The Attached Meanings of Integration: A Discursive
Construction of a Danish National Identity and the
‘Othering’ of Non-Western Immigrants in the
‘Ghetto Plan’
Nicholas Dix Lind
940220T116
International Migration and Ethnic Relations Bachelor Thesis
15 credits Spring 2019
Supervisor: Christian Fernandez Word Count: 13442
Abstract
This thesis examines how integration as a category of practice or as an emic concept functions in political discourses. In doing so, this study delimit itself by focusing on the problematization of non-western immigrants in socially vulnerable residential areas in the whitepaper ‘A Denmark Without Parallel Societies – No Ghettos in 2030’ presented by the Danish Government in March 2018. By adopting a theoretical framework of Umut Özkirimli’s take on nationalism, the
concept of ‘othering’ and Carol Bacchi’s WPR approach to policy analysis, this paper finds that integration as a category of practice function as a code word for differentiation in identity formation where the ‘othering’ of non-western immigrants and socially vulnerable residential areas confirm a Danish national identity. Thus, this thesis contributes to a framework addressing the discursive construction of a Danish national identity in the societal debate on integration through the analysis of policies.
Table of content
1. Introduction ... 5
1.1 Research problem ... 5
1.2 Aim and research question ... 7
1.3 Limitation and delimitation ... 8
1.4 Terminology ... 9
1.4.1 Terminology of immigrants ... 9
1.4.2 Terminology of the ‘ghetto’ and ‘parallel societies’ ... 9
1.4.3 The government ... 9
1.5 Thesis outline ... 9
2. Literature review ... 10
2.1 The ‘othering’ of non-western immigrants ... 10
2.2 ‘Danishness’ ... 11
2.3 Integration as a category of practice ... 13
3. Theoretical framework... 14
3.1 Nationalism ... 14
3.2 ‘Othering’ ... 16
4. Method and data ... 17
4.1 What is the ‘problem’ represented to be? ... 18
4.2 Policy as discourse ... 19
4.3 Methodological considerations ... 20
4.4 Material ... 21
4.5 Coding ... 22
4.6 Reliability and validity of data ... 22
5. Analysis ... 23
5.1 What is the ‘problem’ with ‘parallel societies’ represented to be? ... 23
5.2 What presuppositions or assumptions underpin this representation of the ‘problem’? ... 25
5.2.1 A homogenous ‘us’ and ‘them’ ... 25
5.3 How has this representation of the ‘problem’ come about? ... 27
5.3.1 The affiliation between the Danish People’s Party and the Danish Liberal Party ... 27
5.3.2 The role of the welfare state ... 28
5.4 What is left unproblematic in this problem representation? How can the ‘problem’ be thought about differently? ... 29
IMER: Bachelor Thesis
5.5 What effects are produced by this representation of the ‘problem’? ... 31
5.5.1 Discursive effects ... 31
5.5.2 Subjectification effects ... 32
5.5.3 Lived effects ... 33
5.6 How and where has this representation of the ‘problem’ been produced, disseminated and defended? How could it be questioned, disrupted and replaced? ... 35
5.6.1 Challenging the idea of a ‘parallel society’ ... 35
5.6.2 Maintaining the hegemonic position ... 35
6. Conclusion ... 36
6.1 Further research ... 38
1.
Introduction
1.1 Research problem
For a long time in Denmark, immigration and integration politics have been the focal point and have been centred around ‘problems’ of non-western immigrants on the Danish political agenda (Simonsen 2016, p. 84). Policies, campaigns and legislation directed “against almost all aspects of immigrant everyday life, such as family organization, accommodation, upbringing, authority, gender roles, language spoken in the home, relations with one’s original homeland, clothing,
hygiene, nutrition, marriage, etc.” have introduced an ‘integration industry’ in which every agent of the society are partaking1 (Rytter 2018, p. 6). This ‘integration industry’ has also influenced socially vulnerable residential areas. During the 1990s the concept of the ‘ghetto’ was introduced in the political debate when mayors of ‘Vestegnen’ (the term of an area on the western outskirts of greater Copenhagen) criticized the substantial numbers of refugees concentrated in ‘Vestegnen’
(Freiesleben 2016, p. 118). However, it was not until 2004 before socially vulnerable residential areas seriously entered the political arena as a loose term for ‘failed integration’ when the Danish prime minister at the time, Anders Fogh Rasmussen (Venstre: ‘the Danish Liberal Party’) spoke of ‘parallel societies’ as the consequence of immigrant ‘ghettos’ without contact to the surrounding society (Simonsen 2016, p. 85).
Such depictions of these socially vulnerable residential areas won prominence throughout the political spectrum in 2010 when the Prime Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen (also from the Danish Liberal Party) sparked the integration debate by reinforcing and reintroducing the terms ‘ghettos’ and ‘parallel societies’. These terms were depicted as areas where fundamental Danish values and norms were no longer were the primary. Such a message calls for a strategy which later the same year (October 26th 2010) was introduced and in which the correlation between ‘ghettos’ and ‘parallel societies’ in 29 residential areas was pointed out as making the ‘parallel society’ and ‘ghetto’ a ‘real’ and measurable political category rather than an abstract reference to ‘failed integration’ (ibid.). According to Lars Løkke Rasmussen, non-western immigrants have purposely lumped together into these residential areas which threatens the social cohesion of Danish society (ibid.). A ‘threat’ that demands intense action which was realized in 2018 when the majority of the
1 Parents, schools, day-cares, the police, social workers, the state, local authorities, real estate association of the
political parties in the Danish parliament voted in favour of political initiatives towards ‘ghettos’ and ‘parallel societies’ which was presented by the Danish Government2 in the whitepaper ‘A
Denmark Without Parallel Societies – No Ghettos in 2030’ (also referred to as ‘The Ghetto Plan’). As it is stated in the ‘Ghetto Plan’, the Danish Government aspire to become free of ‘ghettos’ by 2030 as 28.000 non-western families are perceived to live in ‘parallel societies’ (Government 2018, p. 7). In order to become ‘ghetto free’, the government have initiated policies divided into four themes: 1) Demolition and transformation of the vulnerable social residential areas; 2) Management of whom can live in these areas; 3) Strengthen efforts and higher penalties to fight crime and
establish firmer security; 4) A good start in life for all children and young people (Government 2018).
According to the government, a ‘ghetto’ can be defined and measured by meeting two of the following three criterions in vulnerable social residential areas (ibid., p. 11):
• The proportion of immigrants and descendants from non-western countries exceeds 50 per cent of the total population
• The proportion of residents between the age of 18-64 years without any connection to the labour market or education exceeds 40 per cent of the total population
• The number of convicted of a violation of the criminal code, the firearms act, and the law of narcotics exceeds 2.7 per cent of the total population
Or
• The proportion of immigrants and descendants from non-western countries exceeds 60 per cent of the total population
However, when it comes to the definition of ‘parallel societies’, the government acknowledge that there is no accepted definition of a ‘parallel society’ and that instead a question of the individual’s perspective (ibid.). Neither can the government provide an accurate estimate of the number of people living in ‘parallel societies’ despite the statement that 28.000 non-western immigrants live in ‘parallel societies’ (ibid). Nonetheless, the government gives examples of ’parallel societies’ and its inhabitants (ibid., p. 9):
2 Venstre (the Danish Liberal Party), Liberal Alliance (Liberal Alliance), Det Konservative Folkeparti (the Conservative
• Chosen isolation and social marginalization: Persons who are long-term unemployed and without education, insufficient language skills in Danish, and where children are kept away from Danish society. And there is no participation in civil society (association life) nor in the democratic process (low election turnout)
• The concentration of children and adults with non-western backgrounds: Persons who reside in areas where there live many non-western immigrants and descendants live, and where there are few children with Danish background in day-care facilities and schools
• An opposing culture to Danish society: Persons that partake in extremist views or
legitimatize their actions in accordance with an extremist ideology. Persons who belong to a gang or persons that commit illegal actions that prove their discontent with social conditions in society
In the broader debate about integration, the terms ‘ghetto’ or ‘parallel society’ are firmly anchored by political discourses to describe and problematize these areas. Therefore, it is crucial to separate integration as a category of analysis or practice. The definitions of the ‘ghetto’ and ‘parallel society’ provided above are, for example, entailing that integration as a category of practice is centred around dimensions of impalpable matters which are rarely defined and outlined, for instance in order to problematize non-western immigrants to situate a Danish national identity and thereby addressing ways of being and belongings (Rytter 2018, pp. 2, 15). In words of Rytter (2018, p. 15) “the emic [that is the category of practice] refers to descriptions and understandings formulated by people themselves”. Thus, integration as a category of practice is not neutral or apolitical but inherent in deep-seated conceptual logics which show that concepts such as the ‘ghetto’ and ‘parallel society’ are not static nor objective terms but rather political and dependent on context.
1.2 Aim and research question
Consequently, the aim of this research is, therefore, to examine how integration as a category of practice discursively construct perceptions of a Danish national identity. Integration requires a comparison of someone (immigrants and descendants of immigrants) that needs to be integrated into something (values and culture of the receiving society) which may hold a strong emphasis on conceptions of a Danish identity and an identity of non-western immigrants. Integration may therefore be a tool or a code word to differentiate and delineate belongings to the Danish national identity.
This thesis does not seek to uncover whether the ‘problems’ in socially vulnerable residential areas are ‘true’ and ‘real’, but merely the underlying assumptions behind the political discourses on these
areas. Therefore, this research will highlight the need for a critical understanding of how integration can function as a predisposed concept in political discourses by focusing on socially vulnerable residential areas.
For this thesis, I will analyze the whitepaper ‘A Denmark Without Parallel Societies – No Ghettos in 2030’ from a critical perspective supplemented by ‘8 initiatives, putting an end to parallel societies’, ‘A Presentation of Parallel Societies’ and academic literature related to perception and boundary construction of national belonging. To operationalize this, I will draw on theoretical notions of nationalism and ‘othering’ and apply the critical policy analysis approach ‘What is the ‘Problem’ Represented to be?’ (WPR) to uncover the underlying presuppositions that influence policies and the problematizations that lie within them.
In order to address the research problem and actualize the aim of this study, my research questions are as follows:
• What is the function of the concept of integration as a category of practice on Danish identity formation in political discourses presented in the ‘Ghetto Plan’?
• How do political discourses in Denmark construct boundaries and perceptions of a Danish national identity when debating socially vulnerable residential areas?
1.3 Limitation and delimitation
As outlined above, this thesis intends to examine integration as a category of practice. However, the debate of integration in a Danish context varies and takes form in multiple contexts. As a result, I have chosen to confine myself to focus on the debate on socially vulnerable residential areas (referred to as ‘ghettos’ and ‘parallel societies’) which is rooted in the larger debate on integration; a debate that consists of struggles about identity and differentiation. I therefore treat the debate on integration as a grand discourse (Simonsen 2016, p. 89) that is embedded in micro-discourses, such as perceptions on socially vulnerable residential areas, which contribute to the overall frame of this grand discourse.
My choice of method i.e. the WPR approach by Carol Bacchi, allow the researcher to go beyond the study of policy documents by drawing attention towards discourses and genealogies of a discourse as well as to real effects caused by a policy (question three, five, and to some extent question six) (Bacchi 2012a, p. 23). The WPR approach requires a dense research process; however, as the most substantial limitation to this thesis is time and scope, I will answer these questions with secondary
sources such as academic literature. Furthermore, I can only demonstrate the construction of a Danish national identity in the ‘Ghetto Plan’. There are other ways a Danish national identity is established. Kjær (2008), for example show how the relationship between the European Union and Denmark serves as a way to constitute Danish national identity. Therefore, the scope of this thesis is limited to the political discourse of the ‘Ghetto Plan’3 presented by the Danish Government.
1.4 Terminology
1.4.1 Terminology of immigrants
Throughout the whitepaper, the terms ’immigrants’, ’descendants’, or ’non-western immigrants’ appear simultaneously without further clarification. Therefore, these terms are a reference to non-western immigrants in general. I am aware that these form of categorizations4 are homogenous, rigid and do not consider the wide-ranging diversified differences. However, I will apply these categories to stay as close to the meaning of the whitepaper as possible.
1.4.2 Terminology of the ‘ghetto’ and ‘parallel societies’
As in the terminology on immigrants, I will be aware of how I apply the terms ‘ghetto’ and ‘parallel societies’. I will, for instance, apply ‘socially vulnerable residential areas’ or ‘social residential areas’ when I speak of matters not dealt with the ‘Ghetto Plan’. However, when I refer to the whitepaper, the terms ‘ghetto’ and ‘parallel societies’ will be applied.
1.4.3 The government
During the writing of this paper, a new government (a Social Democratic lead government) has been elected. Therefore, I use ‘the government’ throughout this paper to refer to the previous coalition government (Denmark’s Liberal Party, Liberal Alliance, the Conservative People’s Party) who initiated the whitepaper ‘A Denmark Without Parallel Societies – No Ghettos in 2030’.
1.5 Thesis outline
This thesis begins with an introductory chapter outlining the case of ‘parallel societies’ in a Danish perspective followed by the research problem, aim and research questions, terminologies as well as delimitations and limitations. Chapter two consist of relevant academic literature relevant for this thesis that will assist my subject. The third chapter explains the theoretical choices for the
3 However, I use other primary material in form of policy documents to supplement and back up the existing discourse
in the whitepaper which will be outlined in the ‘Material’ section.
theoretical framework by outlining the concept of ‘othering’ and Özkirimli’s (2010) theoretical approach on nationalism. In chapter four, the method and data of this thesis is presented by explaining the choice of method, methodological premises, material, validity and reliability, and coding. The analysis makes up chapter five assisted by previous literature, the theoretical
framework, and the method and methodology. Lastly, chapter six will contain the concluding remarks of the thesis and reflections for further research.
2.
Literature review
The following literature review will be divided into three critical aspects relevant to this thesis. The first theme that will be focused on is ‘‘othering’ of non-western immigrants’ which describe how immigrants are referred to as ‘internal strangers’ and a threat to society in a Danish context. The second theme comprises concepts of ‘Danishness’, the being Danish, that is i.e. the perception of Danish national identity. The last theme, ‘integration as a category of practice’, demonstrates how the concept of integration is applied in public and political discourses contributing to identity formation and boundary constructions of an ‘us’ and ‘them’.
2.1 The ‘othering’ of non-western immigrants
In order to provide a detailed overview of identity formation in a Danish context, it is significant to point out existing literature and research approaching representations and portrayal of the so-called other as the ‘other’ is a prerequisite for the construction of a Danish identity. Karen Wren (2001) argue that there exist “culturalist bias of academic research, which has been very closely connected with public policy” (Wren 2001, p. 152) resulting in biased attention on ‘problems’ of immigrants. The welfare state plays a central role in the problematization and ‘othering’ of immigrants which Emerek (2003) stress. Welfare reciprocity (being a model of lifelong reciprocity and obligation of giving and taking/to give and take, for example taxes contributing to education and health
insurance) contributes to the perception of a Danish identity, and the undermining of immigrants because immigrants has not contributed with taxes over the course of a lifetime (Rytter 2018). To quote Rytte (2018, p. 10), immigrants consequently end up “in a permanent state of negative reciprocity and cast[ed] as a problem for the well-being of the Danish population and the sustainability of the welfare state”. This role of the welfare state is relevant in relation to the ‘Ghetto Plan’ as the government
emphasize the obligation to contribute to Danish society while simultaneously emphasize the burden that that the ‘parallel societies’ poses to the Danish population and society.
Other prevalent literature concerning ‘othering’ of immigrants have dealt with media discourses. Rytter & Pedersen (2014) examine the event of 9/11 and the following ‘war against terror’ and find that non-western immigrants in Denmark have been lumped into a homogenous and fixed identity portrayed as suspects and enemy within, and thus compelling the worry of immigration and crime in a security/integration nexus (Rytter & Pedersen, 2014). Furthermore, Jacobsen et al. (2012) show in a research of Danish Media framing on Muslims and Islam that an antagonistic and dichotomous hierarchical relationship exists between ‘Danes’ and ‘Muslims’ in which Muslim culture are generally negatively portrayed and perceived as a threat to Danish society and values. This is relevant for my study as it highlights the ‘other’ in different social circumstances in which the ‘other’ is perceived as a threat to Danish society and values contributing to a security/integration nexus which permeates the ‘Ghetto Plan’.
Other studies have embarked ‘othering’ differently through ethnographic studies interviewing descendants of non-western immigrants (Haldrup et al. 2006; Kofoed & Simonsen 2007). Jensen (2011) and Haldrup et al. (2006) points to the significance of looking at how identity formations are constructed through banal and bodily everyday practices to construct the ‘other’. We produce and reproduce identities through the mirroring of an imagined Danish identity and an external other (Kofoed & Simonsen 2007). This process “block the way to ‘Danishness’ for anyone not part of the imagined Danish kin” (Fangen in Jensen 2011, p. 74). Exclusive barriers in other bearings is further visible in Simonsen’s (2016) study of the role of the ‘ghetto’ in Danish political discourses. She demonstrates the importance of spatial ‘othering’ in which the ‘ghetto’ appears as an antagonistic anti-identity to Danish society. Thus, ‘othering’ take form in different discourses and may also include spatial ‘othering’ which further illustrate that ‘othering’ is based on a relationship between two mirrored identities.
2.2 ‘Danishness’
The ‘othering’ of non-western immigrants may be viewed as a tool to constitute an ‘us’ and ‘them’ but is also linked with nationalism deriving a specific perception of Danish identity and attachment to national belonging. Agius (2013, p. 247) argues that during the Danish Mohammed cartoon
controversy6, the discourse of a Danish identity under threat from the ‘other’ allowed for restrictive
immigration policies, designed to keep a fixed idea of the nation and ‘Danishness’. The Mohammed cartoon controversy has “promoted an ‘absolute’ and hierarchical understanding of culture and core values, which came to define the debate on immigration and identity […] [and] subordination of immigrants’ value and culture systems” (ibid). These dichotomies are also showed by Jensen (2008) in her study of ‘ethnic’ Danes who convert to Islam, where it is considered that Danish and Muslim values are incompatible.
Hence, identity formation and the notion of who belongs and who does not belong has been the focal point in a significant amount of research. Liberal values have, for example, become linked with the perception of ‘Danishness’, where liberal and democratic values are applied and justified for negative portrayals of the ‘other’ (Wren 2001). Lindekilde (2014), Jensen (2014) and Mouritsen and Olsen (2013) show how such liberal values have become embedded within the idea of
‘Danishness’ by examining the discourses of the influent ‘Dansk Folkeparti’ (the Danish People’s Party). Similarly, Lindekilde (2014) stresses that a new form of ‘liberal intolerance’ has
reconstructed old racism and nationalist intolerance into discourses of liberal reasoning such as gender equality (Lenneis and Agergaard 2018), security risk, social cohesion, among others, for not tolerating the ‘other’ who are bearers of an non-liberal culture.
However, other research has solely focused on traditional nationalist perspectives on identity formation. By studying kinship, Rytter (2010, p. 301) argues that the Danish immigration regime is grounded in specific ‘kinship images’ that are applied in public and political discourses “which basically distinguishes within the pool of citizens between the ‘real’ and the ‘not-quite-real’ Danes”. This ‘requirement of national attachment’ see ‘ethnic’ Danes as the indigenous people having the historical right to the nation and territory embedded in a jus sanguinis principle (Hervik 2019). Such a nationalist approach on ‘Danishness’ is in line with Kofoed and Simonsen (2007) and Agius (2017) studies who argue that the myth of ‘Danishness’ is embedded in ‘Grundtvigianism’ (Grundtvig a national romantic poet and theologian in the nineteenth century). ‘Grundtvigianism’ follow the principle of a Denmark as a small power and ethnically homogenous rooted in
Christianity and Nordic mythology linked to language, birth and blood. Hence the view of a monocultural framework in relation to a Danish national identity.
6 Twelve cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed published by the Danish newspaper ‘Jyllands-Posten’ which got
However, it is essential to note that identities are never fixed and varies according to situations and time, as Simonsen (2018) and Jensen (2008) also pinpoint. Agius (2013), for instance, criticizes the individual attention towards identity formation (in a continuation of the study of the above-
mentioned cartoon crisis) that is constructed discursively by the centre-of-right establishment. She argues that the centre-of-left establishment also construct identities which demonstrate a different notion of a Danish identity that tends to and can be more inclusive towards foreigners, for example, when the Red-Green Coalition won office in 2011, and which shows that ‘Danishness’ also is about identity claims and struggles over hegemonic positions of the discourse about ‘Danishness’. Thus, the literature about ‘Danishness’ highlight how a Danish identity in line with ‘othering’ take different forms that are embedded in historical and social contexts influencing the perception of a Danish national identity and the ‘other’ as well.
2.3 Integration as a category of practice
Rytter (2018) writes that Danish imaginaries of culture, race and belonging is embedded in the application of the concept of integration. He gives examples of this by referring to the perceptions of Danes as indigenous people, host and guest mentality and Danish welfare reciprocity, as previously mentioned. He emphasizes that the use of integration should regain critical academic analysis, since integration as a concept is not neutral but to some extent includes power relations used to constitute identities and boundaries of an ‘us’ and ‘them’ where the so-called ‘them’ cannot fully become a part of ‘us’.
To show how the concept of integration has become a category of practice and a tool to construct identities, Jensen et al. (2017) examine discrimination and racism within the context of integration in public and policy discourses while Simonsen (2016) investigates the linguistic meaning of the ‘ghetto’ in policy discourses as well. They find that integration discourses may be perceived as tools for boundary construction and barriers of inclusion and exclusion in Danish society between Danes and non-Danish citizens due to specific views of national belonging embedded in culture, race, and ethnicity which is important to this thesis examining identity formation in the ‘Ghetto Plan’. However, this thesis will differ from the study by Simonsen (2016) as I uncover the discourse of socially vulnerable residential areas by means of knowledge production through social and historical contexts rather than a sole analyzes of discourses themselves and the mechanisms of language that constitute meaning.
The previous literature shows how ‘othering’ and ‘Danishness’ function as interrelated concepts in identity formation while integration as a category of practice highlight how these concepts are
applied within broader frameworks operating as a code word for differentiation. Such insights are significant and will contribute to my research of how integration as a category of practice is
problematized in the issue of the ‘ghetto’ and ‘parallel society’ as these issues may involve identity formation and specific perceptions of ‘Danishness’ and the ‘other’. A national identity may
construct a sense of belonging, but such a construction is based on the exclusion of something or someone, for example, non-western immigrants and socially vulnerable residential areas. I intent to draw on the three themes by convening the three categorizations into one whole showing how policies too through integration as a category of practice establish ‘othering’ of non-western immigrants, and ideas of ‘Danishness’.
3.
Theoretical framework
In the following section, I will introduce the theoretical framework of this paper which will be utilized for the analysis. I will begin by outlining of Özkirimli’s theory of nationalism and its importance on identity formation. Furthermore, a recapitulation of the concept of ‘othering’ will be introduced as it is a central concept for identity formation as well.
3.1 Nationalism
Özkirimli’s approach on nationalism will allow me to understand the construction of national identity and the mechanisms that lie within such construction, for example, certain perceptions and boundaries that signify a national identity and nationalism within the general debate of integration and more specifically the debate about ‘parallel societies’.
Drawing on contemporary theories of nationalism as well as Foucault and Gramsci, Özkirimli (2010) outline an analytical framework of nationalism consisting of three stages. The first step of the theoretical framework is defining nationalism as a discourse. Özkirimli (2010, p. 206) defines discourse as “practices that systematically form the object of which they speak”, and thereof structures the reality around us setting the limits of how we think and act. Nationalism as discourse seeks to strategically manipulate a national or cultural identity according to different contexts. “Identities, national or otherwise, are not things we think about, but things we think with” (ibid.), and may therefore be viewed as organizational types. One is therefore not to reduce discourses to language, but instead treat them as statements that are produced and determined within social and historical contexts (ibid, p. 208).
In the second step of the analytical framework Özkirimli (2010., pp. 207, 208, 209) present three sets of interrelated claims differentiating nationalism from other discourses of collectives:
1) Identity claims to divide the world into an ‘us’ and ‘them’, stressing characteristics that differentiate ‘us’ from ‘them’ in which the identities appear as homogenous and fixed. 2) Temporal claims which strive to present the nation through links to the past by
demonstrating the ‘linear time of the nation’.
3) Spatial claims to reconstruct space as ‘national territory’ by establishing physical boundaries through territorial imagination.
The last step of the theoretical framework consists of identifying the “mode of operation of the nationalist discourse or the different ways in which human beings are made national” (ibid., p. 210). “The successful nationalist project attains the compromise equilibrium by incorporating ideological elements from competing nationalist projects” which allows the specific nationalist discourse to achieve hegemony (ibid., p. 212). Here, the state machinery and the civil society such as
educational institutions or the political establishment are embedded in and shaping the structures directly or indirectly (ibid). When nationalist discourse achieves hegemony, it is rarely faced with challenging and competing discourses. Such a process naturalizes the nationalist discourse as “all traces of construction and making its claims and values seem self-evident and common sense” (ibid., p. 211).
Hegemony determines “the boundaries of the ‘speakable’, defines what is realistic and what is not realistic […] in such a context, even ‘forms and languages of protests or resistance must adopt the forms and languages of domination in order to be registered or heard” (ibid., p. 213). However, Özkirimli (2010 pp. 209, 210) argues that it is crucial not to “lose sight of their contingent and plural-heterogenous nature […] [as] nationalist discourses are outcomes of social practices that can be challenged and changed” and thus reminding you that the discourse of nationalism is a type of power. Nationalism is a complex construct and an on-going process that is fluctuating in meaning and structured by numerous relations that are comprising ambiguity and discontinuity and
therefore not linear, natural and fixed as the nationalist discourse strive to be (ibid., p. 210).
Özkirimli’s approach to nationalism allows me to understand how the debate of ‘parallel societies’ is embedded in identity formation and differentiation. Thus, by applying Özkirimli’s study on nationalism, I define a national identity as a nationalist discourse which has its distinctive marks in identity, temporal and spatial claims and made up of statements that are produced and established
within social and historical contexts serving as mechanisms for the nationalist discourse to become hegemonic, natural and homogenous.
3.2 ‘Othering’
As my intention with this thesis is to show how integration as a category of practice entails mechanisms of differentiation, boundaries and perceptions of national identity, the concept of ‘othering’ will provide the theoretical framework with further crucial insights to the construction of identities. ‘othering’ endorses my explaining of the process of identity formation towards those who are opposed to the nationalist discourse in which mechanisms of power, stereotypes, binaries, and mirroring will influence the identity construction of national identity and its ’other’.
‘Othering’ is vital in the construction of national identity as the attachment and feeling of belonging can only take place by contrasting the Self with the ‘other’ to create and connect social relations and boundaries of the nation state (Spencer 2014, p. 11). Such boundaries connect people with an idea of a homogenous people with a coherent culture and values in which, for example, ethnicity may be ‘markers of difference’ (ibid., p. 16). Jensen (2011, p. 65) defines ‘othering’ as:
“Discursive processes by which powerful groups, who may or may not make up a numerical majority, define subordinate groups into existence in a reductionist way which ascribe problematic and/or inferior characteristics to these subordinate groups. Such discursive processes affirm the legitimacy and superiority of the powerful and condition identity formation among the
subordinate.”
‘Othering’ displays the understanding of the Self by the mirroring with the ‘other’ (ibid., p. 64). The ‘other’ is therefore always a necessary part of ’us’ because without the ‘other’ we cannot exist, define and understand ‘us’ (Benhabib 2002 p. 8). “Difference matters because it is essential to meaning; without it, meaning could not exist” (Hall 1997, p. 234). Boundary perceptions are
therefore pivotal in which the ‘other’ becomes a prerequisite for the construction of the Self. Binary opposition that differentiates ‘us’ from ‘them’, for example, through stereotypical dichotomies as ‘civilized’ and ‘uncivilized’, ‘black’ and ‘white’ or ‘good’ and ‘evil’ which are established to construct the Self (ibid., p. 235). Here stereotypes may be viewed as a practice within the process of ‘othering’ to “reduce people to a few, simple, essential characteristics which are represented as fixed by nature (ibid., p. 257). In this way, stereotypes can construct boundaries of who belongs and who does not belong by denoting the ‘other’ with undesirable connotations while desirable positive connotations towards the
Self simultaneously are established (ibid., p. 258). However, it is important to acknowledge that ‘othering’ does not necessarily has to be based on negative stereotypical images (Jensen 2011, p. 67). Positive stereotypes to describe the ‘other’ can also take place, but the terms are often connoted with the negative side of the ‘other’ (ibid).
Furthermore, ‘othering’ is simultaneously highlighting the power relations in a minority/majority context. Those of power have what Hall refer to as ‘power in representation’ which is the “power to mark, assign and classify […] [for example] the power to represent someone or something in a certain way” (Hall 1997, p. 259). Thus, the power in ‘othering’ is simultaneously constraining and productive in the sense that relations of power in specific contexts “produces new discourses and new kinds of knowledge, new objects of knowledge, [and] it shapes new practices and new institutions (ibid., p. 260).
The theoretical framework of this thesis will help me to clarify how integration as a category of practice functions as a code word for differentiation. Several mechanisms are applied to construct identities, for example the three interrelated claims of the nationalist discourse and the concept ‘othering’ may construct an ‘us’ and ‘them’ opposition between the Danish society and the ‘ghetto’ or ‘parallel society’. Hence it is not only a national identity that is constructed but also a subordinate identity known as the ‘other’. The two identities may be mirrored, which highlights the boundaries and perceptions of a Danish national identity.
4.
Method and data
To operationalize the selected ideas presented in the previous chapter and to critically asses ‘A Denmark Without Parallel Societies – No Ghettos in 2030’, Carol Bacchi has developed a practical approach to conduct a critical policy analysis that investigates how the policy represents a
‘problem’ to be. Therefore, the WPR approach is applied to examine and uncover the
presuppositions embedded within the ‘Ghetto Plan’. These presuppositions may reveal certain conceptions of integration that is applied as a tool to define a Danish national identity as well as the ‘other’ and how these conceptions of the two are so ingrained that they become unexamined or unnoticed ways of thinking.
4.1 What is the ‘problem’ represented to be?
The WPR approach provides an operationalization to poststructuralist and social constructionist theories7 through a critical policy analysis to understand policies through discourses that create and
regulate knowledge of the social world “in ‘making’ social problem in a very specific way” (Goodwin, 2012, p 28). Despite the increasing focus on discourses in policy studies, scholars have hesitated to declare a method due to the concern of “‘the positivist trap’ of essentializing and prescribing research methods (Goodwin, 2012, p. 31). However, rooted in and inspired by
Foucauldian thinking, Bacchi (2012a, p. 21) have developed a systematic and accessible conceptual framework comprising complex methodological approaches such as discourse and genealogical analysis. These approaches comprise six questions to explore how ‘problems’ are represented in policies:
1. What is the ‘problem’ represented to be in a specific policy or policy proposal? 2. What presuppositions or assumptions underpin this representation of the ‘problem’? 3. How has this representation of the ‘problem’ come about?
4. What is left unproblematic in this problem representation? Where are the silences? Can the ‘problem’ be thought about differently?
5. What effects are produced by this representation of the ‘problem’?
6. How/where has this representation of the ‘problem’ been produced, disseminated and defended? How has it been (or could it be) questioned, disrupted and replaced?
The WPR approach work at another level than a traditional policy analysis by going beyond the generally known way of how governments understand, react and solve ‘problems’ by rethinking government policy (Goodwin 2012, p. 33). The questions presented above8 allow the researcher to
discover and uncover how knowledge of ‘problems’ in policies are influenced and socially
constructed and embedded in multiple layers of knowledge practices that can be traced in historical and contemporary social contexts arising in specific times and space (ibid., p. 29). Despite the possibility of repetition, each question is interlinked and supplement and give insight to one
7 A strong emphasis on Michel Foucault.
another. I will therefore focus on a systematically approach of the six question rather than a holistic approach which the WPR approach also allows.
4.2 Policy as discourse
According to Bacchi, “every policy or policy proposal is a prescriptive text, setting out a practice that relies on a particular problematization” (Bacchi 2012b, p. 4). The WPR approach questions the dominant epistemology by analyzing policy from a problem-questioning perspective, rather than the outcome of a policy, in order to discover the knowledge that presuppose policy proposals (Bacchi 2012a, p. 22). The WPR approach highlight knowledge practices and power relations in the
construction of meaning in policy analysis that is incorporated in a jointly ontological constructivist and naturalist framework (Goodwin, 2012, p. 28). Such knowledge practices are constructed
through social and historical contexts that shape the social world (a way of interpreting, talk and seeing things) and allow discourses to produce ‘truths’, ‘realities’ and cultural products about groups and individuals who are positioned and positions themselves according to these discourses resulting in real impacts on individuals (Bacchi, 2016, p. 11).
Governments are therefore active producers of policy ‘problems’ and not natural or neutral, but responsible for specific ways of thinking about a given ‘problem’ (ibid). Thus, the WPR approach emphasizes that ‘problems’ as phenomena should not be treated objectively as “entities ‘out there’, waiting to be solved” (Bacchi, 2012a, p. 22). Therefore, the WPR approach allows for a more comprehensive conceptualization of politics as policies shape political discourses, which means that policies are pivotal in how individuals are affected by policies in terms of naturalizing specific ways of thinking, for example of how individuals think of themselves and their relationship with others in struggles over identities and differences (Bacchi, 2012b, p. 3).
For the purpose of this thesis, Carol Bacchi’s policy analysis will provide the necessary tools to understand the social construction and mechanisms of identity formation inherited in the problem representation in the ‘Ghetto Plan’ as “this debate is a debate over how the problem ought to be understood […] it is a debate over what kind of a problem is represented to be” (Bletsas 2012, p. 39). Knowledge of socially vulnerable areas may, for example, be embedded in integration as a category of practice in which policies unintentionally or intentionally defining characteristics of national belonging as well as characteristics of ‘standing outside’ national belonging. Such an approach is of great importance because representations of reality in discourses has social consequences (Jorgensen & Philips 2002 p. 21) recreating and reinforcing the deep-seated
conceptual logics of a Danish national identity while simultaneously excluding differences in the problem representation. Furthermore, the WPR approach is based on a highly subjective
interpretation of policy proposals which has allowed me to discover and reveal what seems natural, objective and true such as certain realities and perceptions of ‘Danishness’ and its ‘other’ which is based on deep-seated presuppositions in the policy proposals problematizing ‘parallel societies’.
4.3 Methodological considerations
Discourse analysis (which influences the WPR approach) comes with its own philosophical premises containing theory and methodological guidelines regarding the social construction of knowledge and the social world, theory, and methodological guidelines (Jorgensen & Phillips 2002, p. 3-4) as shown above. The theoretical framework of this thesis will therefore correspond
accordingly with philosophical premises of the WPR approach.
Poststructuralist and social constructivist thinking influence Özkirimli’s nationalism as well as the concept of ‘othering’. First, both concepts are examining nationalism and ‘othering’ as a discourse rooted in Foucauldian thinking and where production and processes of knowledge, power relations and hegemony are the focal points. Secondly, Özkirimli’s approach on nationalism corresponds with the WPR approach and its six questions due to the direct attention towards historical and social processes that form certain perceptions of social reality. Furthermore, neither of the theoretical concepts treat the phenomenon of study as something natural or objective acknowledging that the concept of the nation state or the ‘other’, for example, are naturally constructed but rather are socially constituted. Lastly, Özkirimli (2010, pp. 208, 217) states that nationalism is “‘socially constituted and institutional, hence real in its consequences […] and a very ‘concrete’ part of our everyday lives”, which implies a naturalist perspective of the social world as ‘real’ due to the examination of ‘real’ consequences. Such a view is in line with the WPR approach, which in the fifth question draws attention to the effects of problem representations by looking beyond an analysis of policy as discourse to empirical studies, in other words, how discourse frames reality through the “real struggles over the interpretation and enactment of policies” (Goodwin 2012, p. 33).
Additionally, as a researcher, I cannot position myself outside of the ‘knowledge-power’ nexus as I am not liberated from its discursive construction (Moses & Knutsen 2012, p. 184). I do not hold a neutral position and shall acknowledge my positionality of the research and how this may affect the research (ibid.). For example, I am responsible for the choice of data and how it is to be analyzed.
of social reality by being an active participant in the research partaking and being involved in generating meanings (Jorgensen & Phillips 2002, p. 21-22). I shall, for instance be aware of how and when to apply the terms ‘ghetto’ and ‘parallel society’. I can unintentionally provide
stereotypical images of deprived social residential areas or apply homogenous categories such as Danes and non-western immigrants (despite their diversity) in spite of my attempt to uncover and highlight the discourse and its characteristics of homogenous and stereotypical images.
4.4 Material
To fully answer the differentiation happening in the debate of integration, this study draws on qualitative data using Carol Bacchi’s WPR policy analysis on the whitepaper ‘A Denmark without parallel societies - No ghettos in 2030’, consisting of 40 pages and presented by the government in March 2018. I chose this whitepaper as my primary source because the WPR approach allows an alternative way of thinking than traditional policy analysis and in-depth exploration into a limited number of sources due to the attentiveness of finding discursive patterns. The whitepaper was supported by the vast majority in the parliament comprising centre-of-right parties and two main opposition parties from the centre-of-left i.e. Socialdemokratiet (Social Democrats) and Socialistisk
Folkeparti (the Social People’s Party) (Simonsen 2016, p. 86). As a broad political spectrum with
different political affiliations was supportive of the plan, this study will have a broader perspective on the debate and the inherited discourse.
Additional primary sources was applied in form of two policy documents presented by the Social Democrats and the Social People’s Party in 2018 ‘8 initiatives, putting an end to parallel societies’ and the government with a follow-up paper on their initiatives towards deprived social residential areas in 2019 called ‘A Presentation of Parallel Societies’. These documents were applied to
supplement the discourse embedded in ‘A Denmark without parallel societies - No ghettos in 2030’. Furthermore, the documents applied for the analysis have been in Danish. I have therefore
translated quotes used in the analysis into English. Therefore, loss of potential meaning is a risk when translating, but I did attempt to stay as true as possible to the intended meaning of the text. Secondary sources consisting of academic articles retrieved through university databases were also applied to fully grasp ‘othering’ and national identity in a Danish perspective, and furthermore to provide an appropriate answer to the six questions posed in the WPR approach, as the approach require comprehensive knowledge of the problem representation.
4.5 Coding
The coding of the whitepaper followed the six questions of the WPR approach. In consideration of six systematic questions guiding what to look for, as well as previous research and the theoretical framework, I was influenced by the deductive approach. However, although the WPR approach provides a systematic framework to follow, I have applied an inductive approach when following the six questions influenced by Charmaz’s (2006) approach to the coding process in grounded theory. Charmaz (2006, p. 48) states that “there is a difference between an open mind and an empty head” denoting that a researcher will always hold prior ideas due to the interaction within the field. Therefore, I focused on remaining open-minded to the text allowing for new ideas that could bring forth new ways to interpret and understand the policy rather than being predetermined. I then put emphasize on selective codes to produce concepts and categories that could supplement the theoretical framework and the six questions of the WPR approach and assist me in the analysis of the whitepaper. Furthermore, each question in the analysis will provide short descriptions of how the questions directed me in in terms of data collection and method.
4.6 Reliability and validity of data
Qualitative studies and especially text analysis (discourse analysis) are often criticized for not producing generalizable knowledge due to studies of a small number of sources limiting validity and reliability (Jorgensen & Philips, 2002, p. 120). However, on the contrary, few sources may be adequate as the interest of discourse analysis is to uncover the discursive patterns which lies in a small number of sources (ibid). Here, I apply two additional whitepapers initiated towards the ‘problem’ of ‘ghettos’ and ‘parallel societies’ to supplement the discourse in my primary document in order to get an accurate and nuanced analysis of the discourse.
Furthermore, discourse analysis allow for in-depth exploration through a thorough analysis of a limited number of sources, providing the researcher with a more detailed and more in-depth
understanding of the discursive patterns and the social world, which was not underlined beforehand, and which potentially may enhance validity (Moses & Knutsen 2012, p. 156).
Additionally, Silverman (2014, p. 84) writes that reliability in qualitative work require transparency “through describing our research strategy and data analysis […] [and] paying attention to
‘theoretical transparency’ by making explicit the theoretical stance from which the interpretation takes place and showing how this produces particular interpretations and excludes others”. The questions of the WPR approach and my ‘theoretical lenses’ establish transparency in the analysis of the empirical material. By applying the WPR approach, one should be able to conduct a similar
framework due to the systematically nature of the WPR approach providing six guiding questions to follow. However, it is significant to mention that my interpretation of the problem representation may not be equivalent to another researcher who is studying the same problem representation, which indicates the positionality of the researcher in qualitative work.
5.
Analysis
In the following chapter, I will analyze the ‘Ghetto Plan’ and further supplement the analysis with other relevant material. The six questions will be summarized and explained together in the conclusion.
5.1 What is the ‘problem’ with ‘parallel societies’ represented to be?
The first questioned posed in Carol Bacchi’s policy analysis ‘what is the ‘problem’ represented to be?’ seeks to investigate and outline problem representations in policy proposals (Bacchi 2012a, p. 22). To answer this question, I will describe the conceptual logic that is apparent in the ‘Ghetto Plan’ by examining critical keywords and the language applied to communicate the ‘problem’. In the following, the introduction and the initiatives (the two are essential to describe a ‘problem’) of the ‘Ghetto Plan’ will allow me to identify the discourse and delve into the intention and
construction of the ‘problem’ as well as the measurement taken to solve the ‘problem’ (ibid.).
In the introduction of the ‘Ghetto Plan’, the Danish Government state that 28.0009 families with non-
western backgrounds live in ‘parallel societies’. As a consequence, the ‘problem’ of ‘parallel societies’10:
“There are holes/gaps in the map of Denmark. Many people live in large or small isolated enclaves. Here, a substantial number of citizens do accept fundamental responsibilities. They do not
participate in Danish society nor in the labour market. We have received a group of citizens who have not adopted Danish values and norms [...] The parallel society is a burden for the social cohesion of Danish society […] Citizens in parallel societies must become equal citizens who contribute to society, economically as well as humanly.” (Government 2018, pp. 5, 7).
9 An estimate based on the criteria’s mentioned in the research problem.
10 I will underline key terms applied to communicate the problem in the following quote. Furthermore, the underlined
The ‘problem’ of ‘ghettos’ and ‘parallel societies’ are centred around a nationalist discourse that takes form in a cultural framework between Danes and non-western immigrants (Freiesleben 2016, p. 190). There is much to indicate that the government constructs the ‘problem’ of ‘ghettos’ and ‘parallel societies’ as ethnic homogenous areas deemed dysfunctional and where deviant norms and values exist among non-western immigrants. These values and norms11 of non-western immigrants are deemed problematic as they are unknown to Danish society, because the government view ‘ghettos’ as “environments that in many cases develop countercultures” (Government 2018, p. 5). It is assumed that this ‘ghetto’ and ‘parallel society’ impair the probability to adopt Danish values and norms because of the ethnic composition of these areas (ibid., p. 7). Thus, cultural incompatibility between Danes and non-western immigrants threatens the social cohesion of Danish society. As a result, the ‘parallel society’ or the ‘ghetto’ are symbols of ‘failed integration’ and is therefore, rejected and constructed as a ‘threat’ in form of a ‘counterculture’, which is not perceived to be ‘Danish’, and which calls for extraordinary politics12 and measurements to address this ‘problem’ of
non-western immigrants. Consequently, the scope of the ‘problem’ involves a ‘micro-macro burden’ where many ‘sub-problems’13 and various agents are interrelated14 highlighting that “the
greater the emphasis on strong integration, the bigger the problem of the non-integrated” (Mortensen in Simonsen 2016, p. 97). This perception of the ‘problem’ is apparent in the
government’s definition of and initiatives towards ‘ghettos’ and ‘parallel societies’ holding physical and mental aspects (i.e. the areas themselves and the people who make up these areas) which
display how substantial the ‘problem’ is. A substantial ‘problem’ can justify solutions to the
‘problem’ which calls for strong actions (Delica & Hansen 2014, p. 11). Hence, the proposed policy initiatives to solve the ‘problem’ comprehending demolition, sanctions, control, and punishment (Government 2018, p. 8).
11 These norms and values will be outlined in the next question.
12 Extraordinary Politics deal with the preconditions of the nation state’s existence that is the identity of the nation
and its people (Freiesleben 2016, p. 86).
13 Criminality, unemployment rates, education, welfare benefits, parenting etc.
14 Parents, schools, day-cares, the police, social workers, the state, local authorities, real estate association of the
5.2 What presuppositions or assumptions underpin this representation of the
‘problem’?
The second question examines the taken-for-granted background ‘knowledge’ presumed in the thoughts of the ‘problem’. Investigating the presuppositions embedded in the ‘problem’, one can determine the conceptual logic that depends on the problem representation in the ‘Ghetto Plan’
(Goodwin 2012, p. 32). To understand how the ‘problem’ emerged underlying assumptions will be outlined. This is done by identifying binaries, key concepts, and categories that together shape the societal understanding/knowledge of the ‘problem’ (ibid.).
5.2.1 A homogenous ‘us’ and ‘them’
By outlining the ‘problem’ as a substantial issue regarding incompatible values and norms, the government must outline a comparison between Danes and non-western immigrants in order to clarify their differences: “The parallel society is a burden on the social cohesion of Danish society. It [the parallel society] is a threat towards our modern society when freedom, democracy,
trustworthiness, equality and tolerance is not acknowledged as the primary values. And when rights and responsibility are not adhered to accordingly” (Government 2018, p. 5). The values and norms of Danish society and its people are presented with stereotypical favourable liberal terms which show the politization of culture and the culturalization of policy15 in which liberal values are spoken of as Danish culture. For this reason, the ‘Ghetto Plan’ functions as an identity project/claim in which the favour of a monocultural framework consisting of liberal values and norms is the very foundation of social cohesion (Freieseleben 2016, p. 195).
Furthermore, there is strong emphasis on gendered differences in the identity claims in which gendered aspects are applied to outline the liberal values and norms of a Danish identity by comparing them with contrasted values and norms of non-western immigrants. The ‘Ghetto Plan’ illustrates an example by featuring a statistics model outlining the amount of social control and freedom among Danes and western immigrant women, stating that “women [with non-western background] are considered being less worth than men. Social control and inadequate equality set narrow boundaries for the freedom of the individual [in parallel societies]”
(Government 2018, p. 5). The government outline its values and norms by representing what non-western immigrants are not, and to illustrate differences, crude
stereotypes consisting of ideal types of a Danish identity and defective types of non-western immigrants are established where cultural complexities are neglected.
Contrary to the Danish values and norms, the values of the ghetto/parallel society are outlined as a negative counterpart with antonyms of the outlined Danish values and norms. For example, by being characterized as intolerant, having high degrees of social control, being irresponsible, anti-democratic, and back warded (ibid.). The government assumes that non-western immigrants purposely lump together in socially vulnerable residential areas where they resist on partaking responsibility and to contribute to society. For example, the government writes: “You may get the impression that a person can lose the ability to work the moment that the person arrives on Danish soil” and instead deprive the welfare system and practice a collective counterculture (ibid., p. 6). In line with this is the understanding that this form of segregation is a sign of an active cohesive community where non-western immigrants resist to integrating and becoming a part of the Danish society by distancing themselves from the wider society (Freiesleben 2016, p. 138). Thus, it is assumed that segregation is due to difference in ethnicity where cultural characteristics and attributes are perceived as the cause of segregation from the wider society (ibid., p. 138). Consequently, the problem representation of the ‘ghetto’ and ‘parallel societies’ underpins presumptions that values and norms of Danes and non-western immigrants are self-evident and common sense.
However, “Immigrants are […] often diffused, making it harder to construct them as a parallel society threatening national sovereignty” (Simonsen 2016, p. 90). Therefore, the spatial claim has a particular role in the construction of an ‘us’ and ‘them’. The government highlights the “process of territorial imagination, remembering of lands lost, irrevocably or temporarily” (Özkirmli 2010, p. 209) by displaying a map of Denmark with different dots which represents the physical placement of these ‘ghettos’ and ‘parallel societies’ (Government 2018, p. 12). The spatial claim is a tool to correlate the ‘problem’ of ‘failed integration’ with characteristics of non-western immigrants which “confirms and buttresses the chain of equivalence between the three ghetto criteria of ethnicity, resources and crime” (Simonsen 2016, p. 94). For example, social cohesion and contribution to society become equivalent to a Danish society and its people while the ‘parallel society’ and non- western immigrants are linked with disruption and discord. By linking the physical aspect with the criterion of ‘parallel societies’, the government distinctly establish specific perceptions and
boundaries of belonging in which an absolute homogenous identity of Danish and non-western immigrant is established and where the characteristics of Danes and non-western immigrants as
5.3 How has this representation of the ‘problem’ come about?
The third question seeks to investigate the genealogy of how the representation of the ‘problem’ has come about. The question goes beyond the specific policy text by examining the historical context of the problem representation and how the problem representation has been produced, maintained and legitimatized over time, and thus evolved into knowledge systems (Goodwin 2012, p. 33). These unexamined ways of thinking display the political and cultural circumstances that admit problem representation to gain dominance (ibid.). To answer this question, I will look at the origins, histories and mechanisms of the identified problem representation where the key concepts and categories of the problem representation function as guiding principles to answer this question.
5.3.1 The affiliation between the Danish People’s Party and the Danish Liberal Party
The Danish Liberal Party has over time been dependent on the Danish Peoples Party’s mandates to form government due to their increased electoral support since the 2000s (Simonsen 2016, p. 85.). Three major contemporary events16 i.e. ‘9/11’, the ‘cartoon controversy’ and recently the ‘refugee crisis’ have contributed to the increased electoral support and a securitization of integration (Rytter & Pedersen 2014; Agius 2013): 1) Non-western immigrants perceived as a threat due to terrorism (Rytter & Pedersen 2014); 2) An economic threat due to the burden of the welfare system by being in a constant state of negative reciprocity (Rytter 2018, p. 6); 3) A cultural threat challenging the “homogeneity of society, because immigrants do not support the values responsible for maintaining social cohesion” (Simonsen 2016, p. 85).
The Danish People’s Party have been central to the debate of immigration and integration opposing immigration and refugees from non-western countries while simultaneously advocating for the maintenance of a “nativist conception of [a] Danish community” (Simonsen 2016, p. 84). With the increasing electoral support and these significant events, the Danish People’s Party has forced the political spectrum to adopt similar skeptical attitudes to maintain power (either to gain voters or due to the fear of losing voters) resulting in a strict immigration regime and the widely acceptance of their ideas and positions in the political arena as a mainstream political party (Simonsen 2016, p. 85.).
16 In this lies historical events as well, for example the oil crisis in 1973 resulting in increasing unemployment;
temporary migrants becoming permanent residents; the growing influx of refugees during the 1980s and 1990s; and the role of the anti-immigrant party Fremskridtspartiet (the Progress Party).
This collaboration between the Danish Liberal Party and the Danish People’s Party is apparent in the temporal claims of the ‘Ghetto Plan’ where “the parallel society challenge social cohesion of Danish society which has been developed and built through generations” (Government 2019, p. 37). Coupled with this, the government emphasizes that “a generation ago the majority of citizens was ethnic Danish. This is no longer the case […] many with non-western backgrounds have a different culture far from the Danish one” (ibid., p. 9). The assumption here indicates that values and norms are attached, fixed and a prerequisite according to ethnicity. Here, the emphasis on ‘generations’ adds to the idea of family and kinship in which “immigrants stand outside Danish society not only by cultural differences, but also because they are excluded from the genesis narrative of Danish values” (Simonsen 2016, p. 94) in which the values and norms are inherited. As a result, the temporal claim contributes to a historical nativist narrative that connects the homogenous idea of a unified peoples to the idea of liberal values and norms (ibid., p. 85).
5.3.2 The role of the welfare state
However, the view of Denmark as a culturally homogenous society is “only a fairly brief interlude in a long history of social, economic and cultural diversity” (Olwig & Paerregaard 2011, p. 6). The welfare state is an influential factor that connects the ideological elements from competing
nationalist projects17, and which successful has implemented the idea of a Danish national identity. The role of the welfare state18 has been significant in the contribution of an imagining national identity and functions as a category in the ‘Ghetto Plan’ where the application of ‘we’,
‘participation’, ‘contribution’, and ‘responsibility’ is continuously applied in order to demonstrate the obligation and loyalty to Danish society that, above all, must be an absolute priority for social cohesion and a homogenous entity.
Therefore, the welfare state depends on the population to take in values and norms i.e. the
contribution and participation to society as the welfare state implicates Danes on every level of their daily lives “take up paid employment outside the home, pay any taxes, and leave the care of the children, the sick, the disabled and the elderly to professionals in public institutions.” (Jöhncke 2011, p. 48). The welfare institutions are thereby contributing to the contribution and maintenance of national identity, as it is the population that holds the responsibility and obligation to contribute to
17 Nativist and liberal perceptions
18 The political agreement Social Reform Act of 1933 indicated an idea of a solidary society comprising an egalitarian
‘our’ schools, ‘our’ hospitals (ibid., p. 42) and which makes it “difficult to imagine Denmark without the welfare state” (ibid., p. 41) as the population is integrated as a whole with the idea of being one kind (ibid.)
As a result, many Danes associate “[receiving] of public benefits and the inability to provide for oneself as shameful and embarrassing” (ibid.). Immigrants have become an interfering category which has not been able to contribute to the welfare system in the course of a lifetime (Rytter 2018, p. 9). Therefore, the question of integration has “revolve[d] around how to turn them into “proper” members of society who adhere to these values, the assumption being that they do not share them” (Olwig & Paerregaard 2011, p. 8) highlighting the requirement of national attachment that may contribute to internal differences by constructing ideas of ‘real’ and ‘not-quite-real’ by
institutionalizing a Danish national identity. Hence, the emphasis on the institutional role of the welfare state, for example through day care facilities to contribute to Danish norms and values, which is noticeable in initiatives demanding that children with non-western backgrounds have to attend nursery school from the age of one year (Government 2018, p. 24).
5.4 What is left unproblematic in this problem representation? How can the
‘problem’ be thought about differently?
The fourth question brings forth the limitations of the problem representation by discussing alternative ways to think about the ‘problem’ that may be absent due to the specific way of representing a ‘problem’ (Goodwin 2012, p. 33).
5.4.1 Economic and structural factors
Other factors than the underlying assumption in which non-western immigrants purposely lumps together in ‘parallel societies’ to practice deviant norms and values contribute to the situation of non-western immigrants in socially vulnerable residential areas. With the acute need to house labour migrants during the 1960s, the government accommodated labour migrants19 in social residential areas as these were inexpensive and large enough to house families (Børresen 2002, p. 9). Therefore, immigrants and refugees are often accommodated by municipalities, which limit their decision to decide where to live (ibid.). Moreover, the position immigrants hold in a new country, often reduces social and human capital and limits the knowledge of the housing market and job market (Skifter Andersen 2006a, p. 8). Housing patterns and the social and
