Dorland wrote: "The demographic battle has already been won"

What does it mean ?

"Many French Muslims feel themselves to be fully French"

No they don't.

"ethno-racial considerations aside, have many of the same reasons as français de souche for feeling resentment towards new-comers."

You shouldn't put "ethno-racial" considerations aside. Racial and ethnic awareness is the main reason why Europeans oppose immigration, and the main reason why immigrants vote for the socialists.

If you have met young immigrants in france, you will have noticed that they do not show much interest in intellectual life and in the finer aspects of European civilization. When you watch French TV, it seems that the programs aimed at the immigrants are limited to "youth culture" programs, as if immigrants could only be stupid, impatient, childlike people. It is supposed to be culture for teenagers, but European teenagers are better than that. Yet, this is what European civilization is turning into. Haven't you noticed ?

"If there is de facto segregation going on in many suburban areas, it's due, not to some ethnic plot, but rather to the absurdly ill-advised housing policies of the French state"

Segregation is mainly caused by white flight, due to immigrant crime and immigrant bad behavior.

"the absurdly ill-advised housing policies of the French state, which have had much the same predictable consequences (crime, ghettoization, inter-generational poverty...) as the American housing project boom of the 1960's and 70's."

The French state is not responsible for muslim crime. Originally, the housing projects were made for the local population, and crime was not a problem. But gradually, many whites had to leave, due to mass immigration and rising crime.

"I'm very skeptical regarding the supposed desire for "Islamicization" among European Muslims."

You mean Muslims living in Europe.

"If Islam has become an important vector of immigrant identity in recent years, it has just as much to do with the exclusion and the creation of an oppositional ghetto identity as with international relations or any genuinely religious impulse."

It is a big ghetto! Muslims are about to become a majority in large French cities. It is the whites who are driven away. In the third-world too, islam and terrorism seem to be used as a protest against modernity and the western world. So, it is not only the french government's fault.

"French republicanism has so far done a remarkably good job resisting the sort of official multiculturalism (...) which characterizes politics in the US and Britain."

What is it you call "french republicanism"? France has done a good job of replacing Europeans with third world immigrants. It is the only thing that counts. Whether or not the immigrants are allowed to have their own television stations and learn Arabic and Wolof at school is only a detail. Even if french is the only language allowed in french schools, it will not turn Arabs into Europeans. For example, Europeans do not commit gang rapes and torch cars after it gets dark.

Dorland: Thank you for a well-thought comment from a French perspective. One thing that I would like to see discussed is the FN's economic policy. My understanding is that Le Pen is instinctively anti-capitalist. That sets him very much apart from Wilders in the Netherlands, Blocher in Switzerland, and the Progress Party in Norway. It could also be part of the reason why he is popular with un-integrated French Muslims; or at least, more popular than one would expect. Any thoughts?

Thanks for the link, Paul.

Andre: I agree that there's something incoherent about the FN's recent effort to win the Muslim vote (even if some sense can be made of it if you imagine the FN as a specifically conservative movement the first priority of which is putting an end to immigration -- in such a scenario, all allies are good ones).

I'm less convinced by your other claims.

You write: "French Muslims are pro-immigrant because: (a) a larger relative share of the French population provides greater protection from discrimination and/or oppression from ethnic French; (b) this enables Muslims to form segregated communities not dependent on participating in the French economy or society; and (c) this aids in furthering the goals of Islamization. [...] French Muslims will not fight against immigration nor will they stand idly by as the Front National changes official policy; rather, they will fight (not unlike Hispanics in the United States and non-Whites throughout Europe) to expand current immigration policies."

This is to ignore the complexity of the French case, which in a number of respects departs from the American experience with Hispanic immigration (though I've met a fair share of Hispanic-Americans who oppose mass immigration). To respond point by point:

a) Muslims (or, better, "Muslim-origin" because many descendants of North African immigrants are not practicing) already are at around 10% of the total French population and their share is growing fast due to relatively high birth rates. The demographic battle, in this sense, has already been won (or lost, depending on your point of view).

A more pressing concern for most immigration-origin French people is social exclusion, which is a large part of why JMLP's populist message is appealing in the banlieues.

Many French Muslims feel themselves to be fully French and, ethno-racial considerations aside, have many of the same reasons as français de souche for feeling resentment towards new-comers. 

b) Only a minority of French Muslims wish to form "segregated communities". If there is de facto segregation going on in many suburban areas, it's due, not to some ethnic plot, but rather to the absurdly ill-advised housing policies of the French state, which have had much the same predictable consequences (crime, ghettoization, inter-generational poverty...) as the American housing project boom of the 1960's and 70's.

c) I'm very skeptical regarding the supposed desire for "Islamicization" among European Muslims. Again, it seems to me that this notion only applies to a radical minority. Just as many North Africans, if not more, are functionally atheist. If Islam has become an important vector of immigrant identity in recent years, it has just as much to do with the exclusion and the creation of an oppositional ghetto identity as with international relations or any genuinely religious impulse. Here, too, the stupid policies of the French state deserve much of the blame. 

In sum, things are more complicated than you let on. Some French Muslims -- the more integrated ones who feel a sense of national entitlement and think their social interests are harmed by policies favoring newcomers -- will indeed fight against immigration. Others, perhaps the majority, will behave as you suggest, endorsing continued mass immigration in order to increase their presence on French soil.

Finally, you write: "The policies and programmes associated with multiculturalism have created a permanent problem in the French electorate by re-shaping French demographics." In fact, French republicanism has so far done a remarkably good job resisting the sort of official multiculturalism -- regarded as an American invention and therefore bad -- which characterizes politics in the US and Britain.

Bousquet: "With Le Pen, one does not sense the hostility regarding Islam that infuses a good part of the French right. The FN is seen much more as an anti-immigrant party than as an anti-Islamic one. The fight against immigration remains at the heart of its program. However, these immigrants are in the process of becoming the very substance of its electorate. That is the paradox. Le Pen’s positions on Islam and foreign policy have something to do with it."

 

If the Front National is not anti-Islamic, why then is it anti-immigrant? Individuals and organizations who oppose immigration do so because they are attempting to preserve some form of homogeneity (e.g. ethnic, sub-racial/racial, socio-cultural etc.) that is threatened by immigration.1 French Muslims, the majority of whom are immigrants threaten French homogeneity in every conceivable way i.e. they differ in culture and physical characteristics and are unable thus far to be assimilated into ethnic French society. Moreover, French Muslims are pro-immigrant because: (a) a larger relative share of the French population provides greater protection from discrimination and/or oppression from ethnic French; (b) this enables Muslims to form segregated communities not dependent on participating in the French economy or society; and (c) this aids in furthering the goals of Islamization. The policies and programmes associated with multiculturalism have created a permanent problem in the French electorate by re-shaping French demographics; ethnic French interests attempting to co-opt Muslim ones are in the same position as Baltic nationalists attempting to get their significant Russian minorities on side. French Muslims will not fight against immigration nor will they stand idly by as the Front National changes official policy; rather, they will fight (not unlike Hispanics in the United States and non-Whites throughout Europe) to expand current immigration policies. Le Pen's stance is not only oxymoronic but also moronic.