Characteristics of immigrants in France in the beginning of 21st century

Characteristics of immigrants in France in the beginning of 21th century Abstract Aim of this thesis is to give as complex overview of immigration flows to France as possible and characterize immigrants, describe their geographical origin and main motives that resulted in their migration. In the first part of the thesis we will describe the most important legislative changes, immigration politics and negative results of immigration. In the second part we will define regions with higher concentration rate of immigration basing on analyzed data and indicate main preferences of immigrants concerning choice of final destination region. In analysis we found out that geographical origin of immigrants changed in the past, currently majority of immigrants comes from African countries and familial reasons dominate. Immigration process is very difficult for incomers from African countries and result of their unconformity is very low level of education and high rate of unemployment. The highest concentration of immigrants is located in Ile-de-France, where 12 % of immigrants were in the year 2012. Key words: immigration to France, characteristics of immigrants, motives of immigration, geographical distribution of immigrant in Franc