Canada and the World
Current Events with a Canadian Perspective
Last update
06 January 2012
Europe’s Anti-
Movement Growing
A small but growing minority of Europeans is
voicing opposition to immigrants,
particularly Muslim ones, at the ballot box
While resistance to immigrants is an undercurrent in Canada, it’s much more out in the open in Europe.
In-
Hard Right Party Makes Gains in Netherlands
Holland is a country noted for its openness and tolerance. 
But, that seems to be
changing under the direction of Geert Wilders (left), a man who is strongly anti-
Wilders is a Dutch Member of Parliament and leader of the Freedom Party.
In June 2010, the Freedom Party grabbed enough votes (15 percent of the total) to finish third and hold the balance of power.
In an interview with the Globe and Mail’s Doug Saunders (March 2010) the Dutch politician said, “…the aim of the Islamic ideology is to dominate and to submit the Western societies to their belief, and this is unlike the other religions. I say that Islam is not another branch on the tree of religions – it has to be put in the corner of totalitarian ideologies.”
Anti-
On September 2010, Noah Barkin of Reuters News Agency reported a Wilders look-
Also calling itself the Freedom Party, it is led by a politician from Berlin called Rene Stadtkewitz.
Barkin writes that Stadtkewitz “who wants headscarves banned, mosques shuttered,
and state welfare payments to Muslims cut, is the newest face of a powerful anti-
Herder3
Anti-
In August 2010 Thilo Sarrazin, a director on the board of the Bundesbank published
an anti-
Time Magazine’s William Boston reports (September 2010) that “Sarrazin argues against
further immigration by drawing links between lower-
In France, the National Front’s leader, Jean-
However, in 2009 and 2010, France’s government has been targetting Roma (Gypsies);
an AFP-
Even Scandinavians Turn against Migrants
The most liberal and open societies in the world are in Scandinavia. But, even here,
right-
On September 19, 2010, Stephen Castle of The New York Times reported that, “Sweden
became the latest European nation to see a breakthrough for populist right-
Under the country’s proportional representation electoral system the Sweden Democrats
got 20 seats in the 349-
According to PBS Newshour (September 2010) party leader Jimmie Aakesson is “seeking a 90 percent reduction in immigration.”
Meanwhile, Castle wrote that Aakesson “described Muslim population growth as the greatest foreign threat to the country since World War II.”
Anti-
Islam is Focus of Anti-
The death of a Muslim suicide bomber in Stockholm on December 11, 2010, adds fuel
to the fire of anti-
This comes after the Madrid commuter train bombings (March 2004), the London Underground bombings (July 2005), and the furor of the Danish newspaper publishing cartoons depicting Mohammed (September 2005).
There have been numerous other incidents of violence perpetrated by Muslim extremists
and this feeds general anti-
With the Great Recession still biting hard in many places some Europeans are looking for scapegoats and immigrants present a convenient target.
Image credits
Rickvdgronde
Sources
“The Scary World of Geert Wilders.” Doug Saunders, Globe and Mail, March 11, 2010.
“Analysis: Anti-
“Top German Banker’s Attack on Immigrants Causes a Stir.” William Boston, Time, September 3, 2010.
“Swedish Anti-
“Sweden’s Anti-
© Canada and the World, January 2012
All rights reserved
“Outspoken Dutch lawmaker Geert Wilders called on the government Wednesday (January 4, 2012) to apologize for the country’s ‘passive’ response to the mass deportations of Jews by Nazi occupiers during World War II...
“Of the 140,000 Jews who lived in the Netherlands before the war, more than 100,000 were deported and murdered.”
January 2012
“...the Swiss People’s Party has been steadily expanding its support for 20 years. The party claims that immigrants (and Muslims) were greatly responsible for increased crime and other problems within Swiss society.”
October 2011
Nativism is a word used to describe negative feelings about immigrants