Public policies in francophone immigration in Acadia of New Brunswick: Between institutional incompleteness and symbolic success
Confronted with its aging population and its deeply rooted rural characteristic, l’Acadie du Nouveau-Brunswick has become a host society for francophone immigrants though laws provisions, militancy of the Fédération des communautés francophones et acadiennes (FCFA) and positives measures designed to ensure its linguistic and community vitality. In this specific context, francophone immigration is perceived as a distributive linguistic social policy and a panacea that can solve the equation of an aging population, low birth rate, risks of linguistic assimilation and demographic disequilibrium in favour of the English-speaking majority. More than ten years after the implementation of francophone immigration public policies, l’Acadie du Nouveau-Brunswick is not emerging as a viable host society. Rather, it is characterized by a multidimensional institutional incompleteness when it comes to the issues of immigration. Therefore, it hardly benefits from the democratization of the migration resource. Because of its societal characteristics, integration and retention of critical mass of francophone immigrants amount to a challenge to the laws of migration flows. Despite their failure, francophone immigration public policies have not been challenged. They enjoy a unique success. Firstly, they contribute to the easing of linguistic tensions and secondly they succeeded in making l’Acadie du Nouveau-Brunswick a host society like the Anglophone dominant society.