First off, some facts:
-Denmark is currently 8 percent Muslim, mostly immigrants over the last couple decades from North Africa and the Middle East.
-The social welfare state here is extremely beneficial for members. Free health care, education, two years of parental maternity leave (one year for mommy, following year for daddy), and cleaning staff for the homes of the elderly. Unfortunately, citizenship and benefits of the state are hard to acquire
-It is extremely difficult to acquire Asylum Seeker status here in Denmark. One has to prove that they are being personally proscecuted, which is extremely difficult for people escaping unstable regions. According to an EU charter Denmark should take Asylum seekers from unstable regions on the grounds of lacking personal but having group proscecution. Still, Denmark turns away hundreds of Iraqis, Iranis, Afgans, Roma, and Somali's every year.
-According to the Dublin Agreement a refugee is processed in the first country they are recorded or detected in. Therefore in order to get to Denmark as a refugee one has to take a boat from their native country or be smuggled through mainland europe. This policy is partially why Sweden has the most liberal integration and immigration policies; few refugees make it as far north as Sweden so they can politically and economically afford liberal policies.
-Immigrant and Native Dane communities do not really mix socially in Copenhagen.
Most people define equal citizenship as equal rights and responsibilities for immigrants and natives, along with an equality of opportunities and certain cultural and political demands on immigrants and on the states themselves. Long before immigration issues arose in Denmark has there been a polarity in the dialogue - Integration or Multiculturalism. Integration involves the immigrant community to align with the values and ways of the country, and multiculturalism allows for spheres of different cultures within another society. The United States has been fighting this battle for its entire existence, since we are a country entirely composed of immigrants (minus Native Americans, who have essentially been disseminated through re-education programs and pitiful retributions, you guys know the embarrassing history). It can be said that the United States is an example of multiculturalism with a large degree of assimilation over time.
So what happens in a liberal democracy when enlightenment ideas clash? As a case study we have been investigating the murder of a free-speech advocate and filmmaker who was shot and stabbed by a Muslim extremist in the Netherlands. Where do freedom to practice religion and freedom of speech meet when one is allowed to be slanderous to another's values? Unfortunately in November of 2004 Theo van Gogh paid for his free speech with his life. I am not implying that his death should be condoned, on the contrary. Rather how do we curb such events as this from happening?
Many welfare states stop involving themselves in the lives of immigrants after they have passed loyalty and language tests, essentially abandoning them in a new culture and society. In such an atmosphere, immigrant children have to watch their parents suffer the indignity pushed on them economically and culturally by their native cohabitants, much to their and their parents buried frustration. The freedom to free practice of religion a given in these states, and for many religion is all there is to cling to in a new country with a bleak future, given with a floor on poverty guaranteed by the welfare state.
There is a paradox within multiculturalism: that all communities should have equal treatment, but not the individuals who form those communities. Relativism demands that we see our values simply as the beleifs of the particular tribe we call the west, and multiculturalism is a part of this process. A respect for difference eliminates the framework of what is just and unjust, criminal and legal, moral and immoral. Individuals within these different communities are not allowed to free themselves from their own traditions; instead there is approval of the group and suppression of the individual within. In this line of thought repetition of the past is being encouraged and the struggle for civil rights has to be re-waged within all these communities with values separate from enlightenment thinking. It is also contemptuous thinking because it assumes certain communities are incapable of modernizing. In contrast to republican secular thought, which is based on freedom of religious affiliation and peaceful coexistence, and that all human beings have the same rights, this ideal is far from being realized in a multicultural European context where nationality may not be the first avenue of personal identity association.
So what is important in all of these communities, western or eastern, liberal or conservative? DISSENT. Enlightenment in Europe was fought for against monarchies and the power of the church through dissent, which eventually led to a plurality of individual rights. While some argue that Enlightenment thinking is nothing but another religion with a historically self-conscious perspective (something that I never considered before and I am still wrapping my brain around), I believe that this gives too much credit to the secularization of the masses and the lack of confidence in what religion can provide in personal and communal life. Enlightenment ideals do not result per se in secularism; to a certain degree they exist side by side. Toleration of dissent and discussion is important within all these communities because, if allowed to do so, it makes the community re-evaluate its values and its relationship beyond its own communal walls. Within a multicultural state where the surrounding community can protect dissenters, this practice should be encourages and can also serve as a dialogue between the communities, rather than simply within the boundaries of one or another.
There is nothing wrong with a little re-evaluation. Thats what we all desire anyway, a different perspective. I may go as far as to say that is why humans love alcohol and drugs so much (including nicotine and caffeine). Besides the effect these substances have on the brain that bring pleasure, they change one's orientation and viewing of the external and internal world. Think about it, we all want to stand in someone elses shoes or see the world in a different way, that is why so many people love to travel.
Anyway, I would love any and all feedback. My views on multiculturalism and immigration are constantly shifting, and I am firmly rooted in enlightenment values, however understand perhaps a compromise might have to be made every once in a while. All I know is that if stages for dialogue between co-existing communities are not created and sustained, dramatic intercultural travesties that involve a difference of values like the one that occurred in Amsterdam in 2004 will continue to materialize.
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