The Status Precariousness of Tunisian “Talents” in France: Glass Ceiling, Assignments and Microaggressions

The literature on privileged mobility has recently developed the concept of ‘precarious privilege’ to capture the ambivalence of some of these migratory experiences. Significantly, the concept has been used almost exclusively in relation to white individuals from the global North (Bunnell&Poole 2022; Green, 2022; Poole, 2022). The concept proves difficult to transpose to the case of privileged mobility from the global South, since at least two types of privilege, migratory and racial, can only be observed for North→South migration. In the case of South→North mobility, these privileges are, conversely, transformed into two forms of precariousness, administrative and statutory. It therefore seems more appropriate to reverse the phrase and speak of ‘privileged precariousness’ to characterise privileged mobility from South to North (Thibault 2025).

Based on a survey of 30 semi-directive interviews conducted with Tunisian engineers, consultants, researchers and artists who hold/have held the French ‘talent passport’ residence permit, the paper pays particular attention to the status precariousness of these expatriates, situated at the intersection of a dominant socio-professional position (as members of the upper middle class in France) and a dominated national and racial position (as 'Arabs'/'North Africans'/'Muslims'). It shows that these highly qualified Tunisian professionals in France are caught up in a double division of labour, both vertical (glass ceiling) and horizontal (assignment to certain specialities), which limits their prospects of professional advancement and confines them to the periphery of the upper middle class. They are also constantly exposed, in their ordinary interactions in France, to the risk of being racialised by the majority group –in the dual sense of being ‘othered’ and ‘inferiorised’. This can lead them to experience repeated microaggressions which, when they are not able to ignore them completely, force them to question the racist nature of the acts and comments made against them.