Germany's Failed Multicultural Experiment

Is racism returning to Germany?

German Chancellor Angela Merkel raised some eyebrows, and frankly, freaked some people out this past weekend, when she declared that Germany’s attempts at creating a multicultural society had “utterly failed.” Germany is home to 5 million Muslims, many of whom are marginalized, and U.S. intelligence agencies recently warned that German Muslims who had trained in Pakistan were planning terror attacks across Europe.

It’s painfully obvious that things haven’t worked out for Germany’s immigrants, says the Globe and Mail’s Margaret Wente, but political correctness has stopped anyone from having a serious debate about immigration. “Like Canadians, Germans have been swamped by official propaganda celebrating the joys of ethnic diversity. In both countries, expressing doubts over immigration policy has been socially verboten,” Wente writes, which leads us to believe she didn’t read a single Canadian newspaper this summer, when columns doubting national immigration policy appeared on a daily basis. She goes on to argue that it’s wrong to interpret Merkel’s statements as a German shift to the right amid tough economic times and “(i)n fact, she merely said what most Germans already believe.” Wente obviously means this as a comfort, but it’s precisely the popularity of Merkel’s ideas that has observers worried.

There is “evidence of a frightening new surge in Neo-Nazi extremism” in Germany, writes the National Post’s Peter Goodspeed, citing a recent study which found that 17.2 per cent of Germans agreed with the statement, “Even today, Jews have too much influence” and 58.4 per cent said the practice of Islam should be restricted in the country. “Europe has a long history of turning towards extremists during times of economic hardship and the current crisis is no exception,” Goodspeed says, pointing to France’s recent deportation of the Roma and far-right parties gaining power in a slew of European countries. This is all worrying, but “it is in Germany, with its lingering legacy of horror and hate from the Second World War, that the loudest alarms should be sounding.”