The Chronikler

Zero tolerance=zero difference

By Khaled Diab

Belgian media hysteria over crime and calls for zero-tolerance policing miss the real issue – social exclusion in the inner city.

16 February 2010

To the outside world, the scariest thing about Brussels is probably its bureaucracy. In Belgium, however, Brussels has something of a reputation for being an unsafe city where criminals of Moroccan and other immigrant extractions rule its mean streets and certain neighbourhoods are no-go areas not only for law-abiding citizens but also for the police.

Three recent incidents, including a dramatic one in which a police officer was shot with a Kalashnikov during a getaway after a thwarted armed robbery, have confirmed this perception in the minds of many.

The predictable media frenzy – with a tone that would be familiar to a British audience – about street crime and the need for "zero tolerance" followed hot on the heels of the tragic shooting, and voices of reason and nuance have been drowned out. The police even took to the streets to call for more resources and pay, as well as stiffer sentences and faster judicial procedures.

In addition to idle musings about who polices the police during such a protest (a friend suggested that perhaps anarchists and activist should get the chance to stand on the other side of the barricades), I wondered whether the Belgian capital's image is deserved and whether more draconian security measures are really the answer.

According to available statistics, Brussels has, by northern European standards, a high petty crime rate and it is top of the European league when it comes to domestic burglaries but is one of the safest capitals in the world – and possibly the safest in Europe – when it comes to violent crime, particularly murder. And despite the current media stampede, in the first half of 2009 Brussels registered the lowest crime rate in almost a decade.

Like many Brussels residents, my wife and I lived for years without problems beyond some minor annoyances, on the edge of what is regarded as one of the city's more dangerous neighbourhoods.

The public debate, carrying as it does racial and religious undertones, has not surprised locals in Brussels's problem areas but it has caused widespread disappointment. "The violence we hear about in the media is the exception and not the rule," Kamal, a 32-year-old Moroccan, told me. "With all this talk of zero tolerance, respect has reached zero level. We need a public debate, but one based on mutual respect and acceptance."

The sense of disillusionment is pervasive, especially in Kuregem, which is regularly portrayed as some kind of urban "war zone". Eric Gijssen, a video artist and social worker who has lived in Brussels for two decades and works with young people in Kuregem to help them find their voice through the medium of film, has noticed a growing apathy among his charges.

"The youth I work with and other locals are becoming increasingly apathetic," he said. This is a far cry from the active and engaged young people we met some years ago at the Alhambra centre who were keen to challenge stereotypes and misperceptions. "They no longer believe this will make a difference, and have turned their backs on the media to find their own information sources and forums online," Gijssen added.

While he acknowledges that there are plenty of problems, he finds that the sensation-seeking elements of the media and self-serving politicians are only making a delicate situation worse. "Instead of stigmatising entire communities, we must first of all engage with the youth and offer them alternative perspectives," he said.

Gijssen and others with grassroots experience see the fixation on security aspects of the Brussels question as short-sighted and even counterproductive. Instead of attacking the symptoms with a fist of steel, what is required is treatment of the root causes: poverty and social exclusion.

While it is not inevitable that poverty will lead to crime, ignoring the strong correlation between the two is disingenuous and an easy way for politicians and society to cop out of their responsibilities to create opportunities for the marginalised.

In Brussels, the contrast between wealth and poverty is extremely stark. As the country's main economic dynamo, Brussels has a per-capita GDP that is 233% that of the EU average! However, most of the wealth generated in the city is earned by people who live in its plusher suburbs or who commute there from other towns.

In contrast, inner-city Brussels, unlike most other capital cities, has the highest unemployment rate in the country (17.6%) and, according to Gijssen, in places like Kuregem, youth unemployment can be as high as 50%. Unsurprisingly, this chasm can often lead to feelings of resentment on one side of the wealth divide and fear on the other.

"In places like Kuregem, young people have very little or nothing, and not much of a future to look forward to," explains Gijssen. "One thing is essential: more investment."

But rather than investing more, the authorities have been siphoning off funds from community projects in Kuregem and other poorer neighbourhoods in Brussels and, at a time when everyone is feeling the pinch of the economic crisis, immigrant neighbourhoods have fallen off the political radar when it comes to employment and education.

"If jobs and other opportunities are found, then this security problem will vanish," Kamal told me. "We need to combat social exclusion through better socio-economic integration."

This column appeared in The Guardian Unlimited’s Comment is Free section on 8 February 2010. Read the related discussion.

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The mythical European Umma

Given that only about 4% of the EU's population is Muslim, why is the fear of a coming Eurabia so strong in certain quarters?

25 August 2009

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New model citizens

By Khaled Diab

Tougher naturalisation laws are counterproductive. What we need is to redefine our understanding of citizenship.

7 August 2009

The British government has unveiled tough new proposals to make it even harder for immigrants to gain citizenship. The measures range from the draconian – such as a ban on anti-war protests and testing people’s “integration” into the “British way of life” – to the more sensible, such as rewarding would-be citizens for their engagement in the democratic and civic life of the country.

But this new points-based system misses the point. If a government and society feel that the inflow of people is too high or unsustainable, they can reduce the number of immigrants entering their countries. Immigration can be made more difficult, but citizenship should be made easier.

Once people are resident in the country, they should have the right to become full members of the social compact between citizens and the government: people pay taxes and in return they have the right to choose the government and hold it to account. Expecting immigrants to pay but not play in this way is like the old-fashioned attitude to children: they should be seen but not heard.

It is also grossly unfair. Anyone living in a country for a number of years is affected by the decisions of the political apparatus. Depriving them of full citizenship also deprives them of their right to hold the government to account and to choose a government that defends their interests.

The inequity of the situation is made even worse when you consider that non-resident citizens are allowed, in many countries, to vote and shape the political landscape, but don’t live with the consequences – and often don’t even pay taxes in their home country. In fact, in countries with large communities abroad, the diaspora can be a major political force at home. There are even situations where people who have never lived in a country have more rights than those who have spent many years there.

With increasing levels of mobility around the world, we need to rethink and redefine our concepts of citizenship. Personally, I long for the day when supranational and international citizenship become the norm, and you pay taxes and vote where you happen to be living at the time. But that remains a distant and dim prospect.

It is sensible for countries to say that immigrants cannot apply for nationality until after a certain number of years living in the country (though this should not be set too high: four to five years perhaps) but they should reduce the number of bureaucratic hoops people have to jump through to become citizens. Belgium’s snel Belg wet is a good model in this regard: simple, straightforward procedures, no silly integration tests and no idiotic pledges of allegiance.

But residents who have not yet applied for nationality or, for whatever reason, do not wish to should have the right to vote in local and national elections. Likewise, citizens who have emigrated abroad or are living out of the country long term, especially if they are not paying taxes, should not have the right to vote.

Giving immigrants a voice in the affairs of state is not only good for them, it is also good for society. The elusive integration of immigrants everyone talks about is most likely to be achieved when they are made to feel they have a stake in society and can exercise their rights as active citizens.

We’ve come a long way from the exclusive origins of citizenship as being the free men of a city state. But we still have some way to go yet before our understanding of citizenship is truly inclusive.

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Integration and its discontents

By Khaled Diab

Are religious immigrants within their rights to boycott an 'unspeakable' integration course in Belgium?

February 2009

Experiencing some level of culture shock is part and parcel of moving to a new country. But for a group of recent immigrants to Belgium’s second city, Antwerp, the shock was so severe that they refused to continue their ‘integration’ lessons.

The reason for their outrage was the “unspeakable” nature of some of the content of their introduction to Belgian society: abortion, gay marriage, homosexuality, sex, etc. To top it all off, their horror was completed by the fact that their teacher was a woman.

The group and its religious leaders charge that the authorities are being insensitive to their religious sensibilities, while the government insists that if people are going to make the country their home, they need to learn about its values.

While it is Muslims who are at the centre of the ‘integration’ controversy in Europe, this particular case relates to Hasidic Jews. Following a letter from a group of Hasidic rabbis urging their followers not to move to Belgium until the offending content was removed from the integration courses, their followers already taking the courses have walked out of class.

In no mood to make exceptions, the Flemish minister of integration, Marino Keulen, has threatened to fine those who refuse to return. And the position of these orthodox Jews has caused unease among their secular coreligionists. “I think it’s ridiculous. These guys are living in another world and another time,” a Jew I know from Antwerp said. “They make no effort to get involved in society. They are even against Jews like me who are not conservative. They live in a ghetto.”

And therein lies the rub. How do you go about integrating a counter-cultural movement? Like similar fundamentalist religious sects in Islam and Christianity, the Hasidim were founded on the idea of abandoning mainstream society.

The movement, whose name derives from the Hebrew for ‘piety’, began in the 18^th century in Poland, Hungary and the Ukraine – and that is why their dress looks like a fossil from a disappeared eastern European world. In the early 20^th century, Hasidism, in the hands of the German Martin Buber, became more popular in western Europe as a ‘Jewish renaissance’. This was a direct reaction to the total assimilation of secular German Jews, and the power exerted on Jews to abandon their traditions and culture.

Of course, this kind of self-imposed ghettoisation is not what enriches a multicultural society, but society is also impoverished by excessive conformist pressures. As a secular liberal with progressive ideas, I find much of the worldview of extremists of any religious persuasion to be outdated, intolerant and reactionary – I also find their self-righteous rejection of the rest of us incredibly irritating. But their ideas will only change through dialogue not ostracisation.

Although I would love to live in a society where everyone was tolerant and enlightened, part of being open-minded is to believe in freedom of belief for everyone – as long as they don’t break the law. Of course, the dilemma is that extremists often do not believe in extending us liberals the same courtesy.

For years, I have had misgivings about this fixation on integration – and the full assimilation demanded by the far right. For instance, the extremist Vlaams Belang party – whose centre of gravity happens to be Antwerp – insists that immigrants must “adapt to our culture, our norms and values” and if they don’t, they should be deported. Aside from the absence of expletives, this echoes the “Oi Paki” brand of thugs who regularly invited the younger me to go back where I came from.

But what “norms and values” precisely? After all, many of the party’s own moral positions have far more in common with the conservative immigrants it vilifies than with the mainstream. For instance, the VB is against abortion and believes that homosexuals should stay out of the public sphere.

Of course, that doesn’t mean that assisting immigrants to adapt to their new homes is necessarily a bad thing. “I think integration courses are positive, as long as they guide newcomers and help them understand the system,” my Jewish friend noted.

I agree. Language and cultural courses can help new arrivals get their bearings more quickly. However, it is when they become an ideological weapon, rather than a practical tool, that problems arise.

For instance, the Netherlands actually demands that would-be immigrants sit an ‘integration test’ before they even set foot in the country, which Human Rights Watch describes as “discriminatory”.

Another challenge with such examinations is what exactly do you test for? In addition to language skills, the Dutch system tests the immigrant’s basic knowledge of Dutch society. But is it fair to expect immigrants to know what much of the indigenous population does not?

Many natives are not aware of, for example, the basic division of powers in a democracy nor the ministers in their governments. One hilarious example of this came from a politician. The former Belgian prime minister, Yves Leterme, was asked to sing the Belgian national anthem and instead launched into a rendition of the more memorable La Marseillaise from neighbouring France.

The true measure of ‘integration’ should be how well people respect their fellow citizens’ freedom, abide by a country’s laws and live as productive and useful members of society. What people believe and do in private, and how they dress is their own business.

This column appeared in The Guardian Unlimited’s Comment is Free section on 10 February 2009. Read the related discussion.

This is an archive piece that was migrated to this website from Diabolic Digest

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