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Paper short abstract

This study analyzes the gendered dimensions of mistrust and its critical scope through participatory action research with migrant women. It identifies two critical moments in the formation of mistrust through institutional encounters across their trajectories.

Paper long abstract

Drawing on biographical interviews and participatory action research, this paper analyzes the gendered dimensions of mistrust and its critical significance through the experiences of migrant women confronting French institutions. Within a research group comprising approximately fifteen migrant women, NGO workers, and researchers, collective discussions reveal institutional "false promises" as a central concern. We examine the gendered underpinnings of this phenomenon through participants' narratives shared in both individual interviews and group discussions.

Our analysis identifies two critical moments in the formation of mistrust through specific institutional encounters. First, participants recount their settlement and regularization processes in France: embedded within particular family configurations, they find themselves vulnerable to employers upon whom their administrative advancement depends. They describe experiences of "betrayal" that interweave affective relationships, domestic labor, and administrative procedures.

Second, following these initial disappointments, participants encounter various institutional support mechanisms for professional integration that simultaneously enact control, channel them toward subordinate employment, and promote civic activation. This institutional sequence operates across multiple policy levels, reproducing a gendered entanglement of affect, employment, and citizenship.

Explored through participatory action research, these two institutional sequences produce both affective and epistemic effects. The collective framework enables participants to contextualize and critically reflect upon their experiences, generating new forms of knowledge about institutional functioning while simultaneously opening possibilities for emotional processing and repositioning themselves in relation to institutions.