Integration Cannot Be Dictated from Above

The third of Germany's National Integration Summits has done little to close the gap between the government and the country's migrant population. Baha Güngör comments

It would be unfair to lay the blame for the enervating cacophony on integration at the door of the German government alone. Mistakes have been made on an almost regular basis by all the country's previous national and regional governments. Chancellor Angela Merkel and her Commissioner for Integration, Maria Böhmer, certainly deserve praise for at least attempting to enter into direct dialogue with representatives of migrant organisations.

But good intentions are not enough to achieve positive results. The most important insight to be made is that the year-old "National Integration Plan" and some 400 clear commitments and undertakings on all sides have not prompted the intended turning point – and are unlikely to do so for some time. Integration cannot be dictated from above. It has to be a conscious and internalised goal of all those involved and affected, working towards mutual coexistence free from tensions, despite religious and cultural differences.

Politicians and migrant organisations have called for a standing advisory board on migration issues where a permanent interchange and verification of ideas could take place, but this is not on Chancellor Merkel's agenda. She prefers the idea of "structured dialogue" – but has failed to lay out exactly who should be structuring what dialogue, and with whom.

Extreme bureaucratic hurdles

The extreme bureaucratic hurdles for German naturalisation put many prospective citizens off. And the lack of possibilities for participation in basic democratic decisions, such as the right to vote in local elections, hardly motivates migrants to feel at home in Germany and throw their fears of the majority society to the winds. Separate ethnic communities living in voluntary isolation are the logical consequence.

Even the very description that 15 million people living in Germany have a "background of migration" is contra-productive. Whether they hold German passports, as half of these people do, or not – the number of integrated individuals who no longer stand out on the street, and are becoming increasingly successful in Germany's society and business life, is far higher than the numbers in the problem groups regarded as impossible to integrate. The ethnic Turkish SPD politician Lale Akgün rightly calls for us to see all those who abide by German law and pay their taxes as integrated. These individuals should not be subjected to further inspection of what kind of music they listen to at home, which TV channels they watch, and which newspapers they read.

A ministry for integration is certainly a possibility. It could be run, for example, by the highly respected CDU politician Armin Laschet, who holds a similar office in Germany's largest federal state, North Rhine-Westphalia. The current situation, however, with Maria Böhmer as the country's integration commissioner with no direct powers remains a half-hearted solution. Moreover, the federal government will also have to face the question of whether the Integration Summit in the Chancellery and the German Islam Conference in the Interior Ministry, consisting partly of the same individuals and interest groups, are not proof of unproductive actionism rather than a targeted strategy.

Measuring integration in teaspoons

At the grassroots, the migrant associations and the countless municipal and local authority integration officers are hard at work, digging away with teaspoons at the layers of earth that have piled up over integration issues down the decades. Anyone who sincerely wants to reach the hearts and minds of those affected would do well to avoid the pomposity and popping of flashlights in Berlin, like at the Third Integration Summit last week (6 November 2008), and support local pro-integration activities and organisations on the ground.

Baha Güngör

Qantara.de

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