[LiC] Can there be a Canadian Fortuyn?

[rfmcdonald]

Last weekend, the Toronto Star featured Andrew Duffy's article "The Dutch transformation," examining the Netherlands' recent seismic shift from a multicultural and pro-immigration set of national policies to a strongly assimilationist and anti-immigration set. Duffy concludes that the transition, highlighted by the rise and assassination of populist politician Pim Fortuyn, was precipitated by the apparent failure of the previous multicultural and pro-immigration policies compounded by the initial assumptions behind the Netherlands' recruitment of guest workers:

The assumption that guest workers would leave Holland persisted even when their families began to arrive. Their children were encouraged to attend primary schools in their first languages with Dutch authorities believing this would make their eventual re-integration that much smoother.

It wasn't until the 1980s that the government came to understand that most migrant workers had no intention of leaving. That realization coincided with shifts in the Dutch economy that eliminated thousands of low-skilled jobs.

The Dutch government responded with the liberal-minded Ethnic Minorities Policy that promoted multiculturalism, equal opportunity and social justice. Multiculturalism — and its belief that immigrants can successfully participate in society while retaining their cultural identities — seemed a natural fit for Holland, a country with a history of supporting the rights of religious minorities.

Subsidies were offered to ethnic organizations, trade unions, newspapers and schools. Generous education grants — almost twice the per-pupil grant for Dutch-born children — were given to minority children in an attempt to bring them up to speed academically with their Dutch counterparts. And a special law was introduced in 1993, modelled on Canada's Employment Equity Act, that required large employers to report publicly on the number of ethnic minorities in their workforces.

The openness of Dutch society sped the flow of newcomers and refugees into the country, with migration peaking in the early 1990s. The newer influx drove unemployment among immigrants still higher, and despite all of the government's efforts, the social and economic situation of minorities remained poor, says Han Entzinger, a professor of migration and integration studies at Erasmus University in Rotterdam.

It was at about this time, he says, that "doubts began to develop about the effectiveness of facilitating immigrant cultures and of creating separate provisions for them."

Those doubts, however, were not discussed in public until 2000 when Paul Scheffer, an author and historian, published an essay, ``The Multicultural Tragedy,'' in one of Holland's major newspapers.

For Scheffer, the multicultural tragedy involved the rise of an "ethnic underclass" detached from Dutch culture and society. He argued that the insularity of immigrants, particularly Muslims, would eventually undermine Holland's liberalism and social cohesion.

"I think our idea of tolerance was basically an attitude of indifference," he wrote. Scheffer called for intensive integration programs that stressed Dutch culture, history and liberal democratic principles.

Duffy ends his survey of the Netherlands' situation by raising the question of whether a comparable backlash could happen in Canada:

[S]ome observers contend it is only a matter of time before a charismatic figure such as Fortuyn arrives on the Canadian scene and stirs debate about immigration, multiculturalism and integration.

University of Toronto's Jeffrey Reitz believes it is possible. He argues that Canada has not yet suffered the kind of backlash experienced in Holland because of the overall economic success of immigrants in this country. That success, he argues, is a product of a strong education system and Canadian immigration policy, which has actively sought skilled newcomers while helping them adjust to the country.

[. . .]

But the economic prospects of immigrants have suffered badly during the past decade, he says, making the future social climate less certain.

"When you have a welfare state, it's important that immigrants are not seen as a burden," says Reitz, director of ethnic, immigration and pluralism studies at U of T. "Canadian politicians have convinced people that is not the case here. But I think there's an underlying problem waiting to happen because of rising poverty rates and employment problems among immigrants."

Although Canada has yet to produce a politician like Fortuyn, someone aggressively anti-immigrant, that kind of sentiment can be overheard in pubs and other places where people gather, says Reitz.

"I think the potential is there for a backlash — and it could happen quickly. It might not happen, but it could."

As the Economist noted, the treatment of problems surrounding immigration have been compounded by the popular equation of immigrants with Islam, and the conflation of Islam generally with a number of highly visible and exceptionally reactionary mosques, as Expatica reported back in April:

The Dutch Parliament is to hold an emergency debate about the El Tawheed mosque next week. MPs want Justice Minister Piet Hein Donner and Immigration and Integration Minister Rita Verdonk to explain what they intend to do about the book "De weg van de moslim".

The publication — translated as The Way of the Muslim in English — is said to advocate violence against women and killing gay people.

Gay people should be thrown head first off high buildings. If not killed on hitting the ground, they should then be stoned to death, the book allegedly suggests.

[. . .]

MPs and media commentators attacked the Amsterdam mosque previously when one of the imams referred to non-Muslims as "firewood for hell". He also forbade Islamic women from leaving the family home without the permission of their husbands.

RTL Television reported on Thursday a cameraman was assaulted when a news team attempted to buy "The Way of the Muslim" at the mosque.

Eventually RTL's female reporter managed to buy the book, albeit while accompanied by police protection.

As in Canada, immigration in the Netherlands is an urban phenomenon, concentrated in the highly urbanized and developed west of the country. This high visibility, along with the well-documented phenomenon of "white flight," has produced large ethnic enclaves in many of the Netherlands' largest city and produced fears of a takeover of the country by reactionary Muslims. This is an ill-founded assumption, as Afghan Voice observed back in April, but it remais a potent fear.

I don't think that there's as many grounds to fear a Dutch-style backlash against immigration as Reitz thinks, since Canadian immigration flows are more ethnically and religiously diverse than the Netherlands, and Canada's federal political structure--particularly the diffusion of many aspects of immigration policy to the provinces, makes a backlash logistically more difficult. Still, it's an eventuality that should be considered as a possibility.