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European Islam Challenges for Public Policy and Society

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European Islam Challenges for Public Policy and Society EUROPEAN ISLAM CHALLENGES FOR PUBLIC POLICY AND SOCIETY SAMIR AMGHAR, AMEL BOUBEKEUR, MICHAEL EMERSON (EDITORS) CHRIS ALLEN, VALERIE AMIRAUX, TUFYAL CHOUDHURY, BERNARD GODARD, IMANE KARICH, ISABELLE RIGONI OLIVIER ROY AND SARA SILVESTRI CENTRE FOR EUROPEAN POLICY STUDIES BRUSSELS The Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS) is an independent policy research institute based in Brussels. Its mission is to produce sound analytical research leading to constructive solutions to the challenges facing Europe today. The views expressed in this report are those of the authors writing in a personal capacity and do not necessarily reflect those of CEPS or any other institution with which the authors are associated. This study was carried out in the context of the broader work programme of CEPS on European Neighbourhood Policy, and is generously supported by the Compagnia di San Paolo and the Open Society Institute. The project was initiated at a conference held in Sofia in November 2006, sponsored under International Policy Fellowship programme of the Open Society Institute. Cover photograph: Stockholm Great Mosque ISBN 13: 978-92-9079-710-4 © Copyright 2007, Centre for European Policy Studies. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means – electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise – without the prior permission of the Centre for European Policy Studies. Centre for European Policy Studies Place du Congrès 1, B-1000 Brussels Tel: 32 (0) 2 229.39.11 Fax: 32 (0) 2 219.41.51 e-mail: [email protected] internet: http://www.ceps.eu CONTENTS 1. Introduction........................................................................................................ 1 Samir Amghar, Amel Boubekeur and Michael Emerson Part A – Ideologies and Movements 2. Political Islam in Europe ................................................................................ 14 Amel Boubekeur 3. Salafism and Radicalisation of Young European Muslims ....................... 38 Samir Amghar 4. Islamic Terrorist Radicalisation in Europe .................................................. 52 Olivier Roy Part B – Status and Discrimination 5. Economic Development of Muslim Communities ..................................... 62 Imane Karich 6. Muslims and Discrimination ......................................................................... 77 Tufyal Choudhury 7. Access to Media for European Muslims..................................................... 107 Isabelle Rigoni 8. The Headscarf Question: What is really the issue?................................... 124 Valérie Amiraux 9. Islamophobia and its Consequences........................................................... 144 Chris Allen Part C – Institutionalisation 10. Muslim Institutions and Political Mobilisation....................................... 169 Sara Silvestri 11. Official Recognition of Islam...................................................................... 183 Bernard Godard References and Further Reading ..................................................................... 204 About the Authors............................................................................................. 225 1. INTRODUCTION SAMIR AMGHAR, AMEL BOUBEKEUR AND MICHAEL EMERSON The 15 million Muslims now living in the European Union, representing 3% of the total population, constitute the largest minority religion in the region and also the biggest Islamic diaspora in the world.1 Seven countries stand out for the size of their Muslim populations – France, Germany, Belgium, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Greece and Bulgaria – where they account for between 3% and 13% of the total populations.2 In the three Nordic EU member states (Denmark, Finland and Sweden), around 1% of the population is Muslim. To the south, Italy and Spain have been prime destinations for new flows of immigration since the 1990s and have the same proportion of Muslims. And certain countries in the Balkans (Albania, Bosnia, Macedonia...) have long-established if not predominant Muslim populations, which are the legacy of an Islamisation process that began in the 15th century with the expansion of the Ottoman Empire. In Western Europe, the presence of Islam is mainly the consequence of significant migratory flows in the 1960s from countries of former colonial empires (the Maghreb, sub-Saharan Africa and the Indian sub-continent), but also from Turkey. The arrival of Muslims was the result of organised immigration between the countries of origin and European countries in 1 These figures are a rough estimate, referring to all Muslim cultures; they are not intended to represent religious practice. 2 In some European capitals, like Brussels, the proportion of Muslims can reach 17%. See C. Torrekens (2006), ”La gestion locale de l’Islam dans l’espace public bruxellois”, Les cahiers de la sécurité, No. 62, 3rd trimester, pp. 139-160 (available at http://www.inhes.interieur.gouv.fr/fichiers/RECH_62CSIinternet.pdf). | 1 2 | BOUBEKEUR, EMERSON & AMGHAR order to meet the needs of the latter for manual labour.3 At the end of the 1960s, this immigration was still widely perceived as temporary. Hanging onto the myth of ‘the return’, the Turkish, Maghreb or Pakistani immigrant intended to stay in Europe only for the duration of his work contract, and then return home. For this reason, government authorities in the host countries never devised public policies on Islamic issues or their Muslim communities in a structured or nationwide manner. From the mid-1980s onwards, however, the Muslim populations progressively gave up the idea of returning home and decided to stay in Europe permanently. Gradually, there was a settling on the part of the worker who, having brought his family over from the country of origin, no longer considered himself as a traveller in transit. The signs of this putting down roots became more visible as workers’ children were sent to European schools, and places of worship appeared. While practically non- existent in Europe in the 1970s, the number of mosques multiplied rapidly, reaching over 6,000 by the end of the 1990s, and this under the impetus of the first generation of Muslims.4 Closely linked to their countries of origin, this first generation of immigrants developed a community-minded sense of religion, based on the organisation of worship in their countries of origin. The new mosques of Europe remained tied to these countries (notably Algeria, Morocco and Turkey), which financed them and sent their own imams to manage them. Despite the fact that the first generations were still linked to their countries of origin, there was nonetheless a profound Europeanisation of Islam already taking place, largely due to the younger generations born and educated in Europe. Although they were practising Muslims and came from a Muslim culture, members of this new generation severed their identification of Islam with their parents’ country of origin, and increasingly thought of themselves as French, British, German or Belgian. This re-conceptualisation of Islam coincided with the emergence of claims to equality of treatment with their fellow citizens of European origin. 3Agreements of this type were signed, for example, by France with Algeria (in 1968), Morocco and Tunisia (in 1963) and by Belgium with Turkey (in 1961), Morocco (in 1963) and Tunisia (in 1965). 4 Jocelyne Cesari, Sakina Bargach and Damian Moore (2002), «L’islamismation de l’espace public français: vers la fin des conflits», Les Cahiers du Cemoti, No. 33. INTRODUCTION| 3 Struggles against all forms of racial or religious discrimination took shape within the framework of a ‘citizenisation’ of the Muslim population. For example, as early as 1983, a huge march was organised in Paris by SOS Racism, bringing together nearly 1 million people, mainly from Muslim immigrant communities. They advocated taking part in the political, economic and social life of the host country, by voting and other means. This discourse was also taken up by Islamic religious organisations which, while calling for European Muslims to strengthen their ties with Islam, also invited them to consider themselves as full citizens. Muslim associations encouraged young Muslims to vote and become integrated in the local culture.5 These demands, based on a European and Islamic citizenship, obliged European policy-makers to no longer consider Islam as a migratory phenomenon, but as an integral and lasting part of the political, social and economic landscape in Europe. This tendency towards thinking of Islam as fitting into an endogenous integration process, however, began to be undermined and contradicted by the growing tensions linked to what we might call an ‘Islam in crisis’, highlighted dramatically by the rise in radical Islam, the headscarf controversy and the terrorist acts from 11 September 2001 in New York and Washington to Madrid in 2004 and London in 2005. From the migratory context of the 1970s, policies based on the presence of Muslims have now come to be focused on problems of security and the fight against terrorism. Other conspicuous affairs linked to Islam (e.g. Salman Rushdie’s publication of the Satanic Verses in 1989 or the Danish caricatures of the Prophet in 2006, not to mention the inflammatory declarations of various imams) have also, since the 1990s, fed a political perception of an ‘Islam in crisis’, despite its being far-removed from the daily preoccupations of most of the Muslim populations
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