The birth rate in France diminished much earlier than in the rest of Europe in part because inheritance laws dictated distribution of estates whereas in the UK wealth could be passed to the eldest son or child.

France lost 10% of its active male population in World War I; the 1.3 million French deaths, along with even more births forgone by potential fathers being off at war, caused a drop of 3 million in the French population, and helped make Dénatalité a national obsession; by 1920 ANAPF had 40,000 members, and in July that year a new law strictly regulated abortion and contraception.

Both left and right supported pro-natalist policies; even the French Communist Party ended its opposition to anti-birth control and anti-abortion laws in 1936, and its leader, Maurice Thorez, advocated for the "protection of family and childhood".

(In fact, with its low birth rate, stagnating or declining native-born population, and role as a destination for migrants from other parts of Europe, France's situation before World War II was not unlike that of Germany today.)

[54] Unemployment, youth ages 15–24: Note: people born outside of France (including the overseas departments) are referred to as immigrants regardless of their nationality (French or foreign).

[62] The modern ethnic French are the descendants of Celts, Iberians, Ligurians, Italic peoples (including Romans), and Greeks in southern France,[63][64] later mixed with large groups of Germanic peoples arriving at the end of the Roman Empire such as the Franks, Burgundians, Alamanni, and Goths,[65] Moors and Saracens in the south,[66][67][68][69][70][71][72] and Scandinavians, Vikings, who became, by mixing with the local population, the Normans and settled mostly in Normandy in the 9th century.

[77][78] In 2015, Michèle Tribalat released a paper estimating population of ethnic minorities in France in 2011 to constitute 30% if ancestry retracted to 3 generations but with age limit of 60.

[79] Newly released figures from France’s national statistical agency, which pulled census data from 2019-2020, revealed that nearly one-third of children aged four years and below are of non-European origin, a number which stands in sharp contrast with those recorded in older generations.

Figures also revealed that 16.2% of all children aged four and below living in France are of Maghreb descent—a term used to describe the predominately Arab regions of northwest Africa, including Morocco, Libya, Algeria, Mauritania, and Tunisia.

During the Trente Glorieuses (1946–1975), the country's reconstruction and steady economic growth led to the labor-immigration of the 1960s, when many employers found manpower in villages located in Southern Europe and North Africa.

In 2008, the French national institute of statistics INSEE estimated that 11.8 million foreign-born immigrants and their direct descendants (second generation) lived in France representing 19% of the country's population.

[93] After World War II, the French fertility rate rebounded considerably, as noted above, but economic growth in France was so high that new immigrants had to be brought into the country.

[95] In the 1970s, over 30,000 French settlers left Cambodia during the Khmer Rouge regime as the Pol Pot government confiscated their farms and land properties.

Between 1956 and 1967, about 235,000 Sephardic North African Jews from Algeria, Tunisia and Morocco also immigrated to France because of the decline of the French colonial empire and following the Six-Day War.

[96] In the late 1970s, the end of high economic growth in France caused immigration policies to be considerably tightened, starting with laws by Charles Pasqua passed in 1986 and 1993.

In 2006, The French Ministry of the Interior estimated clandestine immigrants in France amounted to anywhere between 200,000 and 400,000 and expected between 80,000 and 100,000 people to enter the country illegally each year.

The expulsions of ethnic Chinese from Vietnam in the 1970s led to a wave of immigration and the settlement of the high-rise neighbourhood near the Porte d'Italie, where the Chinatown of Paris is located.

Nevertherless, according to Justin Vaïsse, in spite of challenges and setbacks like the riots in November 2005, in Parisian suburbs, where many immigrants live secluded from society with very few capabilities to live in better conditions, the integration of Muslim immigrants is happening as part of a background evolution[105] and recent studies confirmed the results of their assimilation, showing that "North Africans seem to be characterized by a high degree of cultural integration reflected in a relatively high propensity to exogamy" with rates ranging from 20% to 50%.

[107][108] One illustration of this growing resentment and job insecurity can be drawn from related events, such as the 2005 riots, which ensued in former President Chirac declaring a state of emergency.

[111] In 2014, the National Institute of Statistics (INSEE is its acronym in French) published a study, according to which the numbers of Spanish, Portuguese and Italians in France had doubled between 2009 and 2012.

Meanwhile, 14% of all immigrants who settled in France in that year were from Asian countries: 3% from China, 2% from Turkey, 10% from America and Oceania, Americans and Brazilians accounting for 2% each.

While the UK (along with Ireland and Sweden and non-EU members Norway and Switzerland) did not impose restrictions, France put in place controls to curb Eastern European migration.

[122] The immigration rate is currently lower than in other European countries such as United Kingdom and Spain; however, some say it is unlikely that the policies in themselves account for such a change.

[135] In 2014 The National Institute of Statistics (INSEE, for its acronym in French) published a study, according to which has doubled the number of Spanish immigrants, Portuguese and Italians in France between 2009 and 2012.

[9] With the increase of Spanish, Portuguese and Italian in France, the weight of European immigrants arrived in 2012 to 46 percent, while this percentage for African reached 30%, with a presence in Morocco (7%), Algeria (7%) and Tunisia (3%).

Meanwhile, 14% of all immigrants who settled in France that year were from Asian countries: 3% of China and 2% in Turkey, while in America and Oceania constitute 10% of Americans and Brazilians accounted for higher percentage, 2% each.

Many famous French people like Edith Piaf,[137] Isabelle Adjani, Arnaud Montebourg, Alain Bashung, Dany Boon and many others have Maghrebi ancestry.

[140] As mentioned above, the French Ministry of Immigration, Integration, National Identity and Codevelopment was created immediately following the appointment of Nicolas Sarkozy as president of France in 2007.

[144] France, along with other EU countries, have still not signed their agreement to the United Nations Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families of 1990.

Recent incidents, such as the 2005 civil unrest and Romani repatriation have shed light on France's immigration policies and how these are viewed globally, especially in congruence or discontinuity with the EU.