France and Islam

France, with a Muslim population of approximately five to six million, has the largest Muslim minority in Western Europe. Internal politics surrounding the “Muslim question” in France have been marked by bitterness, especially during several headscarf bans and the riots of November 2005. Though the French government has worked successfully with both foreign-born and French-born Muslim leaders in the past to improve its relations with the Muslim community, it has also deported a number of radical imams and preachers. High-profile leaders like Tariq Ramadan are controversial, viewed by some as dangerous demagogues with terrorist ties, by others as progressive voices capable of leading Muslim youth in a bid for successful integration into French society.

Looking at France - and Europe in general - from across an ocean, some Americans are troubled by what they perceive as a rising tide of Muslim influence. The French Muslim population, critics argue, is unduly shaping French policy toward the Arab world, and eroding laicité, the French version of the separation of church and state - one that is actually stricter, in various ways, than our American version. Some go further, wondering if European Muslims will “outbreed” their native European counterparts, eventually “turning Europe green.” (For a hilarious take on this idea, see this diary by Hunter at DailyKos; for a doom-and-gloom approach, see this piece by Daniel Pipes.)

Those who go furthest, such as author Mark Steyn (see Hunter’s piece), see Europe’s “inevitable Islamization” as a dangerous precursor to our own. Conservative websites like Michelle Malkin and LittleGreenFootballs believe this process may be starting already. Convinced that Muslims in general adhere to an agenda of world domination, such observers view Europe as a chilling example of what a losing battle against Islam might look like in America.

Many of these arguments are carefully and convincingly refuted in Integrating Islam by Jonathan Laurence and Justin Vaisse, a painstakingly researched inquiry into the question of Muslim integration in France that was published just last year. Laurence, an American, and Vaisse, a Frenchman, team up to pore through virtually every survey and poll that has been done in recent years concerning views of French Muslims and non-Muslims on various issues related to Muslim life in France: politics, society, education, etc. Laurence and Vaisse provide detailed portraits of major French Muslim leaders and organizations, and track the state’s successes and failures in dealing with the Muslim community.

Though the authors warn that integration will not be smooth or easy, their viewpoint is cautiously optimistic:

On the religious front, we find that a “French Islam” is increasingly replacing the “Islam in France” that has developed over the last thirty to forty years…Despite serious and sometimes spectacular problems and enduring challenges for the French republic, the integration of persons of Muslim origin in French society is, on the whole, going in the right direction. There is little reason to subscribe to the conventional view of an increasingly fractured society in which immigrants and citizens of Muslim origin form anti-Semitic hordes on the verge of imposing shari’a law…Slowly but surely, as with any comparable process of historical significance - whether the integration of Protestants or Jews or of other immigrant groups in France - the process of integration of Muslims in France is under way…This is by no means an unqualified success story, but our findings are in line with a 2005 State Department poll that drew modest but nonethless substantive conclusions: “Large majorities of Muslims in France voice confidence in the country’s government, feel at least partially French, and support integrating into French society.” [pp. 4-5]

Additionally, the book tackles the complicated question of why younger French Muslims are often more observant - and sometimes more radical - than their parents’ and grandparents’ generations. Circumstances, rather than ideology, seem to be the driving force.

Re-Islamization - the increased religious consciousness among younger generations - [may be] a consequence of social exclusion and economic hardship, along with the fact that often young Muslims learn about their culture of origin from foreign imams. [p. 90]

The French government’s passive attitude toward Muslim immigration during the 1960s-1980s, the authors believe, may have allowed some tensions to fester. But this problem suggests its own solution: if the French state takes a more active hand in engaging Muslims in the process of integration, it can prevent radicalization. Indeed, dealing with, rather than ostracizing, community leaders, organizations, and demands has met with success. And by building ties with positive leaders, the French state does not seem biased or prejudiced in the rare instances where it must deport true radicals.

Relations between Muslim minorities and their new homelands will remain tricky and complicated in France and other European countries for some time to come. The election of Nicolas Sarkozy, who is still reviled in many quarters of the Muslim world (including among people I’ve met in Senegal) for his comments about “clearing out the rubble” from the Paris housing projects during the riots of 2005, may complicate the picture further. Or it may bring hope - as Integrating Islam points out, Sarkozy has often been a thoughtful and earnest voice in the discussion of the French “Muslim question.” Despite his image as a racist or an Islamophobe in some people’s minds, he has actually taken many constructive stances vis-a-vis the Muslim community, such as taking a major part in the establishment of the state-sanctioned French Council of the Muslim Religion.

The integration of France’s Muslim community is an important test case for the rest of the Western world. It is easy to assume the worst when the media - and various pundits - constantly cite the failures of integration, the radicals and jihadis, the riots and protests. But the broad picture of French integration indicates that Europe may have little to fear. Indeed, millions of European (and North American) Muslim immigrants are happy in their new homes, ready to practice their religion peaceably (or not practice it at all), and eager to integrate into Western societies and cultures.

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