Young Immigrants, Old Kurmudgeons: EU Demographics & Decline

Demographer Jean-Claude Barreau weighs in on Europe's immigration debate and population decline (which dovetails nicely with my last post on women's issues and fertility in France). Responding to a recently published demographic study by Eurostat, the European Commission's statistics bureau, Barreau puts forth several dubious conclusions, notably that

"The European Commission has proposed only one solution: immigration. This is a potential solution, but if it is the only one, immigration will result in the substitution of a Europe’s population. Without a sufficient number of indigenous children, we will be unable to integrate children that have arrived from elsewhere. When a schoolroom or a neighbourhood no longer has any indigenous children, integration becomes impossible."

Barreau's perspective is of an inherently French-republican sway. He also reveals himself a strongly anti-immigration advocate, making the arching assumption that readers agree on what an "indigenous" citizen is or should be.  His words belie an unspoken laziness that can sometimes characterize how Europeans approach their role in the integration process, insinuating that the onus is on migrants to make the effort -- often herculean, and unassisted -- for streamlining into their adopted societies.

Nor does Barreau grant credence to the pattern by which immigrant neighborhoods, even when overwelmingly composed of foreign-born residents, still usually manage to integrate. One needs only look at the byzantine ethnic quilt that is New York City: the Big Apple positively teems with immigrant children, who develop a culture that may not be recognizably American, but is certainly not of the old country, either. 

The rubbing-together of these neighborhoods provides the heat that brings the famous "melting pot" to simmer (which is real, even if it doesn't always work smoothly), infusing the common culture of the host land with that of the immigrants who come to populate it. 

Barreau's dreaded image of an all-immigrant classroom is precisely what one sees in many New York City schools. Yet those kids still learn English, still mix with the dominant culture and values, and still forge a way toward a national identity with vibrancy and perpetual innovation. So long as immigrant kids live in a host country and stay there, they'll form their own culture, which will belong in the place from which it sprung and might be furthermore celebrated as a cultural product of value. (Think Junot Diaz, Wyclef Jean, Zinedine Zidane and so many others.)

It may be that opinion leaders like Barreau chafe not at today's immigrant waves, and those sure to reach the shores of Europe in the future; perhaps what truly galls his camp is the inevitable change that will come when new migrants bring new vitality to a continent unwilling or uncompelled to reproduce... And what new dynamism will owe its birth to those unlike the aging experts, who can't see their likeness in Europe's crystal ball?

France, Its Women, Their Children: A Disjointed Paean from the NY Times

Several days ago the New York Times published a compelling article on the status of French women, especially as it concerns their child-raising practices. Its author, Katrin Bennhold, has written extensively on women's issues as part of a series published in partnership with the International Herald Tribune. Her piece is, predictably, of a staunch pro-feminist bent. It's also trenchant and largely well-done, yet Bennhold yields to the powers of cliché (or her editor) in profiling French women as the super-sexual beings they are assumed to be, both at home and abroad.

The piece begins with what would surely bewilder the sensibilities of the American heartland, and not a few courtesy-minded Europeans. The lead exhorts the reader to ask him or herself, "could anything be more French?" than the image that follows it, describing a state-subsidized post-birth program of "vaginal gymnastics," "electric stimulation devices" and "nimble squeezing," all for the purpose of "making love again soon and making more babies." 

An accompanying series of photographs shows a woman doctor, in a tight blouse and short skirt, sitting with crossed legs prominently displayed... with one hand between the legs of a patient on her back. The association of French femininity and overt sexuality -- and the casually provocative illustrations of her doctor's visits -- perpetuates just the kind of stereotypes that have badgered women in the feminist era, and does little to foster the respect for them that men are asked (or demanded) to concede. 

This certainly violates the all-important French civic ideal of "la discrétion," the rigorous protection of privacy that dictates many of the related codes and norms of France's art de vivre.

I'll break tone here and give a personal but no less valid case-in-point. In college, I became friends with a French female while she was studying abroad in the U.S. Less than a week after her arrival to a leafy, middle-American (and overwhelmingly conservative) college campus, she became the unwilling recipient of blatant appeals by male students asking for sex. Flabbergasted, she asked several of her would-be partners, 'Why are you asking me?' The single response was repeatedly given, "Well, I heard you were French..."

This anecdote reflects the greater cross-cultural fallout of French femininity as it's been projected in the mass media age. With no apparent sense of irony, Bennhold's article gives nods of feminist respekk to icons from Simone de Beauvoir to Brigitte Bardot. The latter is hardly a torch-bearer in the feminist march of progress; after all, she launched to fame playing the über-sultry lead in 1956's And God Created Woman, in which she spent a great deal of time semi- and fully nude, and completes the film in a ten-minute-plus tantric dance holding her skirt above her head.

-- But let's get back the article: We read on to learn about France's aggressive family-promotion programs and the playing-out of those programs in modern French family life. Bennhold praises the invaluable public service of the "école maternelle," a no-cost daycare scheme available everywhere. The schools allow women the logistical ability to work full-time. While the author praises the system's convenience, she nuances with an interviewee's quip that the schools are "called 'maternelle' for a reason," and that French women are compelled by tradition to juggle a double-load of home and work life. 

Another of Bennhold's interview subjects was Valérie Toranian, the editor-in-chief of Vogue Magazine's French edition. Toranian had this to say about the harried pace many French women struggle with:

 

“French women are exhausted,” said Toranian. [...] “We have the right to do what men do — as long as we also take care of the children, cook a delicious dinner and look immaculate. We have to be superwoman.”

This argument and others from the piece are legitimate. The author is not immune to over-reach, however, as evidenced by arching claims like "French women appear to worry about being feminine, not feminist, and French men often display a form of gallantry predating the 1789 revolution." She supports this thrust by quoting Bernard Henri-Lévy (known in Europe by the rockstar shorthand "BHL"), the pseudo-serious philosopher playboy who laid it on, like, real intellectual when he said, “France is an old Gallic macho country.” 

Grounding an argument on BHL's respectability is not the way to win over American readers, as media force Garrison Keillor has argued ascerbically and hilariously.

Let's circle back to the casually provocative tone of the article. What's prevalent is the careless reference to female anatomy, found at the piece's very beginning, which probably turned off more readers than just me. One wonders how many moderates reading the article browsed over the tangy lead, then didn't finish, assuming the rest would follow in the same spirit. What kind of feminism is to be promoted, if the rules for dialogue are not those that apply to men? What happens when men talk about their bodies -- or, come floods, women's bodies -- with an attitude that teeters on indecency? The answer, of course, is sexist and inconsiderate interaction between men and women -- and it goes both ways -- which I'm sure many women and quite a few men can relate to, either in the example of the French student above or in personal experience.

Transatlantically speaking, what happens when the notion of Bardot-like French-women-as-sexpot, or at least very-fertile in Bennhold's case, hits the public debate across the pond? Things like the caveman-esque pick-up line, and the conflicted mother-career woman. Or both. 

Maybe what we need is balance: women should be not be pressured to work, or stay at home; men could acquaint themselves with the carpool and dirty dishes. And common courtesy would go a long way to smoothing gender equality's progress in the meantime.

Roger Cohen, You're the Man

Solid insight in a broad sweep of the European political scene, from far-right Dutch politician Geert Wilders to Belgian parliamentary breakdown to the haggard but still-beating hopes for a truly federalized EU. Here.

On EU Foreign Corps, EU Officials Optimistic, Others Very Skeptical

           The locomotive of the European Union’s nascent diplomatic corps has been picking up speed, with a ribbon-cutting at the service’s new Washington site on Sep. 29^th, and officials in Brussels promising it will be ready to roll before the planned start of December 1st. But critics on both sides of the Atlantic have expressed major doubts as to whether the world can expect an EU foreign agency that can chug its weight.

            Created after the landmark Treaty of Lisbon in December 2009, the European External Action Service (EEAS) will seek to unify the EU’s voice in world diplomatic affairs. Its chief architect, Lady Catherine Ashton, sits as the EU foreign affairs chief and one of several vice presidents of the European Commission. Another key figure is João Vale de Almeida, the EU ambassador to the United States, who has been promoting a strongly optimistic view on the EEAS starting off well this winter.

EU Officials: New Service? No Problem

            The EU’s new service will offer a “a more reliable, more credible, and a more results-oriented partner” to the United States, Almeida pledged in a September interview with Washington’s The Hill newspaper. A Portuguese national and longtime deputy to European Commission head Jose Manuel Barroso, Almeida arrived in Washington in July amid talk of a “wider mandate” for his ambassadorship.

           

            “My ambition is to move beyond what exists today, to build a stronger and even more positive EU-US agenda with solid bilateral and global pillars,” Almeida said in an August press release, before presenting his credentials at the White House. He promised “an agenda that unlocks the full potential of our economies, promotes joint action in foreign policy, and enhances our capacity as global partners."

            Almeida’s words obliquely addressed critics’ concerns about the EU’s readiness to operate a new diplomatic structure—and a big one at that. As a branch of the Brussels-based European Commission, the EEAS will comprise 8,000 officials, with 800 more EU diplomats dispersed among the agency’s 136 foreign embassies. On budget, the latest estimates from the Devex newswire put the EEAS’ funds at $620 million. (...)

US Embassy Engages French Banlieues

Check out this NY Times article on engagement in banlieues by the U.S. embassy in France. (Many thanks to Art Goldhammer's French Politics blog for the link.)

For those who may not be aware, "banlieue" is a politically charged term for the poverty- and crime-ridden, largely immigrant neighborhoods that surround many French cities. French president Nicolas Sarkozy made disparaging remarks against the banlieues during his 2007 presidential race, and the areas characterize what many call a long-running failure to integrate France's minorities.

Through its engagement, the U.S. embassy seeks to address a sense of abandonment felt by scores of banlieue-raised French youth. The article opens with this:

"BONDY, France -- The residents of this poor, multiracial Paris suburb say they have been abandoned. For 30 years, they say, the French authorities have written off Bondy and neighborhoods like it, treating their inhabitants as terminal delinquents and ignoring their potential.

This, residents note, is not the approach taken by the United States Department of State.


“We’re waiting for the president of the Republic, for his ministers,” said Gilbert Roger, the mayor of Bondy. “And we see the ambassador of the United States.”

Goldhammer's review of the article raises a good point about the how such bold diplomatic strides would be received in the United States:

"The following sentence [from the article] in particular raises a host of questions:

Since Mr. Obama’s election, the Americans have helped organize seminars for minority politicians, coaching them in electoral strategy, fund-raising and communications. 

One can only imagine what the reaction of, say, [House Republican leader] John Boehner would be to the news that the French embassy was coaching, say, Haitian-American politicians on how to knock off their no-doubt Republican opponents."

Ah, diplomacy in action. Central to the U.S. embassy's work is the question of currying favor, with whom, and at what cost-benefit balance: Is the embassy's best move to generate hearts-and-minds change within a largely underprivileged (and, importantly, preponderantly Muslim) popular base, or rather to avoid peeving the French political establishment?

Comments welcome.

Roubini on European Recession : "Hangover"

The economist fabled to have predicted the global financial crisis shoots from the hip on European recovery -- and describes a still-dire bill of economic health for the Old Continent. Nouriel Roubini, professor at New York University, dubs the European condition a "hangover" and one sure to continue galling livers for a good while to come.

The professor employs a host of disparaging idioms in his take on the EU's present status, decrying 1) the policies that "stole demand from the future," 2) the laughable "stress tests" (quote marks his) that only "kicked the can down the road,"  and 3) the lingering "fundamental problems of the eurozone." He singles out sitting EU president and Belgian head of state Yves Leterme as "unable to keep his own country together, let alone unite Europe."

He also dismisses the notion that the EU bail-out created anything beyond transient relief. Though Brussels policy heads managed in May to slap together a rescue fund, risk spreads have returned to their pre-bail-out levels for several European countries. Roubini sniffs that operatives "fudged" this summer's round of financial "stress tests" for European markets, serving to pep up world markets' frail confidence only temporarily -- a move that is already beginning to wear thin.

Even the sunniest eurozone example, Germany, suffers Roubini's ire, and he shrugs off that country's supposed promise as the EU's post-crisis front-runner:

"Even Germany’s temporary success is riddled with caveats. During the 2008-2009 financial crisis, GDP fell much more in Germany – because of its dependence on collapsing global trade – than in the United States. A transitory rebound from such a hard fall is not surprising, and German output remains below pre-crisis levels."

In what may bear nightmarish implications,  the "double dip" recession so feared throughout the world may actually be taking root as we read his words.

"Indeed, the latest data from Germany – declining exports, falling factory orders, anemic industrial-production growth, and a slide in investors’ confidence – suggest that the [double dip] has started."

His forecast on current and future European politics provides little sustenance for optimists. He cites a litany of bummer political events ranging from Angela Merkel's recent shallacking in German regional elections, to unlikely odds that Sarkozy will initiate real (Roubini says "cosmetic") structural reforms in France -- and that is concurrent with sobering competition prospects from the Socialist Party's presidential likely, one Dominique Strauss-Kahn. Similarly unpopular leaders also face grim predictions across the EU's southern belt, from the vulnerable Presidents Silvio Berlusconi (Italy) and Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero (Spain), to the bete noire of EU fiscal cohesion, George Papandreou (Greece).

If all that wasn't enough, Roubini finishes by going for broke on two scenarios for the eurozone's future. The first, the "best" case scenario (though hardly a good one) says the monetary bloc limps on some years longer. The second -- this is the 800-pound gorilla whose presence EU public officials from across the 27 states refuse to entertain -- predicts that "the eurozone will break up, owing to a combination of sovereign debt restructurings and exits by some weaker economies."

US Congress, Anonymous Official Step in to EU Roma Row

When the EU-neglectful United States Congress interjects, it's serious. Democrats Benjamin Cardin (MD) and Alcee L. Hastings, and another official insisting on anonymity have criticized France's deportations of the Roma as a "shell game" for minority migration laws that have often played against the country's Muslim population, the largest in Europe. See the full story from EUobserver.

Ashton Names Many Key EU Foreign Posts

This just in from EUobserver:

"EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton announced the first tranche of EU ambassadors within the new diplomatic service on Wednesday (15 September) with the prized China posting going to a German diplomat.


The posts were advertised in March. Since then, the appointment process has been under the watchful eye of member states keen to make sure Ms Ashton toes the line on two main points - balancing the number of national and EU officials appointed to the service and making sure the under-represented eastern European states get a look in too.

Of the 28 heads of delegation and one deputy head named to date, 13 appointments are national diplomats and 16 are EU officials. Four of the appointees are from new member states while 22 of the posts went to men and seven to women.

"I believe I have appointed the best people for the right jobs," said Ms Ashton adding that she is confident they will do a "really great job."

The top strategic post of EU ambassador to Bejing went to Markus Ederer, a career diplomat currently heading the planning unit in the German foreign ministry.

Roma Exile in Europe, Islamophobia in US

The EU affairs blog Gulf Stream Blues has a good, solid post comparing minority relations issues in the EU and the US. Though the article acknowledges its own liberal bent, it's a cogent and worthwhile read. (That's how we do it at EurAmerican: "Partisan, But Friendly.")

Gulf Stream's author is a Brussels-based American journalist with a collection of European interests much like those at this blog. (See each one's noticeably similar posts on the Belgian break-up rumors here on his and here on mine.)

And in other news, watch this space for an article tentatively titled, "The EEAS Comes to Washington: What Can Each Side Expect?," on the coming EU diplomatic service and whether the scramble to produce it will form a diplomatic corps with the grit to survive in the international jungle that is Washington, DC. There, I've announced it; I'm committed now. Article to follow soon.

Trichet Calls for "Credible Alertness" on Post-Crisis Euro

European Central Bank President, Jean-Claude Trichet

Financial Times editor Lionel Barber interviews President of the European Central Bank, Jean-Claude Trichet. Couldn't embed the video here, but get it via the link at this twitter account: willfleeson

Watch for the nice EU-US comparison around minute mark 3:30, when Barber says the EU cannot boast a common currency and treasury, as can the US. "This is not Massachusetts," he points out, a statement of the obvious that only transatlantic wonks like EurAmerican may find appreciable. 

Also see insightful commentary on economic globalization after nine and a half minutes.