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Muslims are currently the largest religious minority in Western Europe. The presence of Islam in Europe is a direct consequence of the existence of pathways of immigration that opened up in the early 1960s from former colonies in Asia, Africa, and the Caribbean. Following the official end of work-based immigration in 1974, the integration of immigrant populations has become irreversible — spurred by an increasing number of policies on family reunification that contribute to the noticeable increase in family size within Europe. In such a context, asserting one's belief in Islam becomes a major factor in population characterization. The resulting visibility of Islam in Western European countries has crystallized questions, doubts, and even open violence against Muslim communities.
Socio-Economic Marginalization
A combination of factors makes the condition of Islam in Europe specific. European Muslims are mostly immigrants; they have vastly different ethnicities and cultures; they are socio-economically marginalized; they integrate in nations that are politically and culturally very different; and finally, their integration is occurring under international constraints such as the war on terror.
According to the best estimates, Muslims currently constitute approximately 5 percent of the European Union's 425 million inhabitants. There are about 4.5 million Muslims in France, 3 million in Germany, 1.6 million in the United Kingdom, and more than half a million in both Italy and the Netherlands. In smaller countries, such as Austria, Sweden, and Belgium, Muslim populations do not even number 500,000, but still represent significant minorities. Approximately half of all European Muslims are foreign born. In general, the Muslim population is younger and produces more children than the corresponding native population (Savage 2004).
Ethnic Backgrounds
In France and the United Kingdom, Muslim populations began arriving in the middle of 20th century, primarily from former colonies. This led to a predominance of North African Muslims in France and South Asians Muslims in the United Kingdom. In Germany, the Muslim community began with an influx of guest workers during the post-war economic boom, who came mostly from Turkey. In the Netherlands, immigration of guest workers led to a largely Moroccan and Turkish population.
The populations of these and other nations in the European Union have been substantially augmented by immigration flows over the last 20 years. Although immigrants have come from all over the world, they tend to be attracted to countries with existing populations of the same ethnic background.
The majority of Muslims in Europe come from three regions of the world. The largest ethnic group is Arab (45 percent) followed by Turkish and South Asian. Although there are sizable populations of Turks in several countries, the majority reside in Germany, while most of the South Asians are in the United Kingdom (Cesari 2004). Most European countries closed their doors to simple economic migration in the 1970s, but asylum and family reunification policies continue to allow in substantial numbers of new immigrant Muslims (Savage 2004).
Muslims have also entered Europe in large numbers as refugees fleeing from violence in their home countries. Bosnian and Kosovan Muslims who fled the wars in the breakup of Yugoslavia generated large flows across Europe, with more than 300,000 fleeing to Germany alone. Violence in Somalia also drove many to immigrate to Europe.
A Set of "Dangerous Liaisons"
The socio-economic condition of European Muslims is one of great fragility. The unemployment rate for immigrant Muslims is, as a general rule, higher than the national average. In the Netherlands, for example, 31 percent of Moroccans and 24 percent of Turks are currently unemployed. In 1995, L'Institut National d'?tudes Démographiques (INED) showed that with equal levels of education, unemployment was twice as high for youth from a Muslim immigrant background as for youth from a non-Muslim immigrant background.
The situation of one segment of the British Muslim population is particularly critical. People originating from Bangladesh and Pakistan have a level of unemployment that is three times the level of society at large. Within inner cities, almost half of all Bangladeshi men and women are unemployed. This marginality is passed on to the generations born and educated in Great Britain.
In 1991, the unemployment rate for young people of Pakistani origin aged 16-24 was almost 36 percent; whereas the unemployment rate for whites was less than 15 percent. This disadvantage is not limited to jobs requiring only basic qualifications, but also concerns high-profile domains such as medicine and education.
This socio-economic marginality is in most cases accompanied by residential segregation. Data from the British census shows that Pakistani immigrants tend to live in the most dilapidated or unhealthy kinds of housing. Disparities in ethnic concentration per residential area or per residence are also notable in the inner cities of Germany and in France's poorer suburbs.
Withdrawal From Society
Such a situation of relegation has important consequences for Islam in Europe. The political temptation is to associate Islam with poverty, and to consider (albeit tacitly) that the former is the cause of the latter. On the Muslims' side, there is an apologist tendency to use Islam in a defensive or reactive way. Ethnicity, religion, and poverty are all tied together.
Ethnicity thus becomes a trap. This trap can lead to riots or a state of social unrest, as is the case in France during the riots of the winter of 2005. Similarly, a team of researchers specializing in community cohesion, established under the auspices of the British Home Office, led an inquiry in the towns of Oldham, Burnley, Southall , Birmingham, and Leicester where riots broke out in the spring of 2001. The results published on December 11, 2001, are alarming.
They show whole groups withdrawn from society, feeling immense frustration because they are faced with poverty and a lack of equal opportunities. "You are the only white person I shall meet today," said one person of Pakistani origin in Bradford who was interviewed for the report. The report describes an England that is segregated according to race and religion, whether in the domain of housing, employment, education, or social services. The British and French situations are reminiscent of that of Black American Muslims. In each case, the use of Islam may accentuate separatism
The correlation between social problems and Islam has been invoked as one of the reasons for the resurgence of extreme-right political movements, not only in France, but also in Belgium, Austria, and the Netherlands. Indeed, the links made between Islam and poverty serve to justify the hypothesis of incompatible cultures and the threat constituted by the settling of Islam in the West.
One of the consequences of the attacks of September 11, 2001, has been the accentuation of stigma due to the associations that allegedly exist between Islam, the poor suburbs, and terrorism. The Madrid bombing in March 2004 and the London bombings in July 2005 have intensified this correlation. The result has been even stricter immigration and security policies. It is still too early to measure the consequences of these laws on the religious behavior of Muslims in Europe, but it is very likely that the consequence will be an increase in the reactive and defensive use of Islam.
The ethnic diversity of European Muslims is often (and very rightly) underscored. But it is also important to take into account the diversity of national contexts: the status of religion within different societies; the modes of acquiring nationality; the presence of multiculturalism, or lack thereof; as well as the specific characteristics of each European country that have a direct influence on the dynamics of the formation of Muslim minorities and on the construction of identities. If European Muslims do not act in certain ways, we should not seek explanations primarily in the Islamic tradition, but in the range of opportunities made possible by the political and cultural contexts of each specific society.
Sources:
- Cesari, J (2004). When Islam and Democracy Meet: Muslims in Europe and in the United States. New York, Palgrave Macmillan.
- Savage, T. M (2004). Europe and Islam: Crescent Waxing, Cultures Clashing. Washington Quarterly. 27: 25-50.
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