In 2018, German sociologist Aladin El-Mafaalani scored a somewhat surprising best-seller: his book Das Integrationsparadox (‘The Integration Paradox’) shot into the top ten of German book sales, providing a counterweight to gloomy and populist pamphlets on immigrants’ failure to ‘integrate’ and of Germany’s impending ‘Islamisation’ otherwise dominating the commanding heights of the book market. Successes…
For years, German public debates have asked whether ‘Islam’ has a rightful place in the country and whether it can be considered part of its identity. Yet the reasons given by those that see the religion as alien to Germany have fluctuated over time. Shifting discourses of Islam’s ‘incompatibility’ First of all, as the years…
Ever since the Islamic State group began to lose the territories it had so spectacularly conquered during 2013 and 2014, analysts and policy-makers in the West have warned of potential large-scale return movements of so-called ‘foreign fighters’. 40,000 ‘foreign fighters’ Although the term ‘foreign fighter’ is vacuous with respect to international law, it still permeates…
Following the attack on Muslims near the Finsbury Park Mosque, Prime Minister called for an end to anti-Muslim right-wing extremism. Mehdi Hasan, a prominent Muslim British journalist, argues that May’s claim is contradictory with her own political history, which is steeped in support for Islamaphobic policy and tolerance of Islamaphobia in her Conservative party. As Home…
Recent months have not been kind to Germany’s largest Islamic association, the Turkish DİTİB. Particularly since the July 2016 coup attempt in Turkey, the organisation has been under fire for its real and supposed proximity to the Turkish government. This criticism received new force when it was revealed that DİTİB’s Imams had done the…
