender equality and women’s freedom, specifically for Muslim women in France, since it assumed a generalized position about women’s inequality and postulated a standardized solution that has had dangerous consequences (Narayan, 2000) including promoting gendered Islamophobia. To promote women’s equal rights, what is needed is the deconstructing and unsettling of the dominant discourse regarding agency and accountability. Gender equality and women’s emancipation should be understood through “a performative dimension: a political praxis aimed at the unsettling of dominant discourses on gender and sexuality” (Mahmoud, 2005, p.21). In contrast, this has not been the case regarding the burka ban law and its way to pursue Muslim women’s equal rights leading to masked racism.