Parts of Stockholm and Malmö and Göteborg have now some areas which are dominated by immigrant communities. With multiculturalism (as opposed to multi-ethnic under a common culture) made into a god of political correctness, Sweden has done relatively little to ensure the integration of immigrants into the country. That, in turn, has led to the congregation of immigrants into just a few areas and their subsequent segregation.
Both Denmark and Norway are now using Sweden as the cautionary tale and of how not to manage integration.
The Local: Norway’s integration minister has called for tighter immigration policies – to avoid the country becoming like Sweden.
Sylvi Listhaug used Sweden as the cautionary tale when speaking about recent terror attacks in Europe, as well as a package of asylum reforms due before the Norwegian parliament shortly.
“Many of those who have carried out terror attacks in Europe are born and raised in France and Belgium. It shows how important it is to succeed with integration and that is again connected to how many come to Norway. Therefore a tight immigration policy is important,” she said.
In the aftermath of the terror attacks in Brussels, there has been a debate in Norway on so-called parallel societies and neighbourhoods where the police don’t dare to patrol. Listhaug acknowledged that the problem exists.
“We have foreign fighters who have left Norway and [we have] radical environments. We should not stick our heads in the sand and say that everything is good here. But fortunately we are a long way from the conditions we see in some other countries, for example Sweden,” she told NTB.
The difference between multiculturalism with a fractured society and a multi-ethnic society with a common over-riding culture, is one of my hobby-horses.
A “society” – to be a society – can be multi-ethnic but not multicultural
Of course one can have – if one wishes – many different cultures within different sub-societies in a single geographic area. But if these sub-cultures are not subordinated to a larger culture then the sub-societies cannot – because it becomes a fatal contradiction – make up any larger society. Multiculturalism dooms that geographical area to inevitably be a splintered and fractured “greater” society – if at all.
Tags: integration, multi-ethnic, multiculturalism
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