Comments on Pari Namazie’s Report on the “Being the Other” Panel
Regine Scholz, Ph.D.
To be on the panel together with Vamik Volkan in Vienna to discuss Pari Namazie’s findings from her research about the Iranian migrant community in Europe (“Being the Other”) was an honor and a pleasure. Pari Namazie gave much food for thought. What it triggered in me were musings about how words and wording is shaped by partly unconscious, at least unnoticed, assumptions, thus further shaping our perception and emotions.
For example, the quoted study of the PEW Research Center had the title “Europeans Fear Wave of Refugees Will Mean More Terrorism, Fewer Jobs” (July 11th 2016, By Richard Wike, Bruce Stokes and Katie Simmons). Their findings support that these attitudes can be found all over Europe, which is true. If you look more closely into the graphics of their findings, you see that the highest ranking was found in Hungary 76% (Poland 71%) of interviewed persons who agreed to the statement: “Refugees will increase the likelihood of terrorism in our country”. The statement, “Refugees are a burden to our country, because they take our jobs and social benefits,” found an acceptance of 82% in Hungary and 75% in Poland.
If we keep in mind that in 2016 only 425 persons found asylum in Hungary (Zeit-Online, 08. March 2017, Thomas Roser) and 81 persons in Poland (UNHCR Laenderdaten Polen), the title of the PEW Study also could be: In the countries with the lowest number of refugees, the fear of refugees is highest. Both titles address the findings, yet the two titles push thoughts and feelings in different directions, triggering different questions. The same is true with the word “wave”. It implies a flood, a natural disaster against which dams and dikes are needed for protection. Those others who themselves are in need for protection are transformed into a faceless threat, against whom any action becomes self-defense.
What I dislike most is the overall use of the word “refugee crisis”. It immediately rings an alarm bell: Crisis! Danger! Help! Aux Armes! I have never heard in modern management that this company (or part of their business) is in crisis – though it might have severe problems. Managers themselves don’t seem to have problems, they have challenges. I think it’s worthwhile to learn from them. I prefer the term “refugee challenge”, because it directs the attention to what can be done, it’s energizing in a constructive way, without denying the amount of work needed. It’s a huge challenge – implying big problems and big chances.
Germany’s economy very soon saw the potential of the situation: at a moment when the existing population is aging and shrinking, and inter-European immigration is slowing down, refugees are also seen as one basis for continuing economic growths (Henrik Mueller: Fluechtlinge – das Fundament fuer ein zweites Wirtschaftswunder. Manager Magazin 27.12.2015). From my work with refugees, I know something about the problems – but also about their will to make it. That’s something to learn from them. Often those who articulate the troubles are seen as more realistic than those who point to the possibilities – the latter being seen as naive. But I don’t think so. Moreover I assume it doesn’t really matter whether one is considered naively optimistic or unnecessarily pessimistic. There is really no other choice than to face the situation as best as we can. We can learn now how to deal with immigration, given the large numbers of people coming.
Many refugees nowadays will go back, many of them will stay – and others are to come, for various reasons. Globalization won’t come to a halt and the refugees from climate change are not yet here. Now there is still time to develop the instruments, the knowledge of how to deal with situations – according to the values that Pari mentioned. Freedom and democracy are not made for nice weather only, they have to prove their worth, need to be defended, to be adjusted to new circumstances and reinvented every day.
In this context the notion of “the Other” comes into the picture. Referring to Vamik Volkan’s thinking, the notion of “the Other” is already a product of a regressive process. A majority singles out a special group as “the other” and thereby already is in the mode of “Us” and “Them”. This splitting serves the psychological needs of the majority/ host community that feels threatened by the fact that things change. “Othering” is a resistance to change, a reaction to the tension created by new largescale situations.
In this process of “Othering”, special differences are declared to be decisive. “The Other” is put as an object in front of you – at best trying to understand, at worst trying to destroy, the different group that has been, to some degree, created by the majority. This means missing, if not denying, the subjectivity of your fellow men and women in all their and our diversity. The sad truth for those declared by the defining power of the majority to be “the Other” is that they have little chance to prove that they are different from the pictures projected on them. Those pictures – or imaginings of the majority group – may not have much to do with the group’s own characteristics but a lot to do with the psychological needs of the majority. And new items can always be found to justify the difference. This is an enormous threat to the wellbeing of those chosen to be “the Other”. They have to struggle incredibly hard to maintain a healthy self-esteem. Life is hard when you are forced to live as a walking projection screen.
If we miss this point – that the insistence on the differences is in the service of the psychological needs of the majority – if we miss the mechanisms of splitting, projection and displacement, we too easily accept that we are only talking about concerned citizens. But this line of thinking would have to accept that Germans in the twenties and thirties, who felt threatened by the Jewish “world conspiracy” idea, were just being concerned citizens. Here it becomes clearer how the concept of the Other and the process of Othering connects to European and perhaps universal values. There is a lot at stake.
Unless otherwise noted, IDI Blog Posts represent the opinions and/or work of individual IDI members working independently and do not necessarily represent the opinions and/or work of the IDI as a whole.
Photo Credit: Hadi Dehghanpour (Being Iranian Photo Collection 2017)
There are no comments