Steps Towards Integration: Comparing Policy and Community Action in Berlin
Rebecca Duncan
Introduction
When I first discovered that I had the opportunity to spend a month in Berlin learning about identity and migration, while simultaneously working with an organization that helps migrants in various ways, I knew straight away that I wanted to investigate the policy surrounding migrant integration. I am currently studying Economics, but a common concern I have heard about the field of Economics (one which I share) is the depersonalization that occurs when conducting analyses of people. In light of this, I wanted my research in Berlin to include a qualitative angle showing how policy impacts people on the individual level; I wanted to know more about the stories of people, and all the different ways one person may be impacted by seemingly unrelated policies.
As our study abroad group learned more about the different nonprofit organizations that students would be working with, I realized how many of these organizations stemmed from community action. In fact, we would have many opportunities to speak with people who participated in activism, or other forms of community action, relating to migrants and migration issues. So then, I realized I wanted to compare the effectiveness policy changes and community action in helping migrants.
Because of Germany’s long history of being home to migrant communities, in particular the Turkish community, many policy changes and events have occurred throughout history that have impacted migrant populations in Germany. Naturally, writing a concise paper regarding all of these policies and community action events would be quite difficult, so this paper will focus on events subsequent to the change of German citizenship law in 1998. This scope will, therefore, include impacts to migrant populations already in Germany, but will primarily emphasize the impact on asylum-seekers coming to Germany in the 2010’s. In addition, the paper will have some information about Germany as a whole, but will focus primarily on the city of Berlin.
My investigative question is the following: How effective is policy change versus community action in integrating recent migrant populations in Berlin, Germany?
A Brief Summary of Policy and its Effects on Migrants and Asylum-Seekers
One important part of integration into society is being able to become a citizen of the country in which a migrant resides. German citizenship laws have an interesting history that has significant implications for migrant communities. Before 1998, the only way a person could become a citizen of Germany was to be descended from another German citizen; the citizenship law was based on the principle jus sanguinis. In 1998, however, the German government altered the citizenship law so that it was now possible for non-citizens to become German citizens. This pathway has several key requirements, including prolonged residency, extensive knowledge of Germany and the German language. According to a summary of the reform of the 1999 citizenship law, “the red-green federal government coalition reformed the citizenship law by adding the principle of birth in Germany (jus soli) to the traditional principle of ethnic descent (jus sanguinis). The reform also eased the process of acquiring citizenship, provided that certain conditions – like knowledge of the language – were met.” These conditions included (but were not limited to) being a legal resident in Germany for eight years, commitment to the law, no criminal activity, ability to support oneself and one’s dependents without welfare or unemployment benefits, and adequate command of the German language.
This new policy certainly opened doors for parts of the migrant community in Germany; the Official 2015 Migrant Report created by the German Federal Ministry of the interior reported that, between 1995 and 2004, 1,278,424 people (or 1.5% of the German population) obtained German citizenship by naturalization. While this is an impressive statistic, there were many migrants who had been living in Germany for many years but, because of maintaining their place in their communities, had not learned enough German to gain citizenship. As of 2015, Germany is still home to over 9 million resident foreign nationals (non-naturalized permanent residents). This group does not include foreign nationals without permanent resident status (i.e. asylum-seekers, or those with temporary status). The National Integration Plan reports that “some 15 million people with a migrant background” live in Germany (as of 2008), and of course many more have arrived in Germany seeking asylum since then. Therefore, while German citizenship theoretically became more accessible to migrants, it was not as accessible in practice.
Immigration policy also evolved near the turn of the century. The Immigration Act of July 30, 2004 was a reform that “made it easier for well-qualified migrants to immigrate, permitted the entry of certain others on humanitarian grounds, and allowed the children of migrants to join their families in Germany.” In addition, reforms “encouraged integration and made it easier for criminals to be deported”. The report specifies that the federal government, as of this report, was obligated to take on many costs of efforts for integration, including costs of integration courses, and the federal states were to bear the costs of child care and social outreach in the context of integration. In 2007, the German government passed a reform to its immigration laws and developed the National Integration Plan. These actions demonstrated another way to help Germany “come one step closer to developing an integration policy within the European framework.” So, throughout the 2000’s, it seemed as if great strides were being taken in terms of integration policy.
The other side of the coin, however, is that other existing policies in place make integration challenging. One such factor is that German is the official national language of Germany. Because of this, all business conducted at governmental offices, including those such as the German Labor Office, must be conducted in German. This creates a real challenge for migrants without fluency in German who are trying to find employment quickly. In addition, the Dublin Regulations became effective across the European Union in 2013. According to the actual text of the regulation, “the main objective of [the Dublin Regulation] is to further develop the standards for procedures in Member States for granting and withdrawing international protection with a view to establishing a common asylum procedure in the Union”. The main principle of the regulation is that an “asylum request by a third country national is to be presented in the first European country the person arrives in…where he or she was identified by local authorities”. This means that people arriving into Europe as asylum-seekers by boat or on foot, as many people have in the past few years, have very little choice regarding where they can reside legally within the EU. Many asylum-seekers arrive in Italy by boat, and when they arrive, they find a slow-moving economy with little to no job opportunities. When that happens, migrants move to where there are job opportunities, such as Germany, but then lose the benefits of an asylum seeker including support to learn a new language or obtain employment. Therefore, attaining citizenship in Germany for these asylum-seekers is nearly impossible. The Dublin Regulation is an impressive step in creating standards across the EU for asylum procedures, but because of where migration is occurring, this regulation is hindering integration, not helping it.
Throughout Germany, policy framework for integration of migrants, including asylum-seekers at times conflicts with preexisting regulations, resulting in further challenges for migrants. These challenges are likely unintended, but many people are struggling with them in Germany today. With this in mind, I would like to explore how seemingly small-scale changes may have impacted migrants in communities.
Community Action in Berlin
As our group found out when we arrived in Berlin, there are many community groups throughout Berlin providing services to migrants. The fifteen members of our study abroad group volunteered at six different nonprofit community organizations that help migrant and asylum-seeker populations. Beyond our personal experiences working with these community partners, several news stories and professional opinions helped to demonstrate that there is a significant community support system in Berlin, and that there is a history of community action and activism that works to support migrants. In fact, Dr. Viola Georgi, Professor of Diversity Education at the University of Hildesheim and founding director of the Center for Educational Integration gave our group a lecture in which she recalled the peak of the influx of refugees into Germany in 2015. She remarked on what a positive, proactive response the people of Germany took at the community level to support asylum-seekers.
Much of the evidence of community action that connects to migrant populations in Berlin, specifically, are also managing the negative ramifications of gentrification; gentrification in once-affordable areas of Berlin is now forcing out migrant families that have lived there for many years. Because many of these families are migrants, and do not have German citizenship, there are fewer pathways regarding policy or voting that are available to respond to gentrification and rising home prices. So, community action has accordingly been taken in many places in Berlin. For instance, the district of Neukölln has been experiencing gentrification for almost a decade, as is described in the Spiegel article “Neukölln Nasties: Foreigners Feel Accused in Berlin Gentrification Row”. According to the article, community members of Neukölln responded to the issue of gentrification in a slightly unconventional way: putting up posters that discuss the gentrification occurring in Neukölln and ask the audience, which is intended to be “students, artists and travelers”, to “be creative and active against gentrification”. The article also highlights a bar in Neukölln, “Freies Neukölln”, whose owner made an anti-gentrification video that went viral and sparked much controversy. As the article acknowledges, gentrification is a complex issue with multiple valid perspectives, but for the purposes of this paper I would like to emphasize how the community in Neukölln took action regarding gentrification when other avenues may not have been available. Despite this community engagement, gentrification continues to affect Neukölln, and the rest of Berlin.
Periodicals are continuing to chronicle the multiple dimensions of the pushback to gentrification throughout Berlin. More recently, the New York Times article “In Berlin, a Grass-Roots Fight Against Gentrification as Rents Soar” outlined how grass roots movements to halt gentrification have pressured local authorities to “put into effect a slate of measures, including rent caps…development-free zones and increased social housing subsidies” to address the housing market and “conserve the diverse social and cultural makeup of city center”. Residents are now creating an initiative to have milieuschutz in their area. The article describes milieuschutz as “social environment protection”, so that “real estate is shielded against owners’ attempts to renovate and modernise it to the extent that existing residents could be forced out.” In the same article, a local city councilor explains about the measures he has been taking to increase awareness of what residents “have to tolerate and what they don’t” in regards to rent and living spaces. Both this article and the 2011 Spiegel piece are key examples of how residents are creatively confronting gentrification through community action, and many of these residents represent or are themselves migrants or asylum-seekers.
Pushback against gentrification is by no means the only context in which we see instances of community action supporting the migrant population in Berlin. For example, in 2015, an article in the Guardian described how “some of the city’s refugee population share their experiences with tourists” with a new tour around the Kreuzberg district of Berlin. The goal of the tour was partially political: to preserve and acknowledge the birth of the refugee community in Berlin. This tour is extremely connected to and supported by the community in Kreuzberg; without the support of the district, the tour would not be possible.
Communities in Berlin have also sought to help migrants integrate with different models of education. The Neighborhood Mothers Program, for instance, is a program that began in Berlin in 2004 as a grassroots outreach project. The project trains immigrant women “as mentors and agents of integration to help new immigrant families in local communities”. The mothers are the educators, and have the opportunity to be in conversation with other educators in the community. In addition, some schools have sprung up that accommodate the challenging language barrier by offering some classes in Turkish or Arabic, such as the restructured Campus Rutli. The Rutli school, which educates many students with “migratory backgrounds”, used to be one of Berlin’s worst schools, now has a “joint school” program, putting students aged six through eighteen in a comprehensive, more integrated track. The graduation rates of the school have skyrocketed since its restructuring in 2012. School administrators believe that a key part of student success, is the measures taken to integrate the large population of migrant students attending Rutli.
So, we know that communities across Berlin are taking action to support the integration and acceptance of migrants, including very recent migrants, and that some of these measures seem to be effective. Now, I want to briefly examine two cases of policy versus community action in more detail, with a more personal connection to individuals, who are impacted by the intersection of policy and community action.
The Coop Campus, a project supported by the nonprofit Schlesische 27, is a unique combination of a community garden, a school, and a gathering space. The campus first began two years ago as a project called “Die Gärtnerei”, when members of the Schlesische 27 organization and a group of refugees were able to access and use part of a cemetery in Neukölln to build and maintain a large community garden. Since then, the Coop Campus has grown to be a place where anyone, including migrants and refugees, can relax and chat with friends. In addition, the Coop Campus offers classes in German, workshops to build skills for occupations like carpentry, handicrafts, construction, or art, and is a place for “anyone who is willing to try out their ideas”, according to Fetewei, one of the founders of the garden and campus.
I had the opportunity to talk with many people at the Coop Campus about this intersection between policy and community action, and each person had very different perspectives on the efficacy of both techniques. Esther, the project coordinator of the Coop Campus, told me about the impressive growth of the project she has seen in the few months previous, but also told me of the local zoning policies and other regulations that make it impossible to guarantee how much longer the Coop Campus can remain at its current location. Sven, another one of the project leaders, recalled how many unique projects and programs he has seen take shape at the Coop Campus in the past two years, including workshops for local students to create art in the garden, dance workshops he facilitates as another way to experience the space of the garden, and many more. Fetewei talked to me about the work he, Basti, and many others are currently doing in the garden to build a large greenhouse that will also be used as a workshop, office space and possibly a performance space. While he is excited about the progress being made on the greenhouse, or the “Living Workshop”, Fetewei believes that the real problems facing migrants in Berlin are more systemic due to the dominant neoliberal trends in policy overall, but specifically in education, housing, and immigration policy.
Finally, Todosch and Federica, a sculptor and architect respectively, are working together to run creative carpentry workshops for many refugees. Based on the happiness and pride in the eyes of the folks they were working with to complete carpentry projects in the garden, they feel that they are doing something good. But, they wish more could be done regarding the roadblocks to gaining German citizenship. Todosch told me a story of a person he knew who came to Germany as a refugee, learned to speak German fluently after two years, became a skilled mechanic and jack-of-all-trades, and tried in vain to get a decent job for three more years after officially achieving fluency. After a total of five years in Germany, this man’s legal status had not changed, and he decided to go back to his home country and try to use his new skills to get a job there.
The story Todosch told me, about community support being effective up to a certain point, seemed to be a common theme among the people at the Coop Campus. Everyone agreed that the work being done to support migrants and asylum seekers was helpful; people are learning German, attaining new skills, finding safe places to stay and being welcomed by the community, which is wonderful. However, processes like applying for asylum, or getting a job, or attaining citizenship, are different struggles all together, because of the regulations in place.
In another part of Berlin near Kottbusser Tor, an organization called Kotti & Co formed as a response to the intolerable rise in social housing rents in the past decade. In May 2012, the residents’ initiative turned “a summer street fair into a permanent protest camp” by occupying a street corner and building a “permanent protest house”. The original demands of the group were to stop the increase in rent, to organize a conference on social housing, and to invite experts. I got the chance to speak with Sandy Kaltenborn, one of the co-founders of Kotti & Co, to learn more about the community-based group.
In our brief group discussion, Sandy said the rising rents made it impossible for many of his neighbors to have a decent quality of life, given their wages. As a result, this issue brought a community of very different people together to find a solution. “Kottbusser Tor is home to many different kinds of people; ethnic Germans, migrants, conservative people, liberal people. But we all met and had a meeting over there” he said, pointing to a LGBTQ-friendly restaurant across the street, “and talked about what to do.” As a member of the community but also as one of the founders of the organization, Sandy had the unique perspective of seeing what was happening on the ground in Kottbusser Tor, but also being involved in discussions of policy change regarding social housing. He talked about brief demonstrations the residents of the neighborhood would do to raise awareness and grab the attention of the media. Then, in 2012, the increased media attention due to community action led to the demand for a social housing conference being granted. Finally, in 2015, Kotti and Co. created a referendum that led to new housing policies in the area. “In 2016, they stopped the rising rent of social housing. Now”, Sandy exclaimed, “the next step may be to change the whole system!”
My conversation with Sandy presented another perspective in which community action and policy can intersect constructively to effect change. While Kotti & Co. does not deal exclusively with integration of migrants and asylum-seekers, creating accessible housing is an extremely important step in helping minorities integrate into a community. In addition, many of the people who participated in the demonstrations, and whose rents stopped rising in 2016, are recent migrants. So, for the folks at Kotti & Co., policy and community action were able to, eventually, work together constructively to enact change.
In conclusion
By combining my research, interviews, and experiences in Berlin, I have found that policy is instrumental in creating opportunities for migrants to integrate in several key ways: finding work, establishing residence, and becoming a citizen. Some recent policy changes have attempted to help even more migrants integrate in these ways, but there are still preexisting policies that hinder integration. This conflict that is sometimes created between new and old policies is often addressed by community action. However, it is not clear whether community action overall will be successful in facilitating further integration of migrants; it seems to depend on each situation. Nevertheless, after this opportunity to work with migrants in Berlin, I am hopeful that more stories of the struggle to integrate will have happier endings, and that this ending will result from the cooperative efforts of community action and policy change.
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