In Europe, and especially in Belgium, most Muslims are part of the underclass. As immigrants, most have come from underdeveloped nations, many as economic and political refugees. As such, they have often lacked the skills necessary for success in the labour market. That reality, combined with discrimination by the native population, has led to sub-average economic conditions for Europe’s Muslims.
Social workers will visit badly integrated foreigners at home to help them learning German, People’s Party (ÖVP) Integration Secretary Sebastian Kurz announced yesterday (Tues).
Kurz said his office planned to expand a successful Viennese pilot project concept based on programmes in Switzerland and Australia to several other Austrian towns and cities in the coming months. The project has a budget of 300,000 Euros, according to Austria’s first state secretary for integration who was sworn in around one year ago.(source)
In May 2012, Bilkay Öney will have been in office as Integration Minister in the German state of Baden-Württemberg for one year. The Turkish-born politician says she is privileged and told DW about her work.
If you look at integration policies in Germany: what seems to work?
I wish I could answer that question with a lot of positive aspects. But in general, the integration debate is often difficult. We often talk at cross purposes. The migrants don't know what the majority wants and what it regards as integration and vice versa. In that respect, I believe we have to articulate much more clearly what it is we want - so do the migrants. Accusations from the one side are followed by explanations from the other. Somehow, we can't see eye to eye and I get the impression that the battle lines are drawn. It would be good if we could break that up - which can only work if we open up to an honest debate and dare address issues that might be uncomfortable or might be viewed in a critical light. More self-criticism on the part of the migrants as well as the majority society is called for.
What else can migrants do to contribute to integration?
They could more often take up offers to integrate. What good is the best concept for integration if migrants don't take advantage of it. We have to pitch integration; it has to be clear that efforts toward integration are worthwhile. Otherwise, migrants will feel offended and withdraw into their corner.(source)
A group of Swiss Muslims has published recommendations for integration in response to a nationwide vote which banned the construction of minarets in Switzerland.
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The Grouping of Swiss Muslims said its recommendations were not only for the attention of federal, cantonal and communal authorities, political parties, the media and business, but “in a large part, for Muslims”.
“Muslims must make more of an effort, but society also needs to open their arms,” one of the group members, Khaldoun Dia-Eddine, told reporters. The group was set up a day after the vote as an informal think tank, but does not claim to be representative of all Muslims in Switzerland.(source)
President Nicolas Sarkozy's decision to make the labelling of halal meat pivotal to his re-election campaign has infuriated, alienated and dismayed France's Muslim community, which may number as many as six million, and the backlash is growing. Members of the booming educated and entrepreneurial Muslim middle class say they are tired of being cast as scapegoats in Sarkozy's wooing of the extreme right and have accused him of dangerous and divisive election tactics.
Fateh Kimouche, a high-profile Muslim blogger, said the new class of second- and third-generation Muslims in France was not prepared to lie down and let the French republic roll over it as their parents had done.
"My parents came from Algeria and, like many others, they didn't make a fuss because they felt like invited guests who had to be on their best behaviour. But I was born here. We are Muslims and we are French, but every day we are attacked, insulted and treated like terrorists or extraterrestrials," he said. "France educated us; we have energy and enthusiasm and we have brains, businesses and money. The old generation of politicians don't seem to realise this."(source)
German Interior Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich has come under attack from the key author of “The Daily Life of Muslims in Germany” study, published by the Bild newspaper on Thursday.
Some editorial writers have also questioned why Bild was able to obtain the study and release it first.
In an interview with the Süddeutsche Zeitung published Saturday, the study’s main author Wolfgang Frindte said, “After the publication in a tabloid newspaper there was a lot of outrage and even despair in our team.”
He said the findings were published in such a way that the Muslims who were interviewed for the study “could have felt misused, and that’s sad.”(source)
The survey showed that of Muslims living in Germany who were not German citizens, 52 percent favored integration, while 48 percent “strongly leaned toward separation” and clearly rejected German majority culture.
But when taking into account both Muslims who were German citizens and those who were not, the figure rose to 78 percent in favor of integration, versus 22 percent who favoured a more separatist approach.
German Interior Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich is concerned about the results of a study by his ministry showing that every fourth non-German Muslim living in Germany rejects integration, is open to the use of violence, and denounces “western values,” Bild-Zeitung reported.(source)
Immigrant youths are particularly prone to marginalisation, says Finnish Business and Policy Forum EVA. According to the think tank’s study, education is paramount for preventing exclusion from society.
“Over a quarter of marginalised youths have foreign backgrounds. Their entry into Finland’s education and labour markets is four or five times more difficult than for their native Finnish counterparts,” says Pekka Myrskylä, Head of Development at Statistics Finland’s Population Statistics Department, who compiled the report for EVA.
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The word allochtoon, literally meaning non-native, should no longer be applied to people born in the Netherlands, immigration minister Gerd Leers told a meeting on Monday night, according to the Telegraaf.
'I want people born in the Netherlands to be called Dutch, plain and simple, not non-native,' Leers told the readers of women's magazine Libelle.
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European countries could use a period of benign neglect of the Islam issue — but only after they finish incorporating religion into the national fabric. For too long, they have instead masked an absence of coherent integration policy under the cloak of “multiculturalism.” The state outsourced the hard work of integration to foreign diplomats and Islamist institutions — for example, some students in Germany read Saudi-supplied textbooks in Saudi-run institutions.
This neglect of integration helped an unregulated “underground Islam” to take hold in storefronts, basements and courtyards. It reflected wishful thinking about how long guest workers would stay and perpetuated a myth of eventual departure and repatriation.(source)
The government plans to launch an inquiry to study Swedish citizenship in hopes of finding ways to boost its value and use it as a tool for integration.
“When someone immigrates to our country, we want the signals to be clear – we want you to be a part of Sweden, find work quickly, and learn Swedish,” integration minister Erik Ullenhag wrote in an opinion piece in the Svenska Dagbladet (SvD) newspaper in which he outlined plans for the inquiry.
Foreigners seeking French nationality face tougher requirements as of January 1, when new rules drawn up by Interior Minister Claude Guéant come into force.
Candidates will be tested on French culture and history, and will have to prove their French language skills are equivalent to those of a 15-year-old mother tongue speaker. They will also be required to sign a new charter establishing their rights and responsibilities.
“Becoming French is not a mere administrative step. It is a decision that requires a lot of thought”, reads the charter, drafted by France’s High Council for Integration (HCI). In a more obscure passage, the charter suggests that by taking on French citizenship, “applicants will no longer be able to claim allegiance to another country while on French soil”, although dual
nationality will still be allowed.
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Sarkozy made the remarks while delivering a speech on Europe and the eurozone debt crisis in the southern French port city of Toulon, the same city where he spoke in 2008 about the global financial crisis and the need to "re-found global capitalism."
"A Europe that applies the principle of free movement internally and does not control its external borders cannot last. The Schengen must be rethought," Sarkozy said in the speech.
"We can not stand unlimited social immigrants," he said, stressing that "Europe needs more political responsibility."
Unfair competition caused by "social dumping and tax dumping between member states" could not continue, Sarkozy added, demanding immigrants to share the value of France for integration.(source)
Swedish society is failing its "immigrants", many of whom, such as football star Zlatan Ibrahimovic, are forced to look elsewhere to build successful careers, social commentator and author Tove Lifvendahl argues.
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British Muslims feel a greater sense of national pride than the average UK citizen, according to the results of a new poll.
While 79 per cent of the Britons quizzed said they agreed with the statement 'I am proud to be a British citizen', the figure rose to 83 per cent among Muslims.
And Muslim Britons were also found to be significantly more optimistic than most with just 31 per cent agreeing with the notion that Britain's best days are in the past compared to an average of 45 per cent.(source)
A writer who last month won the EU’s literature prize on behalf of the Netherlands has failed his citizenship test and now has to go through a complete integration course, NRC.next reports.
Rodaan Al Galidi came to the Netherlands in 1998 as a refugee from Iraq and was allowed to take the fast-track test to prove he had mastered all aspects of Dutch society.
European culture and Islamic culture have different ethos and both are bound to collide unless there is assimilation and compromise.
Anwar Shaheen of the University of Karachi’s Pakistan Study Centre said this here on Thursday on the second day of a two-day international conference on ‘Islam in Europe’ while speaking on the topic of hijab and burqa in Europe. The seminar was organised by KU’s Area Study Centre for Europe in association with the Hanns Seidel Foundation.
New arrivals to the Netherlands will be able to borrow up to €10,000 in a soft loan to pay for their compulsory integration (inburgering) course, the government has decided.
Immigrants will have up to three years to pass the course, which will include a centrally-organised examination, or lose their residency permit.(source)
Thousands of Turkish nationals are set to claim back the cost of integration courses from the Dutch state, now that the compulsory classes have been ruled illegal, the Financieele Dagblad reports on Tuesday.
Lawyer Bilal Coskun told the paper some 30,000 Turks have been forced to take the courses, many of them in Turkey itself.
He has now set up a foundation to represent them in claiming back an average €5,000 per person.
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