Tuesday, April 06, 2010

“Multikulti Has Failed”

JLH has translated an article about the failure of Germany to integrate its immigrants. Coming from the MSM, this amazing to see. Five years ago the Berlin Kurier would not have allowed such words — e.g. “Multikulti has failed” — to be published in its pages. The political winds seem to be shifting.

The translator includes this note:

One of the most significant things about this story is that the speaker is a Social Democrat.

The brief description of what makes the USA successful at integrating while others are not, should be painted in big, red letters the length of Pennsylvania Avenue to remind America’s leaders how their society was built.

The translation from the Berlin Kurier (as republished in Austria):

“Integration Is Hard Work — for Everybody”

Heinz Buschkowsky — the first SPD member to say, “Multikulti has failed” — talks about the bursting of the red-green dream.

“The question is whether Neukölln [Berlin] in the future will lie only geographically in the middle of Europe, or also in the hearts and minds of people,” says Heinz Buschkowsky, district mayor of Neukölln, in a talk with the Kurier. Germany’s most experienced immigration politician is referring to those people “who come from rural areas of Pakistan, southeast Anatolia, or Somalia, i.e., from another stage of civilization, where women are genitally mutilated, adultery is punished by public stoning, and children are raised collectively.” Suddenly, these people find themselves in a value system that requires completely different competences, formulates different duties, and makes new demands.”

For instance, that children come to school on time and have certain basic skills: “On the first day of school, some have never seen colored paper or clay, some cannot hold scissors or eat with a knife and fork. The language is often just street German — ‘I go school’ — or not spoken at all. We should not stand by while children from this uneducated milieu become clones of their parents.”

162 nationalities live in Neukölln. He is especially concerned about those who live in closed cultural circles, completely self-contained islands, parallel societies. Their infrastructure offers problem-free everyday life in their native language — an “inner integration” including their own judges and enforcers.

Some Arabic and Kurdish extended families are like “circled wagon trains.” “Frequently, organized crime is active where enforcement of national norms can be dangerous. Respect for civic order is not strongly developed there,” the district chief euphemistically describes what appears daily in the newspapers.

Buschkowsky is well acquainted with other countries who have many immigrants. He quotes the Dutch author, Leon de Winter. “A welfare state of the European type can never be a good integrator. People may see the USA as cold and inhuman, but their integration policy is more successful. They force people to participate, to rely on their skills and take responsibility for their lives. So long as there is an enormous wealth gap in the world, the poverty-stricken will migrate.”

Incentives
- - - - - - - - -
Buschkowsky also knows why Germany is most attractive. “Naturally, the most comfortable welfare system exerts the most attraction. The anonymity of our dense population centers offers protection. Neukölln is bigger than Graz or an individual city in the Ruhr. It is easy to disappear into the crowd.”

16 million immigrants make Germany the second biggest immigration destination after the USA. “However,” Buschkowsky says, “in my opinion 25-30% have never actually ‘arrived’ in Central Europe.”

Integration policy has been discussed for too long. “Some talked about guest workers who go home again. Others talk about multiculturalism as a joyful slide into happiness. Both are false. Integration is hard work — for everyone. Society must become used to new impulses; the individual must acclimate to a different set of rules for his life.”

Buschkowsky does much to make this possible. He has unemployed immigrant women trained to be “district mothers.” They explain to completely isolated families about school and questions of education, domestic violence, healthy diet and language courses. The much-tested model has thus far reached over 2,500 families.

His Rütli Campus is especially ambitious. He has arranged the entire infrastructure of the neighborhood around the former problem school. The goal is companionship for the children from kindergarten through entrance into a career. At the same time, the 5,000 residents of this small area who have no common background are meant to become neighbors.* The project is regarded as a model of innovative integration.

Politics

Germany gives out the most money of countries in the OECD (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development) for family support, but is in third-to-last place in sustainability. Buschkowsky’s conclusion: “The only thing that succeeds is focusing on the children.” Every fourth student leaves school incapable of entering an apprenticeship or further education.

In Berlin, 25% are already in therapy before enrollment in school. 90% of those under 25 receiving help in the Neukölln Jobs Center are unplaceable without further qualifications. In North Neukölln, 70% of the children are receiving disability compensation.

“We do not need child support as a stay-at-home parenting credit,” Buschkowsky attacks the CSU [Bavarian-based faction allied with the CDU as “the Union”], who want to make it possible for parents to care for their children and avoid “GDR conditions.” “We do not need free required kindergartens and all-day schools, so that, from 1:45 PM on, the children do not see a TV from ‘home.’ Only in structured free time will the children learn German and how to obey rules.”

But Buschkowsky fails in the SPD even with his suggestion of putting soft pressure on hooky-players, i.e., “If the child does not go to school the [support] money does not go into the family’s bank account.” The lesson he draws from this: “The degree of suffering is not yet severe enough (to bring about} many changes that would favor the children. Our German ‘Pearl Harbor’ has not come yet.”

North Neukölln As a Nationwide Warning Signal

The southeast district of Berlin has more than 310,000 residents. Approximately 45% of them are legal and illegal immigrants. 30% of the residents receive social transfers [cash or in-kind aid to bridge extreme situations]. Foreigners are concentrated in the north of the district, where they comprise over half of the population, and 85-100% in the schools. 80% of those under 18 in the north are immigrants, and many are unemployed. In the already weak economy of Berlin, this district is one of the laggards. Not in criminality, however: 10 Arabic extended clans of ca. 500 people each live almost entirely from crime and welfare. The government seems helpless.

Buschkowsky the Person

Heinz Buschkowsky, 62, is the elected district mayor of Neukölln. His experiences in this problem district of Berlin have made him known throughout the Federal Republic. When he is in the mood, he expresses them. “Multikulti has failed” brought him much attention, which he visibly enjoys.

In the SPD, however, Buschkowsky accomplished absolutely nothing — not even in Berlin. The measures pushed through by the red-green coalition to ease the way for family members to join immigrants already here — one of their most important voter groups — are widely seen today as mistakes. Chancellor Merkel made corrections in 2007. Buschkowsky’s plea for soft pressure on immigrants unwilling to integrate or to work, as for instance successfully practiced in the Netherlands, is rejected by Greens, “Leftists”, and the SPD.

Reinhard Frauscher, Berlin Kurier, February 4, 2010


* Which may explain the name of the school, after the Rütli Oath, sworn by the leaders of the cantons that were to become Switzerland. In agreeing to defy Habsburg authority, they swore to “become one people.”

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

The people from poor countries will always want to migrate and it's the duty of the rich ones to keep them out!

All these policies are really amusing to me. Pay parents to send kids to school?! And why should the Germans do any work to integrate people?

Cyrus said...

Indeed. In a normal world the immigrants would be integrating so as to not attract any unwanted attention or incur the wrath of the locals.

Anonymous said...

RV,

I once read on a Marxist website the idea that because of the gap in wealth the West must either absorb billions of immigrants or pay 80% taxes to the third world. The problem with this kind of Marxist platitudes is that they don't take into account any causes for this poverty other than supposed oppression by the West. If today we pack up the entire West and move it to another planet where there would be no connections with Earth, they couldn't claim oppression still continues. Yet the third world will likely slide into a much worse state without Western technology and medicine and money. Of course, the Marxists will still claim the sorry state of the humanity left on Earth is a result of past oppression, but for how long?

The solution for third world poverty can't be the absorption of its entire population in the West. It isn't feasible. If they really want to help, they should try and analyze with honesty, and not just ideology, both the causes for success in the west and for failure in the third world, and then try to address the problems. Even the existing level of mass immigration (tens of millions and not billions) isn't solving poverty, but instead impoverishes the West since the causes of this poverty continue to exist.

There are also countries outside the West that can't be said to have historically enjoyed the financial fruits of colonialism or slavery and still resemble Western countries rather than Third World countries. Why is Israel far more successful than its neighbors? Israel started from nothing and the majority of the population in the 50s was made of refugees from the Middle East and Europe, their descendants make the majority of Israel's population now. Most Middle Eastern Jews had to leave all their property behind and never got reparations. We don't have oil like Iraq or Iran, nor any other natural resources in substantial amounts. Most of our land was desert. It's not aid. The Palestinians received more aid than Israel. Most of the aid Israel gets from the US is spent on buying military equipment from the US, because nearly half our budget goes to defense. If Israel would now be moved to some desert island (too bad there are none big enough) we won't need any aid, and we'll be more successful than we are now since most of the resources and manpower now devoted to defense will be invested in the economy. We never had slavery, Israel was founded long after slavery was abolished in the West. We never controlled large amounts of natural resources of other countries. So what is the explanation? Why is Israel more successful than Jordan? Jordan got 3/4 of the Palestine mandate and was founded in the same period of time. Its royalty has Western education. They even controlled the West Bank and east Jerusalem from 48 to 67. So there is a lot of similarity, except Jordan has far more land and its neighbors never tried to destroy it. So why is Israel more successful than Jordan? Oppression and exploitation can't possibly be the explanation. So if the West or the left really want to help they should look at the deeper causes rather than blame the West all the time.

Anonymous said...

Continued...

And I don't completely reject socialism. Socialism developed in a different society from the ones we're living in the West today. I don't accept it as the ultimate theory for explaining human society, but it has some good ideas and some of its cures can be applied in societies where there's a rigid hierarchy and a small minority controls all the means of, err, wealth (production might not be the right word in all cases). For instance, in the Palestinian society where a tiny political upper class has control of the aid funds and invest much of it in their own Swiss bank accounts and in funding terrorism. Or in Iran, where small elites control the oil revenues and invest much of it in funding terrorism across the world, developing WMD, and in large police apparatuses and armed forces to maintain their rule against the will of the people and enforce their religious law to the most minute detail. Surely if you need to fund a secret police and a large number of disguised agents in the streets to make sure every woman exposes no more than one centimeter of her hair, then you won't have a lot of money left to develop a prosperous economy. So in societies like these a more equal distribution of wealth makes a lot of sense...

ANTI-ISLAMIST said...

"Reinhard Frauscher, Berlin Kurier, February 4, 2010"


Strange are the paths and consequences of the free word.
According to the Online-Archive of the 'Berliner Kurier' the Berlin
journalist Reinhard Frauscher has written 21 Articles in 2010 -
none of them, howerver, about Heinz Buschkowsky and Multi-Culture.
The translated article from the Kurier in Vienna must be written directly
for the Viennois Kurier. The article seems to be a rehash of old stuff
from the year 2005, when the right-conservative-national-liberal (SIC)
weekly Online-Paper Junge Freiheit published
a startling interview with Heinz
Buschkowsky.
Three days later Christine Richter wrote an article in the 'Berliner
Zeitung' titled: 'Resignation of the Bürgermeister of Neukölln
demanded' [by the CDU+Grünen and due to an interviuw given to a
right-extremist paper].
Bürgermeister Buschkowsky's comment: "The multiculti-concept has
failed and responsible for that is the maffia of of he 'goody two-shoes'
[those who are fundamentalist & extremist PC] had
annoyed the locale AFA/ANTIFA who started activities and called
the Bürgermeister a 'spiritual arsonist'.
Buschkowsky is since 2001/2002 unchanged Bürgermeister of
Neukölln/Berlin. Last summer he was backbitten in a long
article
in the indymedia.de.
Here a late
interview
with him in German.
----
Compare if you please this backboned Bürgermeister with the
corresponding funky-PC one of Malmö/Sweden.

Sean O'Brian said...

JLH wrote,

The brief description of what makes the USA successful at integrating while others are not, should be painted in big, red letters the length of Pennsylvania Avenue to remind America’s leaders how their society was built.

America's integration policy is only successful if you discount the occasional massacre or terrorist attack by an immigrant every few years - think of the guy who shot up El Al, the Fort Dix plotters, insert your own example here. What does participation, self-reliance, blah blah blah have to with it? Anwar al-Awlaki earned a B.S. in Civil Engineering from Colorado State University in 1994 and is currently fulfilling his individual potential rather well, after his own fashion. Nidal Hassan was a doctor and a Major.

The main difference between America and Germany's situation is that America got German immigrants to integrate (at least in the past) and Germany got immigrants "from rural areas of Pakistan, southeast Anatolia, or Somalia." Leon de Winter is a writer for the Wall Street Journal and the editors of that publication would rather die than admit that Muslim immigration itself is the problem. So they seize on incidental factors like welfare statism, as if Turks living in Berlin would not want sharia law if only they had learned the values of thrift and hard work. Or as if Somali holy warriors based in Minnesota are any different.

Anonymous said...

doom and gloom, if you believe in socialism and that there is no difference in between ethnic groups and that kinship is just a racist idea, there's no reason to be against your country's people being taxed by 80-90% to fund weflare in the third world. It is illogical not to believe in that. The oppression thing won't stop until white people will stop to exist, I think. Or until this mode of thinking won't be fully discredited. It's the same as silly open borders libertarians who think that being against immigration is wrong because we are all just individuals and you are using force against people to keep them out shouldn't support laws that parents should take care of their children - they're after all individuals(the parents) and shouldn't be coerced to take certain decisions.

And Africa is poor and Europe is becoming poorer as Europeans are replaced is because Africans aren't black skinned Europeans. It's fairly easy - just look at South Africa who had a rising standard of living and human development index under the apartheid, even for blacks, now is dropping in both with blacks ruling the country.

Colonialism also usually incurred more costs to the country having the colonies - you can check the India case which is documented a lot. In the same time colonies benefits from the mainland building them up and technological transfer. Israel is more successful than it's neighbours because Israelis are Jewish, not Arabs. That's about it. And Israel did get reparations from Germany(billions actually).

Also, if Israel has a legitimate claim, then I think the USA should build the Romanian army up too so that we can fight the Russians if they attack us. I mean, if you agree on the moral argument for the help for Israel, there is no difference.

About a small minority controlling most of the wealth, capitalism is the best solution for a relatively equal society, not wealth redistribution. But again, capitalism, not what passes today by capitalism, which is more or less corporatism.

Sean, the reason why immigration to the US was successful until about the 1970s, it's because you were taking mostly European immigrants, which were racially similar and would just have to learn the language and their children to adopt the culture as time passed. So yes, you are right and WSJ stopped being a worth-reading magazine quite a while back for me.

Kairos said...

Problem with people is that they seem to have no memory at all. Years ago Chancellor Merkel said:" Mutlikulti is over, we have to link (Multi Kulti ist vorbei, wir müssen zusammenwachsen)!"

Problem with politicans is they know that people have no memory. They can just say what sounds "in" at a time and do the direct opposite of it. They can talk about "immigrant problems" and let more and more of them into our countries.

Like here in Germany it is all over Europe. We all have the same problems and the same people who declare, that there were no problems at all...

For the German readers: http://kairos.myblog.de/