Article

2004-11-25 Europe

Turkish workers a mistake, claims former German chancellor

Archived material is restricted to Rantburg regulars and members. If you need access email fred.pruitt=at=gmail.com with your nick to be added to the members list. There is no charge to join Rantburg as a member.

Posted by Bulldog 2004-11-25 4:10:42 AM|| || Front Page|| [3 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 authoritarian governments, he added, naming Singapore as an example This a gratuitous slur against a country that has a very large immigrant population - fully 33% of the population and a very succesful immigration policy. Singapore actually wants its immigrants and actively seeks out those who it feels will benefit the country.

Posted by phil_b 2004-11-25 6:32:15 AM|| 2004-11-25 6:32:15 AM|| Front Page Top

#2 This a gratuitous slur against a country that has a very large immigrant population

It's only a slur if you think "authoritarian" to be an insult. Which I do, but am not sure Singapore does.

"The PAP prohibits public discussion of sensitive racial and religious issues "
"...any public assembly of more than five people must receive police approval."

Posted by Aris Katsaris 2004-11-25 10:11:04 AM|| 2004-11-25 10:11:04 AM|| Front Page Top

#3 Anywhere else, and this would be merely inteligent discussion of demographics, and easily processed.
Here, it is disturbing if only because of the history. Kinda like when a white, conservative southerner like me weighs in on racial issues here in the U.S.

My sympathies, TGA, for all the Ignorant comments (including mine!) you are about to recieve.

Posted by N Guard 2004-11-25 10:20:03 AM|| 2004-11-25 10:20:03 AM|| Front Page Top

#4 I've got no problem with foreign workers who assimilate

Posted by Frank G 2004-11-25 10:22:52 AM|| 2004-11-25 10:22:52 AM|| Front Page Top

#5 Aris et alia: the situation in Singapore is a lot more complex than that; keep in mind it started out as a mainly Chinese city in a newly independent country where the Chinese were a hated minority group.

I wouldn't be suprised to learn that a great many of their immigrants are Chinese-descended people escaping discrimination from elsewhere in SE Asia.

Posted by Phil Fraering 2004-11-25 10:32:50 AM|| [http://newsfromthefridge.typepad.com] 2004-11-25 10:32:50 AM|| Front Page Top

#6 We have many different cultures living in the same society and we have to do that with mutual respect."

Word, man. It's all about 'spect. I've got a family to feed.

Posted by Latrell Sprewell 2004-11-25 10:40:10 AM|| 2004-11-25 10:40:10 AM|| Front Page Top

#7 My neck still hurts

Posted by P.J. Carlissimo 2004-11-25 10:48:40 AM|| 2004-11-25 10:48:40 AM|| Front Page Top

#8 PF: Aris et alia: the situation in Singapore is a lot more complex than that; keep in mind it started out as a mainly Chinese city in a newly independent country where the Chinese were a hated minority group.

Hate is too strong a word. Resented is more like it.

PF: I wouldn't be suprised to learn that a great many of their immigrants are Chinese-descended people escaping discrimination from elsewhere in SE Asia.

That much is correct. The benefits for the ethnic Chinese refugees are clear. What's in it for the Singaporean government? This is part of a strategy to preserve or increase the proportion of ethnic Chinese in the country. Singapore is also deliberately admitting large numbers of Chinese nationals into the country to preserve its ethnic balance, despite the higher birth rates of its Malay Muslim ethnic minority.

By contrast, Germany is deliberately introducing people from another religion into the country. This is a very different proposition from what is happening in Singapore. If Germany were to try to redress the imbalance, it would have to start importing Eastern European, Filipino or Hispanic immigrants into the country.

Posted by Zhang Fei 2004-11-25 2:10:51 PM|| [http://timurileng.blogspot.com] 2004-11-25 2:10:51 PM|| Front Page Top

#9 Singapore claims to import foreigners on the basis of specialized talents. But the reality is that large numbers are unskilled Chinese nationals brought in to pad the proportion of ethnic Chinese in the country. Singapore's objectives are quite distinct from Germany's - Germany imported Turks to fill a labor gap irrespective of culture or religion, whereas Singapore is attempting to preserve the domination of ethnic Chinese in Singapore's political scene and economy.

Posted by Zhang Fei 2004-11-25 2:19:51 PM|| [http://timurileng.blogspot.com] 2004-11-25 2:19:51 PM|| Front Page Top

#10 The bottom line here is that the color-blind immigration policies of the West are quite unique. No other region of the world invites foreigners of other skin colors and religions to change the very composition of society. (I think it is unhealthy to admit too many people at once - Germany might end up becoming Turkish rather than the Turks becoming German). Europe is finding out what unlimited immigration coupled with the welfare state means for the preservation of their culture. Multiculturalism coupled with immigration is nothing more than the colonization of the West by another name.

Posted by Zhang Fei 2004-11-25 2:25:27 PM|| [http://timurileng.blogspot.com] 2004-11-25 2:25:27 PM|| Front Page Top

#11 [Only the West] invites foreigners of other skin colors and religions to change the very composition of society. ...Europe is finding out what unlimited immigration coupled with the welfare state means for the preservation of their culture

Emphasis on the welfare state here. America's success in assimilation waves of immigrants who were strikingly different from the majority (first quakers and other Prot. dissenters, then Irish Catholics, then jews and asians and latinos) derives largely from the combination of a) great economic opportunities for the skilled and ambitious and b) the absence of a welfare teat to nourish the unskilled and/or lazy.

The Europeans are screwed in this matter by their fundamentally corporatist approach to different ethnic and religious minorities. Rather than provide incentives for (and eliminate barriers against) individual entrepreneurship-- which is the tried and true immigrant path to integration and a stake in the larger society-- the euros still think in terms of groups rather than individuals, ie in terms of political entities that require co-optation by the state rather than self-standing economic actors. There's little difference between the corporatism of Mussolini and Hitler and the recent proposals by Sarkozy in France for separate Muslim institutions that are infiltrated and directed by the state. This is the corporatist mentality that underlines Herr Schmidt's unfortunate remarks. Sigh.

The American individualist/laissez-faire approach has the great benefit of being ruthlessly color-blind, which ensures that entrepreneurial strivers prosper and that resenters fail. Also, this breeds a commitment to meritocracy that enables succeeding generations to blend into the larger culture more easily. Pretty simple, really, yet for some reason the euros are incapable of learning from 300 years of repeated American success with this concept.

Posted by lex 2004-11-25 3:19:34 PM|| 2004-11-25 3:19:34 PM|| Front Page Top

#12 In my personal experience, skilled Indians and Europeans had no difficulty in getting Singaporean Permanent Residence.

large numbers are unskilled Chinese nationals - This is contary to my experience and I'd like to see some evidence to back up the claim.

Posted by phil_b 2004-11-25 4:24:07 PM|| 2004-11-25 4:24:07 PM|| Front Page Top

#13 lex, the reason European nations are not following the American path of laissez-faire integration is that Europeans consider the individual as a citizen, to be governed and given privileges -- while Americans think of individuals as ends in themselves, who tolerate government for the sake of securing their rights.

Think about this: are you a _subject_ of the State from birth to death, or is the government _your_ temporary delegate?

Posted by Kalle (kafir forever) 2004-11-25 7:46:57 PM|| [http://radio.weblogs.com/0103811/categories/currentEvents/] 2004-11-25 7:46:57 PM|| Front Page Top

#14 Sad but true, Kalle. This is I think the essence of the British reluctance to sign on to the EU project. In the Lockean Anglo-American political culture, the state does not exist above and before the individual. It is the individual who, by bestowing his consent, creates the state, not v-v. Profoundly contrary to EU thinking, ideology, culture, m.o.

Posted by lex 2004-11-25 11:24:29 PM|| 2004-11-25 11:24:29 PM|| Front Page Top

#15 phil_b: This is contary to my experience and I'd like to see some evidence to back up the claim.

The Asian bulletin board on Yahoo appears to default to Singapore. There are a lot of complaints from local ethnic Chinese that Chinese nationals are being imported en masse for menial jobs. For many locals, the issue isn't the ethnic composition of imported labor - they want it stopped, period.

Posted by Zhang Fei 2004-11-26 12:02:06 AM|| [http://timurileng.blogspot.com] 2004-11-26 12:02:06 AM|| Front Page Top

00:22 lex
00:02 2b
00:02 Zhang Fei
23:46 lex
23:45 lex
23:38 PBMcL
23:31 lex
23:27 mjh
23:26 lex
23:24 lex
23:17 lex
23:15 lex
23:05 anonymous2u
23:03 Frank G
22:58 phil_b
22:54 Frank G
22:53 Frank G
22:42 Verlaine
22:37 Mitch H.
22:34 Mark Z.
22:33 gromky
22:27 Verlaine
22:27 RWV
22:27 lex