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Divergent Trajectories Islam and Ethnicity in Switzerland

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Divergent Trajectories Islam and Ethnicity in Switzerland I S I M NEWSLETTER 6 / 0 0 Regional Issues 31 Western Europe PATRICK HAENNI Divergent Trajectories The relations between Islamic revival and ethnic alle- giances are all too often presented as being in oppo- sition. Islamic identity Ð and this dimension is very present in Islamic discourse Ð is by its very nature Islam and Ethnicity dedicated to transcending the centrifugal tenden- cies of ethnicity, of nationalism or of any form of seg- mentarism. In the face of ideological discourse, the social imaginaries of the interested parties are con- tradictory. Arab nationals in Switzerland affirm an in Switzerland engaged Muslim identity by a rejection of national and cultural ethnicities, while the Turks affirm their Muslim identity by borrowing the paths of ethnicity. chosen to play the card of the 'reborn Mus- These divergences from the trajectory of 'Islamiza- lim'. For these young people, it is not a ques- tion' have less to do with cultural differences be- tion of returning to the traditions of their tween places of origin than with forms of social parents, generally rejected for their old- change that have diversely affected these two popu- fashioned ways, nor is it a way to launch a lations of Muslim origin since their settling on Hel- community project. Neither the demand for, vetic territory. nor the offer of, Islam in the Arab-speaking Islamic groups in Switzerland is fundamen- In the framework of the Turkish immigrants, tally destined for 'separate development' the reference to Islam was imposed at two (even if certain tendencies of this sort do points in time. Firstly, by the establishment exist). All members of the Arab-speaking Is- of a fragmented network of mosques, in- lamic network insist upon the necessity of scribed in both community and religious participation in the Swiss social domain and strategies followed by small groups that upon cooperation with Swiss authorities. sought to preserve religious practices of the Thus the affirmation of an Islamic network Ð migrants' home community. Later on, the open to the host society and socially active network of Turkish mosques in Switzerland Ð is at the root of the decrease in traditional became politicized along ideological lines, social control. Islamization, advocating but ethnicity continued to play a determin- specificity by dialoguing with the host soci- Turkish mosque ing role. In the 1970s, while immigration ety, and individualization are not conflict- in Lausanne. was essentially a male phenomenon not in- ing. In this case, they mutually reinforce one tended to become a permanent situation in a n o t h e r . Switzerland, religious practice did not mat- the community, far from the universalism Arabs Islam in Switzerland ter much. It was simply placed aside while displayed by their Arab co-religionists (to Arab Islamic institutions emerged in The forms of Islamization amongst the the immigrants awaited their return home. be dealt with further on). This was to Switzerland from 1960-1970. Two dynamics, populations of Muslim origin in Switzerland Religious association, not hegemonic in the change at the end of the 1980s. From then one political, the other social, contributed are thus diverse Ð this is no surprise Ð but least, served as a space for remembering on, the substance which brought them to- to this: in the first place, Islam in French- the interest lies less in plural Islam than in one's origins (the religious space coexisting gether was to fall prey to a double dynamic speaking Switzerland initially developed in the syncretisms that the unique situation (of with friendships, sporting associations, of politization and fragmentation. With the the wake of conflicts that formed the Arab ethnic heterogeneity under the Islamic ref- game rooms, and cafés), destined to facili- population increasing, political and reli- political landscape. Saïd Ramadan, son of erence, while spatial differences are abol- tate the return of an immigrant population. gious networks lost no time in implanting Hassan Al-Banna, founder of the Muslim ished) risks engendering. Islam in Europe is In the 1980s, the Islamic reference progres- themselves in this population fully in the Brothers, created the first Islamic centre in confronted with the challenge of internal di- sively acquired greater status as the plans process of establishment. This continued 1961 in Geneva, fleeing from repression in versity (and not so much with seculariza- to return became increasingly illusory. This until the Turkish community stabilized its Egypt. When relations deteriorated be- tion), that is to say with intra-religious multi- was due to, on the one hand, the political core, having reproduced itself within the tween the Muslim Brothers and the Saudis culturalism amongst ethnic or national and economic hardship in their country of main lines of the ideological spectre of the in the 1970s, Saudi Arabia founded its own communities placed in contact by their mi- origin and, on the other hand, the arrival of political and/or religious field of their coun- mosque in Geneva. The polarization be- gratory experience. After 30 years of main- families and the entirely Swiss education of try of origin. In Zurich, the immigrant asso- tween official and unofficial religious insti- taining particularisms, that ideological una- their children (the second generation). The ciations were to either join up with partisan tutions which, until the present, remain a nimism will manage to impose a vision of mosque, having been a place of remem- or religious networks, or be directly put in central point of conflict of the political sys- Islam that is both particularist and homoge- brance of ethnicity and a functional space place by militant immigrants. Zurich was tems in the Arab world, reproduced them- nous is highly unlikely. ◆ for 'preventative asocialization' (Dassetto) thus to witness the emergence of 'indepen- selves in the crucible of Arab Islam in for the first immigrant men awaiting their dent associations'. With the creation of Milli Switzerland. The dynamic of Islamization return home, became in the 1980s a protec- Görush (European wing of the Islamist Party amongst Arab immigrants did not take the tive structure, as much for regrouping fami- of the Prosperity of Islamist Obedience) in same path as that of Turkish populations. In lies as for preserving the identity of the sec- 1973 in Germany, some associations were the Arab-speaking community, there exists B i b l i o g r a p h y ond-generation immigrants heavily ex- to re-attach to this organization. Soon after, a direct constitution of a religious field rela- Ð Bamba, A. (1992), 'L'islam en Suisse et à Genève', posed to the host society. The reproduction the Dyanet, State Ministry of Religious Af- tively unified both ideologically and in post-graduate thesis, Institut Universitaire d'Études of cultural and social identity of the group fairs, with its imams and places of worship, terms of identity, and in clear opposition en Développement, Geneva. thus became the principal function of the appeared on the Swiss scene. The fragmen- with the pre-migratory heritage and identi- Ð Basset, Jean-Claude (1989), 'Le croissant au pays de mosques. The pennants of the football tation was not to stop at this bi-polarity of ty. Contrary to the situation amongst the le croix fédérale. Musulmans et chrétiens en Suisse', team in the cafeteria of in the place of state Islam / Islam of opposition. Contrary to populations of Turkish origin, the Arab na- Islamochristiana 15. prayer, posters of the regions of origin, and what was occurring in French-speaking tionals experienced a rapid alteration of Ð Baumann C.P.& Jäggi (1991), Muslime unter uns. the systematic presence of a parabolic an- Switzerland, the fragmentation was then to their pre-migratory social structures. This Islam in der Schweiz, Luzern: Rex Verlag. tenna, all demonstrate the strength of par- continue simultaneously along religious occurred as part of the process of individual Ð Haenni, Patrick (1994), 'Dynamiques sociales et ticularistic identities and allegiances. Turk- and political lines. The Nurcu movement assimilation. By tradition, however, parents rapport à l'Etat. L'institutionnalisation de l'Islam en ish Islam from 1970-1980 was an Islam of (see p. 7 of this N e w s l e t t e r, Yavuz), known as still endeavour to prevent their children Suisse', Revue européenne des migrations an ideological 'think-tank' of Rifah, was to from marrying Swiss partners, although the internationales 10. Islam in Switzerland: a few statistics leave the Milli Görush, for its ideology was notion of free choice, having been assimilat- Ð Idem (1995), 'Les déterminants anthropologiques de In a 1980 census, the population of Muslim origin in Switzer- too dogmatic in their eyes. The Suleyman- ed by that generation, means that the fami- la réislamisation en Suisse', Lausanne, unpublished. land had tripled within 10 years, passing from 17,000 to 56,000 cies, a third important network in Turkish ly directives are not accepted without con- Ð Idem (December 1995), 'Musulmans de Suisse et persons. In the 1980s, nationals of Muslim origin continue to Islam both in Turkey and elsewhere in Eu- testation. Many young people have opted Religion. D'un islam à l'autre', Cahiers d'histoire et de flow in at the same rate as in the 1960s: 157,000 people af- rope, proposing a popular Sufism, was also for individual integration in the host society science des religions 4. firmed their membership to Islam in the national census, which to secede, just as the Grey Wolves, an ultra- either parallel to, or as a substitute for, fam- Ð Waardenburg, Jacques (1995), 'Muslims as means 2.1% of the entire population. By 1996 Switzerland nationalist political party which already in ily ties.
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