The Rise of the Right: Europe's Scary Solution to Immigration

By Handan T. Satiroglu, The Women's International Perspective. Posted January 29, 2009.

Indeed, the sheer number of Muslim immigrants sheds some light on the newfound fear of the "bewildering Islamic cacophony," as Johann Hari in a Dissent magazine article sardonically put it. By varying estimates, the European Union is now home to 15-20 million Muslims, with France hosting the largest number. Annually, half a million migrants flood the gates of Europe in search of work and an additional 400,000 seek asylum, many of whom are from the Middle East. Added to this mix, is the influx of between 120,000 to 500,000 undocumented immigrants.

High immigration from Muslim nations, combined with fertility advantages, means that ethnic Europeans might lose their demographic counterpoise: a fact that touches a raw nerve with many. For almost a generation now, Europe's birthrates have dipped far below the replacement level. According to 2005 statistics collected by the European Union, for instance, 30 percent of German women are childless, with the number rising to 40 percent among more educated women. With a Muslim population that is expected to grow to 40-50 million by 2050, the populations of major European cities would be half non-native within two generations.

Seizing on these numbers, Bernard Lewis, a leading historian on Islam, argues that Europe would complete its transformation into "Eurabia" by the end of the 21st century. Italy's flamboyant and controversial journalist Oriana Fallaci once lamented that their province was falling prey to ‘a colony of Islam' -- whereby a sense of surrender of fundamental European values such as freedom of expression and democracy were being felt.

The sense that Europe is under siege is further heightened by concerns over the welfare system being overtaxed by non-natives. American Bruce Bawer gave voice to these concerns in his book While Europe Slept, using statistics primarily from Nordic countries to highlight the issue of welfare dependency. In Denmark, for instance, he writes that immigrants from the Middle East "make up 5 percent of the population but receive 40 percent of welfare outlays" -- among them public assistance, unemployment benefits, relief payments, child benefits, disability, cash support, and rent allowance. Statistics for other countries are comparable.

According to Bawer, about 15 percent of the Moroccan émigrés in Norway are on a disability plan when a quarter of them have actually returned to their own country. The Frisch Center for Socio-economic Research study, supported by the University of Oslo, also claims that as many as 50 percent of immigrants are "caught up in various forms of welfare benefits." Further south in the Netherlands, rising unemployment rates have left 33 percent of the foreign-born population out of the labor market -- and thus dependent on the welfare system, while unemployed Belgians and migrants have found themselves competing for the lower-end subsidized housing market. Pressure from national authorities to use objective criteria when placing individuals in government housing has meant that migrants, due in part to their larger families, lower wages and high unemployment rates, tend to qualify for housing before Belgians.

Unsurprisingly then, unemployment, insecurity and concerns about welfare burdens have been the vote-winning themes for the extreme right on the continent. But clearly this is not the full picture; to some extent an extreme right vote is also a vote against elitist sentiments long perceived to be out of touch with the concerns of everyday folks. It is a desperate call for nation-building, leadership, and identity preservation as an overcrowded, embedded and burdened continent struggles to absorb waves of newcomers.

"Multiculturalism has, in practice, been a dismal failure," says Esman. Indeed, the integration of Europe's new arrivals from non-Western cultures stands out as one of the greatest challenges facing European governments in contemporary times -- a challenge that a growing body of citizens feel mainstream parties have not dealt with effectively. And insofar as left or centrist governments do not debate the limits and/or confines of multiculturalism, or take measures to fully integrate non-Western cultures into the 'European identity' to become fully at home in their host countries, we can expect individuals of all persuasions to flock to the far-right (whom they perceive as having "commonsensical" approaches to these issues.)

Though I don't personally believe the far-right is a panacea to the continent's woes, I do believe the time has come for a new kind of politics, not necessarily far-left or far-right, but politics that genuinely represent the interests and concerns of citizens; politics that make the diversity of Europe work. Until then, Europe can expect votes for the radical right to come from the right and the left, the young and the old, the marginalized and privileged, the integrated and the alienated, the urban and the suburban for years to come. It is a phenomenon leftist or centrist parties can no longer ignore.

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