Tag: Angela Joya

How Migration has Contributed the Rise of the Far-Right in Germany

Presenter(s): Quinne Hauth

Faculty Mentor(s): Angela Joya

Oral Session 1 S

Increased migration into Europe in the summer of 2015 signified a shift in how the European Union responds to migration, and now more so than in Germany, which has opened its doors to about 1.5 million migrants as of 2018. While Chancellor Angela Merkel’s welcome helped alleviate the burden placed on countries that bordered the east as well as the Mediterranean, it has been the subject of a lot of controversy over the last three years within Germany itself. This study explores how migration has affected Germany’s migration policies, and the extent to which it has affected a shift towards the right within the government. Germany’s relationship with migration has been complicated since its genesis, and that ultimately Merkel’s welcome was the exception to decades of policy, not the rule. Thus, as tensions increase between migrants and citizens, and policy fails to adapt to benefit both parties, Germany’s politicians will advocate to close the state from migrants more and more. However, these actions will fail to account for how Merkel’s decision has already drastically changed Germany’s culture, socially, demographically, and economically, and above all, politically.

Une Singularité Française: Laïcité and the Rise of Radical Islamic Terrorism among French Muslims

Presenter(s): Carson Hauth 

Faculty Mentor(s): Craig Parsons & Angela Joya

Poster 154

Session: Social Sciences & Humanities

In the past twenty years France has seen a sharp increase in radical Islamic terrorist attacks committed by its own citizens unparalleled by its neighbors in Western Europe. This study aims to address reasons for which French Muslims are radicalized at a significantly greater rate than Muslim citizens of other European nations. Three dominant theories exist to explain the phenomenon of radicalization: low socioeconomic status, external radicalization by existing terrorist and extremist cells, and secular identity politics which exclude French Muslims from French identities. Drawing from secondary sources regarding key features of the life histories of fourteen French Muslim terrorists between 1985 and 2018, we may address the extent to which these three theories explain the increased radicalization in France, and what sets France apart from other European nations. Founded on staunch republican values, the unique structure of French laïcité creates a French identity which conflicts with religious identities amongst Muslim communities. Through tacit and explicit secular laws- supported by the cultural acceptance of laïcité- which unequally target Muslims, Islam is externalized from French society thus increasing feelings of isolation and anger among French Muslims and facilitating radicalization by external catalysts. This study works towards furthering understanding the underlying causes of radicalization and the recent rise in radical Islamic terrorism.