June 25, 2007

Immigration Imbroglio, European Style

America is no stranger to setting trends. The most recent one comes from the south of Texas, where accessorized by an Excursion and an NRA membership, anti-immigrant t-shirts are the new black.

Of course, while our guillotine-sharpening friends in France pretend to be the ones dictating the rules of style, they are spending a month of their mandatory vacation time creating ‘inspired’ versions of the “Mexi-can’t” t-shirt.

The black tees, printed on the smoothest cotton from one of the ‘–stans’, feature an Algerian struggling to gain entry into France, except that instead of jumping a wall he must swim the Mediterranean Sea, and read ‘Afri-cant.’

Now, before the good Reverend Jesse Jackson decides to supplement his child support payments with donations from affirmative action-loving liberals who will come to see him on his speaking pilgrim-, er, tour, let us be clear that race relations in France are different from here in the U.S.

But maybe not for long. The Camus-inspired guilty feelings that plagued the French are slowly turning into hostility as record numbers of Algerians infiltrate the country. The dependence of the Algerian immigrants on the social welfare programs provided by French taxpayers is amplified by the clash of values between the Muslim Algerians and the not-so-Muslim French.

France is not alone in its struggles with immigration control. The whole EU is trying to create a comprehensive immigration policy. The countries on the southern border of the Union – Italy, Malta, France and Spain – are forced into a different position than Norway or Austria by their geography.

That’s not to say that they are the only ones who have to make the pivotal decision about whether a person is allowed to seek refuge in the EU. The European Council on Refugees and Exiles dictates that all countries use the same criteria when determining who ought to be granted asylum. However, there are striking differences between the decisions of even neighboring countries. For example, Austria accepts over 90 percent of asylum-seekers from Chechnya, while Slovenia accepts only a few.

In a recent interview, Kris Pollet of Amnesty International told the BBC, “It is very striking. They are all using the same country-of-origin information and yet they all come out with very different results for the same groups. Surely it's an indication that something isn't working."

Maybe what is wrong is Mr. Pollet’s understanding of European history. Getting on Russia’s bad side has not worked that well for Eastern Europe in the past, so Austria is welcome to extend their support to the Chechens. As for the European Union members who remember the supple skin of the ‘before-Yuschenko,’ we’re keeping our heads down and hoping we get the next gas supply.

So, while back at the ranch the best accessory to the conservative, and offensive, t-shirt is a red neck, the negative undercurrents in European immigration policy will take more than simplistic solutions offered by the means of a pun. Les sigh.