Transatlantic Roots of Rage
By Dr. Jackson Janes

Burning Cities
Forty years ago, in the summer of 1965, the United States witnessed an outbreak of urban violence in Los Angeles which eventually spread around the country. Over the next four years, riots ravaged New York City, San Francisco, Chicago, Philadelphia, Detroit, and Washington, D.C. The street battles were racial conflicts driven by a cancerous mixture of poverty, unemployment, incidents of police brutality, and the murder of Martin Luther King, Jr. in April of 1968. But there was also a pervasive sense of powerlessness among those caught up in that poisonous web. There were many reports generated by these experiences, one of which proclaimed that "our nation is moving toward two societies, one black, one white - separate and unequal."

How much progress the United States has made since those turbulent years is still a matter of debate. Inequality remains a contentious issue in an American society where class and race continue to matter in maintaining political consensus and economic success, or the lack of same. Drawing on the lessons of the past, we have enabled a larger part of the minorities in the U.S. to establish a larger stake in the society. But we are continually confronted with those still left behind, despite policies designed to address them. Hurricane Katrina was another recent reminder of that brittle part of the United States.

Burning Cars
Watching the burning cars in France during the past weeks, Americans can or should be able to recognize part of the rage. The basis for the alienation and anger among the younger generations of immigrants who do not feel or are not seen as really "French" may not be comparable to the roots of American discontent. But the poverty, unemployment, and powerlessness may be similar dimensions of a shared problem.

Despite the fact that French society touts its "liberté, égalité, fraternité" slogans for all its citizens, the entrenched patterns of social divisions remain sobering reminders that our rhetoric often outpaces our realities.

While President Chirac has pronounced that France is having an identity crisis, the rest of Europe is also struggling with a similar set of challenges. The answers to questions like "who are we?" will differ across the European continent and elsewhere, based on our respective histories, mythologies, and our capacities to build on and share both. But in most cases, the "we" referred to within our societies is far more complicated and contradictory than we like to admit.

Who are "we"?
In his latest book, Freedom, Timothy Garton Ash challenges us with a question: "what's the widest political community of which you spontaneously say 'we' or 'us'? In our answer lies to the key to our future." He also cites an old proverb that says that a nation is a group of people united by a common dislike of their neighbors and a shared misunderstanding of their past. Or as Erik Erikson once warned us: we spend too much time working on whom we are not, rather than who we are.

The political society of France is coming to grips with the unfinished questions of the "we" in a society made up of so many different communities. Around 5.5 percent of the French population is foreign, 45 percent of which are North African or African and most of whom are Muslim. Yet the peculiarities of French citizenship laws make it confusing to count or label who is French or foreign. Where does the "we" end, and the "other" begin in France? In an age of increasingly borderless societies, those questions are of short-term concern if they are to have long-term positive answers.

Most countries around the globe have not found permanent answers. How an American citizen was defined in the mid-nineteenth century was different than in the mid-twentieth century, although it took a civil war and a powerful effort by women that accounted for this difference. On the other hand, there are those who believe they have the right answers but have a decisive commitment to making the "we" more restrictive and making the "other" unwelcome.

Germany's Integration Challenges
So how is Germany coping with all this? Is it likely that the riots we have seen on both sides of the Atlantic might break out in Berlin, Bielefeld or Bremen?

The answers will depend on how Germany defines the "we" and the "other." Based on their own recent history, Germans carry a continuous reminder of the depths to which a society can fall if those answers result in defining a "we" at the expense of erasing the "other." Today, all of us can see the fresh scars of those answers in the killing fields of Africa, Southeast Asia, and even on the doorsteps of Europe in the Balkans.

Today's Germany is host to over seven million foreigners, making up around 9 percent of its population. The largest group is made up of Turks, whose population is around two million. The vast majority come from other European countries. The loudest debate in Germany about this presence has been driven by the question of how successful the process of integrating foreign residents has been with a focus on the non-Europeans (read Turks). But there are also immense difficulties with the so-called ethnic Germans who have arrived from Russia during the past decade. The integration challenge is not entirely based on the religion of a group, but rather on the readiness to be integrated as well.

How can one measure integration? One-third of the foreigners living in Germany have been there for more than two decades, two-thirds more than eight years. Yet living in Germany for a longer period of time is no guarantee for integration. As one can see from the French or other societies, alienation can go hand in hand with long-term residence. Familiarity can breed contempt.

Is Unemployment the Cause?
Having a stake in a system has much to do with whether one has a job and a future in it. Here the problems of foreigners in Germany are more serious. The unemployment rate of foreigners is around 20 percent, almost double the national rate, and two-thirds of that group is between the ages of twenty-five and forty-five. Related to this gap is the fact that most foreign, younger cohorts are not reaching the upper levels of education, leaving them less competitive for the job market and more likely to be on the streets.

Put that together with a language disadvantage and you have the makings of problems for those trying to see their own futures in a positive light. These are challenges that exist in many parts of Europe where the unemployment rate of foreign youth is double the rates of their national counterparts. And more are coming every day.

Yet the riots in France have not happened in Germany. Is that because the level of integration is higher? In fact, the violence seen within Germany during the past decade has been largely generated by German gangs and groups, often attacking foreigners.

The German experience with integrating its foreign populations has always required a mixture of tolerance and commitment on both sides of the equation. Yet it has also required that the foreign population feel that they have a recognized stake in their presence in Germany, despite racial or ethnic tensions, regardless of whether they are citizens or not. So far, Germany has been able to avoid the social isolation of their foreign populations in ethnic ghettos, like outside of Paris. However, it is not something that one can take for granted. The vicious circle of unemployment, poverty, and resentment can build up quickly and explode, as we have seen on both sides of the Atlantic.

Or is Citizenship the Issue?
The experience in France shows that even if many of the rioters are French citizens, unlike many of the Turks in Germany, they seem to have less stake in French society and may in fact be more alienated because of the expectations that come with citizenship. In the German case, no matter how alienated the Turks feel, they are not segregated into such unappealing ghettos. Even if they don't feel German, they have an investment in their life in Germany.

What happened in Paris was not a product of the same hate that led to the bombs in Madrid or London, although it provides fertile ground for those seeking to exploit it. It was an outbreak of the alienation within French society in which those who want a stake cannot find one. Any and all of our societies are susceptible to those threats. Whether they escalate to the murderous plans of suicide bombers is the question that emerges out of these conditions. The capacity of a society to manage inequities is a core challenge. Without a shared sense of the future among its citizens, there is little basis for dealing with its problems and less confidence in how to solve them.

From Los Angeles in 1965 to Paris in 2005 you can draw a line of familiar problems which will remain serious for many years to come, until we can find a better answer to the question Garton Ash posed about the widest political community for all of "us."

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This essay appeared in the November 17, 2005 AICGS Advisor.

Please direct comments to: jjanes@aicgs.org
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Want to know more? Check out these links:

"Fanatically Secular, France Places Scarves under Siege." By Zachary Shore, AICGS Advisor, January 9, 2004.

"Europe's Time Bomb." Newsweek International, November 21, 2005.

"A Week of Riots in Not-so Gay Paris." Der Spiegel, November 3, 2005.