Attempts at assimilation can lead to more discrimination

By Tomi Ervamaa
     
      Everyone behaved very well. Nobody even gave a suspicious stare. Nevertheless, the atmosphere was icy.
      Just over a year ago I was sitting in a cafe in Les Mureaux, one of the Paris suburbs with a large immigrant population. I was speaking with Omar, who was Algerian-born.
      He did not mince his words.
      "I don't like to live here. I never have. There are two worlds in France - or one world split in two", Omar said, and left.
      For an outsider, being there felt like being a pig in a mosque.
      A few blocks away was the world where people like me had absolutely no business at all: young men standing on the street corners with nothing to do - at least ostensibly.
      They were on their own turf.
     
A couple of days later I was in London. Again, another world. A mosque in Central London was so full of people for Friday prayers that there was a mountain of shoes in the corridor.
      The Imam, with a Bangladeshi background, spoke more openly and freely than would have been possible in Paris.
      Nevertheless, the Imam had plenty of negative things to say about British society.
     
I went back home. A couple of weeks later, and a hard-line Muslim murdered film director Theo van Gogh in The Netherlands. Riots broke out, mosques were burned, and churches were vandalised.
      The harmonious facade of the liberal idyllic country appeared to suddenly collapse like a poorly-made stage prop, the construction of which had involved shoddy workmanship from the very beginning.
      At least there has been no rioting in Finland. Except for Kajaani - almost.
      Last summer local yobbos appeared to react to the frustrations of their shabby lives by harassing immigrants.
      In Helsinki, meanwhile, it was noticed that some - very few - young people with Somali backgrounds had been brutally mugging other young people.
     
Millions of immigrants have entered Europe in recent decades. More are certain to come in the future: many more.
      Attitudes toward them vary in different countries, and the atmosphere varies from one society to another, as if the societies were on different continents.
      This has made for plenty of work for the social scientists. They have listed different attitudes that society can take toward its immigrants, drawing up the following four models:
      Assimilation, in which immigrants are expected to blend into society linguistically, culturally, and socially. This is the French model.
      Integration means that immigrants are expected to go to school and work, and take part in social activities just like everyone else, while maintaining their own language and culture. This seems to be the way of thinking that prevails in Finland, for instance.
      Multiculturalism has long been a key buzzword. It means giving space for the lifestyles and identities of different groups. Immigrants join society through their own communities. This has been the policy in Canada, Britain, The Netherlands, and Sweden in the 1980s.
      Then there is Segregation, in which it is accepted that ethnic and cultural communities live separate lives from each other and the rest of society. In the view of some researchers, this has been reality in the Chinese communities of US cities, and others see this in parts of Germany as well.
     
This is not the only possible classification. Karmela Liebkind, Professor of Social Psychology at the University of Helsinki, has a different approach. She quotes Canadian researcher Richard Bourhis:
      "There are public values, that everyone has to adopt. They are written into laws - concerning what is a crime, for instance, and what is not. Then there are private values, which the state does not interfere with - on how people dress, what they eat, what language they speak, and so on."
      Liebkind sees France as a good example of a country that wants to assimilate immigrants.
      "There, society does not just define public values - it also wants to influence private values."
      "A standard is created: how to dress, what language to speak. No support is given to the multiculturalism of the different groups, and there are no collective rights to multiculturalism."
      Individuality is respected, but everyone is expected to be sufficiently French as individuals.
      At worst, the policy of assimilation can lead to a completely opposite result from what was intended.
      "If assimilation is promoted enthusiastically, immigrant groups that would like to be part of society, while at the same time trying to preserve their culture, will feel threatened. Then they will easily want to protect themselves against assimilation pressures by becoming isolated, and turning their backs on society."
      There is marginalisation. Especially some of the young people can become interested in political extremism, and radical Islam, for instance.
     
What about The Netherlands? If assimilation is a way of thinking that has failed in France, is multiculturalism turning out to be impossible in The Netherlands, after an extremist stabbed van Gogh, and other idiots set fire to the shrines of other religions?
      Liebkind says that the Dutch have not actually followed the multicultural ideas officially promoted by their country. Instead, she says that attitudes toward immigrants are largely the same as in Britain.
      But isn't Britain one of the great fortresses of multiculturalism?
      Not really, in Liebkind's view. Instead, she speaks quite warmly about Canada.
      "There is a vast difference between Britain and Canada. In Britain, multiculturalism is not a public value, but it is also not denied. The civic society is left on its own to deal with the issues: if some group wants to offer education in its own language, it is allowed to do so, with its own money. Each group is allowed to arrange its affairs as it pleases.
      In Canada, meanwhile, multiculturalism is a public, and even an official value, and the requirement of tolerance is imposed. "This applies to everyone in society: everyone - including immigrants - is expected to show tolerance toward other cultures and toward those who are different."
      Canada also supports different cultures by granting money to groups that represent them.
     
So where does Finland fit in?
      It varies.
      The ideal of multiculturalism is reflected in Finnish legislation. There is a minority ombudsman, and a discrimination complaints board. Public funding is given to help preserve the different cultures, education is organised, and people are offered career counselling.
      "However, the obligation of tolerance has not been defined as a common value for all, as has been the case in Canada", Liebkind points out.
     
There are also differences from one Finnish local authority to another. Some municipalities have special integration programmes for immigrants, while others do not.
      Increasingly in ordinary life, situations come up where it is necessary to decide where lines should be drawn.
      "We must not be tolerant of intolerance. That is where the line is drawn", Liebkind says.
      "It must be just as unacceptable to beat a wife black and blue every Saturday, whether or not it is part of Finnish or African culture."
      Liebkind takes another example from Canada. She quotes John Berry, an expert on psychological interaction between cultures.
      "If the parents of a Muslim girl say that the girl must not go to a public swimming pool with a male physical education teacher, it is the obligation of the school to provide a woman teacher. If the parents demand that the woman teacher must be a Muslim herself, they are going too far."
     
Liebkind agrees with Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a Somali-born Dutch Member of Parliament.
      "In Europe we have an atmosphere of political correctness. Tolerance toward immigrants is emphasised so much that their obligations are easily forgotten. This means that intolerance is permitted in the name of tolerance", Liebkind says.
      If tolerance is not demanded of the minorities, backlash is sure to emerge sooner or later.
      If issues are hushed up, there is no point in being surprised if a party of the far right wins an election, or someone like Tony Halme grabs votes in East Helsinki.
     
On the other hand, prejudices run deep in the majority population.
      When the children and grandchildren of first-generation immigrants have grown up in, say, the Paris suburbs, they might realise that they still cannot get a job even though they speak perfect French.
      How genuine has France's assimilation ideal actually been?
      Liebkind is in favour of attitude education also - and especially - in Finland. She adds that it is very difficult.
      Naturally it is clear that only a small proportion of young people with a Somali background in Finland are criminals, but does this really enter the popular consciousness?
      "What makes these things so hopelessly difficult is that people also have subconscious prejudices, which they get with their mothers' milk. They are part of the culture. [Former Lutheran Archbishop] John Vikström said it well: culture is like the water in which a fish swims.
      Fish have no idea of water.
      Even a person who is "culturally aware" can live like a pike.
      "A person who sees himself as open-minded and tolerant, and progressive, and humanistic, and so on, would prefer to die rather than admit to having prejudices", Liebkind says with a laugh.
      So education has a long way to go.
     
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 5.11.2005  


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Helsinki officials and Somali community groups ponder youth crime issue (10.10.2005)
  City of Kajaani to root out racism and prevent further outrages (10.10.2005)
  Police arrest main suspects of stabbing in Helsinki (4.10.2005)
  Several violent robberies in downtown Helsinki (9.9.2005)
  Kajaani Finland´s most racist city, statistics reveal (3.8.2005)
  "We Somalis must do more to adapt to Finnish society" (25.10.2005)
  COMMENTARY: Not so very far from Melilla to the Helsinki suburbs (11.10.2005)
  Helsinki youth with Somali backgrounds tired of constant suspicion (4.10.2005)
  Publisher says "technical error" led to omission of part of Ayaan Hirsi Ali book critical of Islam (19.9.2005)