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Tuesday, 26 July (4.45pm) – Sunday, 31 July (noon)
Learning to live in a multicultural world
Diaspora and peacemaking in Europe
Have a look at the programme – I spent a few days at Caux last year and loved it. Loads of people (including young interns) from all around Europe in a huge palace hotel just above Montreux on Lake Geneva.
Lectures, networking, panels, discussion groups, training – along with leisurely meals on the sunny terrace, challenging speakers and a spot of washing up duty to keep the costs down (92 Swiss francs per person per night, 55 for students).
I’m extra happy to be going with my 22 year old daughter this year – I can’t think of a better companion.
With the recent election result from Finland and the face-covering ban in France, I’m keen to meet other Europeans and look at migration, identity, religion and European history in all its complexity.
Anyone else coming?
Untitled by Lisa Gornick. She says, "I feel helpless at the killing of women in countries all over the world. The disasters inflicted on a woman because of gender."
Through Jewish Book Week’s blog, I found Lisa Gornick’s extraordinary drawings. Lisa has a Drawing Shop and a daily drawing blog. Here is one of drawings, Unititled, which I’ve chosen because today was Million Women Rise‘s march, but have a look at them all. Others I like very much are Ambition and Freedom.
I’m off to hear Gary Younge at Jewish Book Week tomorrow.
“Journalists Gary Younge and Jeffrey Kaye wrestle with “identity” in this thought-provoking session.
Younge assesses that identity politics may be a great place to start an idea of self and community but a terrible place to conclude.
Kaye examines what he terms ‘coyote capitalism’, a strategy which defines people, like other natural resources, as supplies to be shifted around to meet demand.”
Splendid!
Searchlight Educational Trust’s Fear and Hope report is now online. There’s quite a lot of it so a good read will have to wait.
A quick look at the ‘tribes’ (see previous post and another on cultural confidence) shows that the Cultural Integrationists of the pre-publicity material has been renamed as the Culturally Concerned.
I seem to be mainly a Confident Multiculturalist (8% of the population) although I hope I’m not as smug as this sounds . . .
Most likely to be graduates or post graduates, these people are predominantly professionals and managers. They are more prevalent in London and the South East, and among people who identify with Labour, Liberal Democrat and Green. Outgoing, social and happy with their lives, they are confident about their own, as well as their country’s future, and think Britain has benefitted from immigration.
. . . but with a dash of Culturally Concerned (24% of the population) . . .
Generally older and more prosperous than other groups, many are (or have been) professionals and managers. They are more likely to view immigration as a cultural issue with concerns about the impact of immigration on national identity and about immigrants’ willingness to integrate. This group forms the largest segment of those identifying with the Conservative Party.
. . . because immigration is, amongst other things, a cultural issue. How well people are welcomed and encouraged to get involved in local life – and how individual and community identities evolve – has long been something I’m concerned with and working to improve.
I skipped – as you do – to the last page to see that Searchlight will be
establishing a project to explore, understand and tackle the rise of right-wing nationalism and extremism in Britain and Western Europe.
Good! Maybe we’ll be able to link them up with our emerging network of European grassroots groups which are building trust between communities. And even persuade them to extend their project to other parts of Europe beyond the West.
It’s been a challenging weekend for multiculturalism – and barely a mention of David Cameron or Angela Merkel.
Harry Eyres' Slow Lane is often a treat
Harry Eyres’ Slow Lane in the FT Weekend wonders whether our current idea of culture isn’t much more than a collection of behaviours, rather than something to aspire to.
You can have a culture of not swiping your Oyster card on a bendy bus, or driving at 10 miles an hour over the speed limit on motorways.
He suggests multiculturalism from the inside – understanding our own individual multi-culture – and gives a rough guide to the Western cultural canon as a start.
. . the Greeks, the ethical profundities of the Old and New Testaments, Roman civilisation and law, the Renaissance and the rise of science, the Enlightenment and the Romantic rebellion, Freud’s insights into the power of the unconscious and so on.
I’m a Scot who’s lived and worked in Calcutta and Papua New Guinea. I’ve glimpsed wisdom in different religious and philosophical traditions. I’ve worked locally alongside people with African roots for decades. So my addendum would include colonialism and subsequent trading patterns, world faiths, feminism and a Celtic/Highland take on Christianity and the natural world. We all have our own patchwork of experiences.
I wonder to what extent we receive or choose our own multi-culture or multiple identities? Some of us have more choice than others – and some ‘own’ our identities more than others, as I argued recently.
Eyres recalls a British Academy Forum last year on multicultural London. In Pat Thane’s short report, well worth a read, Rob Berkeley (Runnymede Trust) concludes that London succeeds at being ‘the world in one city’ – which won us the 2012 Olympic bid.
We are creating the world in one city and all the inequalities of the world in one city. I want to start in a hopeful place about those interactions and things that we could create differently in London, to challenge the rest of the world about some of the ethnic conflict that still occurs.
He seems to be saying, ‘as a world city, we don’t want simply to replicate the injustice and conflict of the world, we want London to be a force for good, showing how a fairer world can work’.
Tomorrow Searchlight releases its Fear and Hope report – a study of attitudes to immigration, identity and multiculturalism (co-written by Nick Lowles of Hope Not Hate, with a foreward by Jon Cruddas, MP for Dagenham & Rainham). Nick has summarised the findings for the Guardian today.
The survey of 5,000 people, the largest of its kind ever conducted, is stark, brutal and unequivocal.
Some 39% of Asian Britons, 34% of white Britons and 21% of black Britons now believe all immigration into the UK should be stopped permanently, or at least until the UK’s economic situation improves.
Meanwhile, 52% of Britons agree with the proposition “Muslims create problems in the UK” . . . In addition, 48% of Britons say they would consider supporting a new far right-wing party, if it shunned violence and fascist imagery.
London’s population may, on the whole, live well with its differences, but in some places – in London and across the UK – attitudes to immigration are tied strongly to economic and social security:
The means test appears to have a greater impact upon attitudes towards integration and identity than the cricket test.
Security of identity (and, I would say, of multiple identity) is a key factor, too.
A new politics of identity, culture, and nation has grown out of the politics of race and immigration, and is increasingly the opinion driver in modern British politics. There are now in effect six “identity tribes” in our society. These are: confident multiculturalists (8% of the population); mainstream liberals (16%); identity ambivalents (28%); cultural integrationists (24%); latent hostiles (10%); and active enmity (13%).
The cherished “middle ground” of British politics is occupied by two of these groups; the cultural integrationists, motivated by authority and order; and identity ambivalents, who are concerned about their economic security and social change. Together they make up 52% of the population.
Migration to the UK and opportunities to welcome or oppose multicultural life here depend on what is happening elsewhere. People come as refugees (seeking safety), students (seeking high quality education) and economic migrants (for better paid work).
Enda Kenny, the incoming Irish taoiseach, has said that he doesn’t want the economic crisis to send another generation away to start a new life abroad – in Sydney, Brisbane and Vancouver. British Libyans have said how happy they would be if they could go back to their home country and help rebuild it.
London might not be a world in one city if it weren’t for trouble elsewhere; a more equitable world might deprive London of its special multicultural status but ensure that people were thriving where they wanted to thrive. We would choose to travel and live in other parts of the world on the basis of a level playing field.
Harry Eyres asks us to discover our own value-based multicultural heritage; Richard Berkeley wants London to be a ‘beacon’ for the rest of the world; Nick Lowles wants to oppose political extremism by bringing communities together. Yes, yes and yes.
Security of identity and economic security seem to be key. In addition to working towards a fairer world, how can British culture itself evolve and change without taking away the security of any group – whether that’s Muslims, the white working-class, rural communities or the urban multiculturalists?
Faith Matters held a panel/Q&A event a couple of months ago in London (lovely venue – Royal Commonwealth Society), with Christina Patterson, columnist at the Independent; Jonathan Arkush, barrister and Board of Deputies of British Jews senior vice president; & Muhammad Abdul Bari, former Secretary General of the Muslim Council of Britain as panellists.
I was leaving for Scotland that evening, but stopped off on the way. I missed the presentations but gathered the main focus of the evening was an article written by Christina Patterson. Fiery discussion ensued with views about faith schools, ghettos & parallel living, tolerance, free speech, inter-marriage, homophobia, anti-Semitism, censorship, Islamophobia, female genital mutilation – and just about everything else on the religion v secularism list – aired through radio mikes. The room wasn’t full; about half asked questions, and most were answered.
Having chaired multifaith round table gatherings myself, I know it’s possible to bring people of very different (and strong) views, beliefs and practices together and for it not to end in tears. We can get to understand each other a bit better, whether we change our minds about anything or not. There were no tears that night, but sensitivities on all sides were clearly trampled on. Afterwards, participants gathered in like-minded groups rather than mixing, which seemed like a missed opportunity. I heard the phrase “bigoted toe-rag” thrown about.
So, a bit too grandstandy and playgroundish for me, although a few participants obviously enjoyed themselves. Plus points were meeting a young woman involved in bringing people together through the arts – good stuff – and having a word with Dr Abdul Bari (Muslim Council of Britain) about European networks.
One contributor said that, given the choice, they would ban both faith and private schools in favour of state education, which would include lessons on the world faiths. I’ve heard similar views before: children should be given the choice of which religious tradition to follow and whether to follow one at all.
If it were food rather than religion (not that you can separate even these two), I suppose each school would give them a bit of veggy, a bit of fast food, a bit of organic, a bit of meat-&-2-veg, plenty of information about them all and then ask them to choose.
Three ideas pop into my mind.
- No school is “neutral” and children will pick up the values of any educational institution they find themselves in – just as they are influenced by their family. They may reject what they inherit at some stage (and most of us, as adults living in a free society, leave behind some of the values and identity we’ve inherited), but children can’t help but absorb the values their lives are directed by.
- By keeping religious (& non-religious) tradition out of children’s lives except through formal learning, we could be depriving them of a part of their identity, or, even worse, asking them to choose one – who am I? This feels like too much responsibility, too much of a burden for a child.
- People who reject value-led schooling (religious, Steiner, Montessori) in favour of a monopoly of state-run education put far more trust in the state than I do.
There was also a mention of Britain changing from a monocultural country to a multicultural one – with consequent difficulties. It was apparently much easier when there was a monoculture.
For my money, I’ve never come across a monoculture, even within my own family. There are cultural differences between England & Scotland, between Glasgow & Edinburgh and between the New Town & Morningside. There are differences all around and always have been. How we respond to people being different is the interesting part – do we all need to be the same in order to get along? Are there limits to difference, and if so, what are they? Teasing out these kinds of issues is part of the public conversation, through the media and the democratic process, to determine public policies which support us all to live our lives to the full.
Heard from Angela & Nina at IoC Switzerland that the programme for Learning to Live in a Multicultural World: Diaspora and Peacemaking in Europe is ready and will be at Caux, Switzerland, on 26 – 31 July 2011.
I only caught the last couple of days this year but it was well worth it.
Two sessions on the 2011 programme have caught my eye -
Identity
Identity is a crucial issue when cultural diversity becomes a reality. This is not only true for diasporas, but also – and no less importantly – for the host society. Current debates about
religious/cultural symbols, integration or assimilation, about radicalized second – and third generation immigrants, and the fear of loss of ‘European’ values, are revealing the growing
importance of identity. Taking the concept of ‘multiple identities’ as a starting point, the following questions will be addressed: How is the issue of identity related to the growing cultural diversity in Europe? What is the reason for and role of identity politics? What benefits – if any – could the notion of ‘multiple identities’ provide?
Participation and power relations
This theme will explore the mechanisms of exclusion and inclusion. The plenary will focus on the issues of power and power relations, and relate them to the question of social, economic and political participation of diaspora members. What are the power relations currently in place – within diaspora communities, and between them and host communities? What are the forces for social, political and economical exclusion of diaspora communities? How can diaspora communities influence power relations? Case studies will provide practical examples of how existing power structures can be influenced, and political, economic and social participation increased.
Irresistible. Anyone else from the UK coming?
No, not genealogy – spare me – but identity.
Gary Younge was on BBC2′s The Review Show (the arts show that hasn’t quite found its feet since it stopped being Newsnight Review) and also on BBC Radio 4′s Start the Week (catch both on iplayer), talking about his new book, Who Are We and Should it Matter in the 21st Century? I can happily listen to Gary Younge for a long time, even if he is plugging a book.
Belgium’s election has produced a leap in support for a Flemish separatist party. I’m told language is the key symbol of difference there, with a lot more – economics, history – stacked up behind it. The language you speak defines you. Which surprises an almost monolingual Brit like myself when I know that Belgians (and most other Europeans) are pretty multilingual. Younge says of the EU, ” borders have come down, but the borders of the mind have gone up”.
How different can we be, how similar do we have to be, to live peaceably together? Over 140 languages are spoken at home by schoolchildren in my part of London. Language is not a key identifier here – it’s just one of several. But then English is the only language of government, the judiciary, science and the academy in London. Business, the media and the arts are more varied, but on the whole, no English = no participation, so there are strong reasons to acquire it, pronto.
Do we need to eat the same food? I used to take enormous care to make sure that no-one felt left out at large 
multifaith gatherings – everyone should be able to eat everything on the table. The end of the line on this one is a diet of kosher hummous and fresh fruit. At some point, exasperation took over and I adopted a smorgasbord approach – lots of different food, well labelled, so that everyone could eat happily while learning something about other people’s dietary rules and preferences.
Should we wear the same clothes? Barcelona is considering banning face-coverings in public places, such as municipal markets and town halls. At a café this morning (I’m in Vienna), I overheard three businessmen talking about the headscarves some Muslim women are wearing in Austria. One said, “It’s what Tyrolean grandmas have been wearing for centuries”. Face-covering, whether balaclavas (sometimes adopted by bank-robbers), motorcycle helmets or the niqab or burka, is different – but whether a general ban on all or some of these face-coverings in all public places is a useful thing to do is questionable. I wore a face-veil on my wedding day.
I wrote most of this last month in London but never got around to finishing it. Having just been at the Learning to Live in a Multicultural Europe gathering at Caux, I’ve been more aware than usual of our tendency to over-culturalise. A good example was given by Judith Jordaky, a project manager at TikK (taskforce for intercultural conflict resolution) based in Zurich – she talked of a difficult situation that a Swiss family of Turkish origin faced. Those responsible for their welfare worried that they couldn’t really understand what was going on ‘because they were Turkish’. With TikK’s careful listening, it transpired that mental health and employee conduct were the key issues, and neither had much, if anything, to do with ‘being Turkish’.
“Identity is an essential place to start but a very bad place to end” says Gary Younge.
Guard from SRPS
I was catching the 0939 from Bristol on Sunday and was on the platform at 0938. But British trains are now protected from the indignity of just-in-time types like me. The doors are locked ahead of departure and the theatre of paddle waving and whistle-blowing by guards is performed to an impotent audience of would-be passengers when there is clearly plenty of time to hop aboard. To his credit, the guard did seem embarrassed that the train took so long to pull out, so there was an abundance of paddling and whistles until it finally left.
Bristol docks
So Bristol claimed me for a few more hours. I caught a cab to Bristol Cathedral for Sunday Eucharist and, after a traditional service with a retiring collection for Haiti, I headed down to the docks.
Bristol is miles away from the sea – the river must have been jammed with ships during the maritime years. Bristol – West Africa – West Indies was one of the slave-trade triangles. There’s a wider stretch which apparently has a deep layer of bones on the river bed – the ships used to throw their dead overboard before reaching the docks.
The Golden Guinea - a fabulous pub in Redcliffe
One of the old pubs (not the Golden Guinea, which has its own particular history) has a couple of look-outs carved into the wall so that pressgangs could be spotted early as they approached. I talked to three young Somali lads living in Redcliffe – they would be about the target age for pressgangs, but they have their own challenges living in C21st Britain. Port cities always have international populations and Bristol is still home to people from all over the world. My taxi-driver was from Pakistan.
The docks are now given over mainly to cafes, yachts, narrowboats and new housing and I was thinking about slaves, the origins of Haiti and the awkward clash of history with leisure facilities in old ports when I met a remarkable young woman.
A Liverpudlian by birth, she has an Irish grandmother – but her grandfather, who died a while back, was from Nigeria. He was a mariner and worked his way from West Africa to Liverpool in the 50s. He married there and had six children – way ahead of the curve. 
His grand-daughter has inherited his spirit of adventure and is one of those rare people who is thoroughly alive and a joy to spend time with. She absorbs history as she breathes and plans to find where her grandfather came from – preferably travelling by sea. Good luck!
I walked back to the station, hoping to stop off at the British Empire and Commonwealth Museum, but it’s closed down. The café survives (watch out V&A).
Identity at the Wellcome Collection, London
Identity – inherited, formed, forged or chosen?
I haven’t visited yet – hope it includes ideas from post-essentialism geography and cultural theory.
Exhibition at the Wellcome Collection, London.
Alexandra Estate NW8
A great evening with old friends from Papua New Guinea days (now dividing their time between Timor and the US). Then TV news footage of the devastating earthquake in Haiti and a ‘phone call from someone with connections there.
Before turning off the television, surprised to find an Anthony Minghella film on BBC1, based in London (Alexandra Estate NW8), which includes characters (and a copper coffee ibrik) from Sarajevo – Breaking and Entering. Bit of a syrupy ending, but the distant and rather romantic view of Bosnia portrayed probably comes close to my own view before travelling there last year.
Glad to find Doreen Massey’s For Space mentioned in Stephen Greenblatt’s Cultural Mobility – a Manifesto, one of the books I shouldn’t really have bought from the London Review Bookshop the other day. Greenblatt reckons that cultures or patterns of meaning have rarely been stable or fixed. The kind of radical mobility that is taking place today is in fact an old, old story.
To grasp the shaping power of colonization, exile, emigration, wandering, contamination, and unexpected, random events, along with the fierce compulsions of greed, longing, and restlessness, cultural analysis needs to operate with a new set of principles.
It was good to mull over with friends how Papua New Guinea is doing nowadays, how Timor is getting along, how Bosnia is working its way to becoming part of the “international community” – and what our role is, as citizens of far more powerful nations. Although I associate the word ‘protectorate’ with days of empire, some small countries struggle to rise much above this status, even in the C21st, or perhaps particularly in the C21st.
