Future EU Network on Immigrant Religion – Sign up today!

I had coffee on Friday with Hubert Krieger, a research manager for the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions, an EU agency located in Dublin. Hubert overflows with energy–sometimes too much, he confessed, especially for someone who’s been working 20 years in the same position. But I think this is a good thing because he’s putting together a network of researchers and policymakers from 28 European cities, including Istanbul and Izmir in Turkey, to explore local needs and strategies concerning the integration of migrants. It’s simply a huge undertaking to coordinate this and get everyone on the same page, especially because there is no EU-wide mandate for integration; it’s up to individual nations and municipalities to identify their integration issues and how best to address them. As I understand it, the goal of this network is to take the jumbled mess of migration policies from across Europe and distill some best practices based on pooled research, strategies, and lessons learned.

What’s missing is an explicit research initiative on religion, and this is why Hubert has shown such an interest in my project. He says that ethnic Germans, both politicians and the general public, simply know very little about the 3 million Turks living in Germany, especially when it comes to their religion. Until very recently the German government took a hands-off approach that barely acknowledged the cultural differences of Turks and focused primarily on labor market integration. Of course there are other European countries in similar situations, but when it was revealed that some of the 9/11 hijackers had studied in Hamburg, Germans because especially concerned about what was going on in their Muslim migrant communities.

Now, I’m in no position to root out Islamic extremism in Berlin and my project is certainly not designed to do so. Indeed, my focus is on the very moderate, “can’t we all just get along” sermons of the Turkish government, an entity that probably commands a small share of the Islamic religious market in Germany (although this remains to be seen). Uncovering extremist ideology might be more pressing in terms of policy and security, but I think it’s also important to understand how major players like DITIB shape the structure of migrant religious life. Hubert agrees with me on this, and he knows that there is only so much a person can do for one dissertation. However, he also wants to fill out more of the picture, especially since religion is going to become increasingly important to his research program in the coming years.

So Hubert strongly encouraged me to network with other students of religion and migration in Europe, not just to say “Hey, what’s new?” but ultimately to design collaborative research projects that the EU would be interested in funding. In other words, there couldn’t be a better time to dream up, or bring to life, both quantitative and qualitative studies on immigrant religious life in Europe, particularly those with policy implications. I know several German and Turkish researchers who work on Turks in Germany and I’ll be getting in touch with them soon. In the meantime, if you or people you know work on this subject, please let me know. I haven’t decided if Europe is going to be one of my long-term research interests, but I’d be happy to put others in touch.