Cultural garment or religious symbol? Debate over France's ban on abayas in school

The French education minister’s proposal to prohibit students from wearing abayas - full-length robes worn by some Muslim women - has been welcomed on the right as a move to protect France's secularist traditions, but it has divided the left over whether the garment is a cultural or religious symbol, or just a fashion statement that the state should not be involved in policing.

A woman wearing an abaya dress and Islamic veil in Paris. Education minister Gabriel Attal says the garment violates secularism laws, and wants to ban it in schools. © Miguel Medina/AFP

The proposal to ban students wearing abayas “is dangerous. It is cruel. It will turn once again into discrimination towards young women and in particular, of Muslim faith,” said lawmaker Manuel Bompard, coordinator of the hard-left France Unbowed party on French public television Tuesday, announcing that the party would submit the ban to the Council of State, arguing it is unconstitutional.

The abaya is not a religious symbol, like the headscarf or veil, which has been banned in schools since 2004, but some school directors have been concerned about the increase in the number of female students wearing them at school, which they say violates France's laïcité - or secularism - rules. 

The education ministry, which started keeping statistics on laïcité violations in schools in 2017, has recorded an increase in reports of 120 percent between the 2021/2022 school year and this past school year – most of the violations have involved students wearing religious symbols.

• 'Growing number' of French schoolgirls flouting secularism rules

The head of the conservative Les Republicains party, Eric Ciotti, welcomed Education Minister Gabriel Attal’s announcement that he would ban abayas in school, which he said was long overdue.

Unions representing administrators also welcomed the move, saying that the decision to allow the garment or not should not be left to individual school directors.

Policing women's clothing

But the issue is dividing the left/green Nupes alliance. Socialist lawmaker Jerome Guedj supports the ban, saying that that when the garment is worn “in an ostentatious way”, it must be prohibited under the 2004 law banning the wearing of religious symbols in school.

However, France Unbowed leader, Jean Luc Mélenchon, warned the ban feeds “an absurd war of religion” around what women wear.

Bompard, who said he supports the ban on headscarves, argues the abaya is just a long dress, and “when you start to regulate what people wear, in particular women, you open a Pandora’s box that we will not be able to escape”.

The French Council of the Muslim Faith, an umbrella group of Muslim organizations, said that the government should not get involved in what is a religious symbol.

“Unless all long dresses are simply banned in schools, for students and teachers, regardless of their adherence to a faith or not, it will be impossible to apply a measure specifically targeting an 'abaya' without falling into the trap of discrimination and arbitrariness,” the council said in a statement.

This was the position taken by former education minister, Pap Ndyaye, who in June declined to ban abayas, and instead said school directors could ban certain items of clothing if they determine it violates secularism rules.

A system-wide ban would create endless regulations on dress lengths, sleeve shapes or colours, he said, inviting legal challenges, without addressing the fundamental issue.