Throughout history, immigration has been a reality and phenomenon that affects civilization in many aspects of life. Immigration is an international movement that occurs all over the globe consisting of individuals that choose to leave their native country to move into another, illegally, for various reasons. During the great recession, many individuals migrated in search for opportunity out of their home land. In countries like Europe, immigration occurs on the daily basis so they must consider distinct ways to grasp these conditions before it makes an unremarkable impact. We analyze the first decade and a half of the two thousands to examine the relationship between Europeans and immigrants. The way Europeans and immigrants treated each other largely depended on several aspects of life. The aspects that were particularly evaluated were in the education, work, religion, and health related settings. With plans to embark on a new journey for a better life, numerous migrants in Europe immigrated in search for economic, education, and religious opportunities. But was Europe prepared and receptive of this approach?
The sacrifice of leaving their home land and loved ones behind for economic opportunity is fairly common and typically the situation that amounts for immigration. During economic hardships for a country, such as the great recession in 2008, Europe became more receptive of immigration because of the value they brought to the labor workforce (Kahanec et. al., 2017). These individuals seem to be more flexible when it comes to occupation and are willing to adapt rapidly to changing job sectors to fill in those labor market gaps. Although, this creates more competition between the immigrants for these low skilled labor jobs, many are still able to find work one way or another. In the article, How immigrants helped EU labor markets to adjust during the
Great Recession by Kahenec and collaborators, noted that higher educated immigrants respond better to labor shortages than lower educated because they are able to overcome more societal barriers. It's quite expensive to immigrate into another country to begin with and most of these people start from zero upon arrival. In fact, many might even start in the negatives because they will borrow financial resources from others in order to make this transition. European employers notice this truth and take advantage of them financially for their own gains. Although some employees acknowledge they are being taken advantage off, many of them are in need of financial resources and are willing to put up with exploitation out of necessity. There are many benefits employers get by hiring immigrants. The wages are cheaper and spendings are reduced tremendously because they don't offer any health care or welfare benefits for the job. Of course, under these circumstances, immigrants are left feeling vulnerable, inferior, and shameful.
Some view these circumstances as an inhumane crisis and believe that an influx of non-native immigragrants could be a challenge and a threat to the economy. According to experts in economics, business owners view this migration “risk” as an opportunity (Portes, 2016). They reason that demographic challenges such as an aging population would produce negative long-term implications economically. They argue that immigration helps cope with European working-age population deficits. This is particularly important because they claim that there were more deaths than births in countries like Italy and Greece. This indicates that in Europe, specifically in Germany, natives cannot keep up with the rate at which jobs are being created. This is where immigrants come in to fill in those labor gaps. With this in mind, not only is Europe accepting refugees and immigrants, they try to find ways to encourage this act because it fortunately sustains the labor force. In addition, other benefits Europeans see in immigrants is their skills. Usually, even the non-educated migrants carry a pair of valuable skill sets that can benefit the natives by teaching them directly new tricks or strategies they learned elsewhere. It is true, however, that not all European societies strive to encourage an integration of immigrants into their labor markets if not necessary.
During extreme circumstances, many individuals are voluntarily forced to immigrate into another country in attempt to avoid violence, poverty, or disasters in their native land. These individuals are known as refugees. Iraqis and Syrians found themselves in this situation and ventured to Finland only to be caught by surprise (Economist, 2018). Finland did not welcome the Iraqis and Syrians and as a result, Soldiers of Odin escorted them before they even passed the border. To this day, many refugees are in Haparanda, Sweden. European democracies impose the belief that drug trafficking, shootings, women gang-rapes, murders and burglary were not primarily caused by natives in Sweden, but specifically by immigrants. Hungary, recently even placed a law in which it would make it illegal to assist immigrants in any way, shape, or form as of June 2018. Despite all these negative outlooks, empirical research, by criminologist Christian Pfeiffer, states that 2017 data demonstrates that the crimes involving violence decreased by 6% and that burglaries decreased by 30%. Pfeiffer implies that the remaining crime record is most likely due to native eastern European gangs (Economist, 2018). As for the immigrants, most consist of no criminal record because they have more to lose than natives do and usually seek opportunity. Some opportunities are found in societies that discourage and treat them poorly. The jobs there can cost them their life if they don't take care of themselves and could even be detrimental to their mental and physical health status in the long run.
Even with health-related illness, does that stop immigrants from reaching their financial, spiritual, or life goals? In the article, Are immigrants and descendants with ill health more prone to Unemployment by Heggebø and partners, we see that ill health does not necessarily leave the immigrants unemployed. They observed over 100 minority groups from 18 different countries and employers in Europe. They say that health is wealth and for employers, health is a concept most employers do not take for granted when hiring during an economic strain. Health starts interfering with productivity, responsiveness, and reliability and when there are businesses closing and downsizing, productivity becomes vital to the success of that organization. Given that is is against the law in some countries to ask about health issues in job interviews, most of the time the immigrant being hired is prone to lie about their health conditions in order to obtain the job. Regardless if they manage to obtain the job while containing a health issue, they still have more to lose than European natives, such as the entirety of the job itself, because migrant workers don't necessarily have the longevity that natives have at these lower skilled jobs. So usually, the way most employers fire is by "hired last, fired first" basis.
In addition, coming from a different native country imposes language barriers and minimal knowledge of the organizations they're working for (Heggebø, et. al., 2016). Regardless of these factors, ill health is still viewed as a one of the highest risk for unemployment because the potential of having low workability, low productivity levels, absentees, and sick days. The fact is, these immigrants already face implicit discrimination by coming from a minority background. Proving to be ill, will only diminish the chances of acquiring any job at all. Austria, Belgium, Croatia, Czech Republic, Estonia, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Slovenia, Spain, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom were the countries that were included in the study. There were some limitations in this article in which they were self-reported. In this case, immigrants that don't speak the language or were seriously ill didn't participate. The study ultimately found that ill health and being an immigrant are independently associated with unemployment (Heggebø, et. al., 2016). It introduced a perspective from employers about how they treat the immigrants. This perspective known as the “human capital perspective”, denoted that all they cared about were financial “results”. The employers are mainly focused on productivity, attendance, and cultural competence. Since health is a big risk factor to the needs of the employer, non-native workers are seen as a bigger risk because of their language, cultural, and health barriers – if any. Even though immigration is not a planned scenario they encourage, the question is, are Europeans taking enough responsibility to ensure proper integration of the immigrants that are already there in the country illegally?
In the research article, How is Europe Facing Education in Europe by Pere Feliu and partners, entail that the ideal approach Europe can take to help integrate immigrants that are already there, is to produce policies that force the state to educate the immigrants through academic institutions. Although they continue to focus on educating the natives above all, in certain areas where immigration rates seem high, it comes to the attention of that state that they must consider these serious state implications and be practical about them. In areas or states where immigration is not common, attention is rarely given to the implementation of new programs to help these foreigners learn the language, new skills, or about the culture itself. The Common Basic Principles (CBP) for immigration integration policy in Europe insisted that the pathway to integration would derive from education. However, in 2009, The Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) reports showed that, in some countries, the results of the second-generation students were lower than the first-generation students (Feliu, et. al., 2016). This impart, demonstrates the inadequate performance of the education systems in attempt to fulfill the level they expect to achieve in integrating immigrants. Apparently, it seems to be quite the opposite; based on academic results, the subsequent actions enhanced the cultural isolation of these individuals rather integrate. However, these results are still arguable and doubtful because if they are blaming the education system for not doing enough now, how were the first generation of immigrants capable of achieving better results than the second-generation individuals? There has to be more external factors associated with these results.
Many of these integrational problems arise for immigrants because of socioeconomic conditions. Poor academic performance has been associated with low socioeconomic status (Feliu, et. al., 2016). Being low on the financial pyramid does not necessarily hinder you from further opportunities. However, it does become more challenging to excel and have an academic, social, and financial privileges that others already possess. Especially if its a young child working full-time hours and going to school full time. How do they keep up? Not only does that put tremendous pressure on that child academically, but the pressure of providing financial resources to their family from their native land, also burdens them. Even if they excel academically, they might still struggle to fully understand how the institution and cultures operate and they typically cannot use prior knowledge to help themselves because of the different customs and values that the new society holds. Efforts to comprehend the language rapidly, is indeed a great strategy to shorten the learning curve for individuals that desire to achieve their goals quicker. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (United Nations, 1948, article 27) states that cultural diversity should be accessible to everybody. But is it really?
In 2013, the European Commision took a broad approach to the incorporation of the youth in the education system. They emphasized that the education system is indeed the only way to influence diversity management policies in hopes to promote “plurilingual proficiency” (Feliu, et. al., 2016). Efforts like these will hope to induce migrant families to be more proactive in the local community and education of their children. Schools and local authorities are encouraged to focus on improving the specific local needs of children of immigrant conditions. Often times, however, these efforts are not considered to be a priority for lower migrant areas like in Baltic. In other areas where higher migrant rates occur, such as southern countries like Spain, Italy, Greece, the Cyprus Republic, or Portugal, they consider promoting intercultural education and improving some policies. As of yet, they still continue to tremendously struggle to meet the needs of children from immigrant families. European authorities appear to be quite considerate when it comes to educating the immigrants and guiding them through the integration process. The immigrants seem to do their part by having their families be more supportive and proactive in the community for their children to get better educated. But the local powers in the communities appear to not quite stress the intercultural education enough to a level of high priority. Perhaps this may or may not be the case with immigrants of different cultural beliefs or religions.
Muslim immigrants are often viewed as separate from other migrants in regards to culture, ethics, and values. This in particular, has been the case ever since the 9/11 terrorist attack happened (Carol, et. al., 2017). In this study, European countries like Yugoslavia, Morocco, Turkey, and Pakistan that were living in Belgium, Britain, France, Germany, Switzerland, and the Netherlands, were studied. Western Europeans are confronted with a situation of whether or not they should tolerate and support these individuals or act against them. In an attempt to compromise, the Europeans were quite flexible with the muslim religious practices. The muslim immigrants were given the freedom to build mosques, minarets, and also allow them to wear headscarves in public organizations. Even though religious freedom is the target for all the European liberal democracies, policies can vary across different settings throughout Europe. There is no surprise that we see a high number of repulsion about religious rights in the education setting. This setting is where the majority of societal values are passed onto the children of the next generation.
The authors predicted that people who held intense religious beliefs would have to face greater resistance. There are some slight differences in the connection between the state and religion (Carol, et. al., 2017). Individuals often associated themselves with a certain group to seek a positive group identity and therefore become bias and view out-groups as inferior. The relationship between outgroups and ingroups often collide heads because of contrast in value and beliefs. When immigrants go into a society of bigger and stronger religious groups, they often times are in a powerless position to deny the religious rights of the host society. In the assumption that the natives know of their religious empowerment, they probably feel superior and confident to practice their religion with more ease than immigrants do. However, in the study, it showed that although the natives perceived immigrants as religious threats, they still tolerated them in the public. Some of the out-groups (non-religious immigrants or of a different religion) seem to believe that there will be major threats and harsh punishment if they don’t adopt or at least respect some of the native/host beliefs. Despite of any religious conflicts or tolerance, immigrants and citizens learn to understand the role and importance that religion play in their country. Many European countries have multiple accommodations for different religions, particularly for immigrant Muslim. However, certain practices and tolerance level depend on the state or country (Carol, et. al., 2017). For example, Switzerland allows teachers to wear headscarves in the education setting and in public areas, whereas Belgium would view that image as a threat because they believe the muslim is trying to impose their own religious beliefs on the rest of the students, children, and society. If we were to rank countries by least to most accommodating order it would be; Belgium, Germany, Switzerland, France, UK, and the Netherlands being the most accommodating.
Immigrants and even natives in France are particularly hesitant toward allowing religious rights because of the prevailing non-religious tradition in the country. On the flip side, the Netherlands advocate equality and religious rights for Islamic minorities and for other groups in general, like Christians (Carol, et. al., 2017). It was interesting to see that more natives who were highly educated opposed religious education to a greater extent than less-educated natives. In the Netherlands, a country that promotes religious rights and equality, proposes a positive view on headscarves in public but not so much on Islamic religious education. In the study of Carol and partners, immigrant Muslims appear to be open-minded about non-muslims and even willing to negotiate religious accommodations with respect to the natives. The findings show that religious non-muslim natives were more considerate in granting accommodations to immigrant religious out-groups, like Muslim, which is viewed as a positive effort in the religion integration process.
We can agree that immigration is a global topic that has been a part of history and evolution worldwide. During economic hardship, countries like Europe were left with decisions to make on immigration and their demands. Europe has to take into consideration several factors that would proclaim the relationship between immigrants and themselves. Whether it’s religion, health, education, or financial subjects, we assessed the general attitudes between Europeans and immigrants that derived from those aspects of life whether it presented a positive or pessimistic outlook. Even though immigration is not necessarily responsible for all global matters, especially for European global issues, it is inevitably a prominent concern for the field of politics.