Three weeks ago, two teenage boys, Zyed Benna and Bouna Traore, ran from French police officers and were unintentionally electrocuted in Clichy-sous-Bois, a northeastern Parisian suburb. Riots stemmed from the deaths in the form of massive destruction performed by teenagers in protest toward French authorities and politics.

As the weeks go by and the hazardous fires begin to subside, many people believe the central worry of the French government and its citizens is no longer the violent youth, but unemployment, education, immigration and discrimination.

In a telephone interview, Professor A. Belden Fields, who studied French politics in the University’s political science department, attributed the social conflict to the unemployment of its African communities. Africans were encouraged to immigrate in the 1950s and ’60s by the French government through formal policies. However, the French government did not expect them to bring their families and create permanent homes in France, Fields said.

As a result of the move away from industrialization, many people in France have lost jobs.

“The unemployment rate is extremely high,” Fields said. “There is a racial component, ethnic component, age component, social class component and demographic component.”

He said much of the rioting is due to tensions between the French youth and the government, but particularly the French Interior Minister, Nicolas Sarkozy. Sarkozy has a “get tough” policy, and wants to get rid of immigrants and crime, known to be located in the suburbs, Fields said.

He said part of the reason why the youth does not like Sarkozy is because he eliminated a program called community policing, where the police officers traveled through neighborhoods on foot to establish positive relationships with residents.

Zsuzsanna Fagyal, assistant professor in French linguistics, worked as a French tutor in the ’90s in the areas where riots occurred. She said unemployment is not the only issue creating problems in Paris’ northeast neighborhoods.

Even though people of Arab and African origin have the same opportunities as other citizens, the problem at hand is figuring out how to effectively integrate them into the economy and mainstream society, especially when “you can hear a lower class accent” or a job application has an African last name, Fagyal said.

Celine Vidallet, a graduate students from Poitiers, France, said even though everyone in France has the same educational opportunities and receives social allowances through tax dollars, the rioting teenagers simply do not have anything else to do, and are not taking advantage of what the French government has to offer them.

Vidallet said she did not want outsiders, especially Americans, to think that the teenagers are being dramatically oppressed.

“There will always be unhappy people,” Vidallet said. “They study in the best schools, but nobody sees that.”

Jamela Clark, senior in LAS, is currently studying abroad in France.

“I actually got a letter from the American embassy urging that I do not disclose my nationality to anyone, that kind of scared me,” Clark said in an email.

Clark is staying with a family in the 19th arrondissement, which is near the riot areas, and had some difficulty traveling to and from her residence.

“Transportation was temporarily affected because they didn’t want any of the troublemakers coming in to the city,” Clark said. “All metros going up north were shut down temporarily or put on curfew, which kind of made me late a few times because I live in Northern Paris, so very few trains were riding through.”

Ashley Hetcher, junior in LAS, is going to study in Paris next semester. She said she is excited, but is only 95 percent sure she is still going to Paris; the other 5 percent stems from doubt due to her father’s worries.

“When people start getting hurt, that’s when it’s unacceptable,” Hetcher said.