The anti-immigrant and especially anti-Muslim incidents in the UK, which for some reason the Turkish media did not pay enough attention to, have calmed down, but only for now… It all started on 29 July when someone stabbed young girls on their way to a dance class in the seaside city of Liverpool on the north-west coast of the United Kingdom (comprising England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland), which we collectively call the UK. After the incident, in which three little girls died and others were hospitalised with serious injuries, the police did not reveal the identity of the killer because he was 17 years old, leading to intense speculation and manipulation on social media.
Anti-immigration groups began protesting, claiming that this person was one of the Muslim refugees who arrived in the UK by boat last year. It was later revealed that the killer was born in the UK to Rwandan immigrant parents, but in the meantime, the anti-immigrant and/or anti-Muslim violence that was likely to erupt anyway has spread rapidly, especially in the UK and parts of Northern Ireland.
Over the course of almost two weeks, many Muslim-owned homes and businesses have been vandalised and hotels set alight where those who have landed illegally on British shores in boats seeking refugee status are being sheltered by the government. The incidents seem to have slowed down as a result of tough policing and the British justice system’s speedy trials and harsh sentences for the main perpetrators of the violence, but from talking to my acquaintances I realise that these violent incidents will be a bad milestone for Britain. The Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi communities in particular seem to be very concerned.
Why has the supposedly tolerant British society exploded?
How did overtly racist and aggressive acts of violence emerge from the society in England/UK that I had the opportunity to personally observe during my years of residency/doctoral studies (1986-93)? There has always been a culture, particularly in large cities such as London, Birmingham, Manchester and Liverpool, of crowds of masked violent protesters taking to the streets and burning and looting in response to police violence against someone – usually a black Briton – but these incidents (riots) had never taken on an overtly racist and/or anti-immigrant character.
Today the situation is very different. The fact that between a third and forty per cent of the population support some form of violence against immigrants/Muslims is something to think about. Former Prime Minister Boris Johnson, in an article critical of the current Labour Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, insists on this point and explains why it would be wrong to dismiss these protesters as far-right. And he asks whether more than a third of the population has become far right overnight (https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13727921/BORIS-JOHNSON-Time-pack-Factor-50-Keir-check-Britain-reflect-frenzy-utter-stupidity-Labours-embarked-on.html).
Immigrant Britons, foreigners and refugees
The most important aspect of the problem, as academic expert Mark Almond (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=laLpfszBD2I) points out, is economic. Especially since the financial crisis of 2008, both continental European countries and the UK have been struggling to make ends meet. If you do not work in the financial sector or anything related to it, and especially if you live on a salary, conditions are not improving as the years go by. Meanwhile, you find yourself surrounded by a growing population that makes you feel like a foreigner.
The first immigrants to England came from its former colonies, particularly from the so-called Indian subcontinent, which now includes India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Kashmir and Jamaica. Because the first generation spoke English, they were immediately granted citizenship and quickly integrated, but problems began to emerge with the second and especially the third generation. The main problem was radicalisation and political Islamism, particularly among Muslim communities. Britain’s efforts in those years and still today, together with America, to eliminate secular regimes in the Middle East on the grounds that they were dictatorships (the main justification was that they were anti-Israel) made many big cities, especially London, the centre of such activities and there is no doubt that they also played a role in this radicalisation.
The result is a Muslim population of over ten per cent (12 per cent according to some figures). They are citizens of the UK, but they have gradually begun to carve out their own areas within the UK, rather than being integrated, as was the case to a lesser extent in my time. Another source of discomfort is the fact that the police use different practices in Muslim areas when talking to their community leaders, in other words a kind of two-tier policing.
In recent years, large numbers of refugees (mostly young men) have been arriving by boat across the Channel. According to figures, more than 130,000 people have arrived since 2018. The highest number of arrivals was in 2022 (almost 46,000). A year later, in 2023, there was a significant drop, but there is clearly confusion in the country about how to deal with the problem. The previous Conservative government had struck a deal with Rwanda to send refugees to Britain. Of course, the UK was going to pay Rwanda a lot of money for harbouring them.
But first the UK Supreme Court overturned this decision as contrary to international refugee law, and then the Labour Party came to power promising to scrap the deal. The fact that these events occurred just weeks after Labour formed a government may have something to do with this attitude. Meanwhile, Nigel Farage, whose politics are characterised by anti-immigrant and xenophobic rhetoric, entered the July election at the last minute and won a significant number of votes. Not only did he get into parliament, he almost gutted the Conservative Party. Not only did he enter Britain’s two-party system as a third party (he was previously in the Lib-Lab), but he also created scenarios in which he could take over the Conservative Party. Farage, whose views on asylum seekers, refugees and foreigners are becoming more and more in tune with the British public, is not unlikely to become leader of the Conservative Party or to come to power with his own party, Reform UK, at the next election.
There are lessons to be learnt, but no one to learn them from
Every part of what happened in Britain is full of lessons for Turkey. In the conversation I had with my old friend, academic/expert Mark Almond for Harici, he insisted that Turkey has similar problems; he pointed out the problems that would arise if the number of foreigners coming into the country exceeded certain figures and rates, and all this in economic conditions that were not getting better.
The per capita national income in the UK is four times higher than in Turkey. Despite this, people begin to object when the number of people they do not recognise as their own and perceive as foreigners, even if they are British citizens, exceeds the limit of society’s capacity. While these objections are initially voiced within the normal democratic system of their parties, the issue gradually becomes a hunting ground for extremist groups and eventually leads to a social explosion.
It is clear that conditions in Turkey are no better than those in the UK. In the face of the world’s worst and most mismanaged economic crisis, the bill is largely being paid by those with the lowest incomes, and using the issue of asylum seekers/refugees as a provocation for three or five provocateurs can have very bad consequences.
To avoid this, it would surely be a wiser policy option to take full advantage of the opportunity for reconciliation with Syria, where we are more fortunate than the UK, and send the refugees back. The UK cannot make such a deal with India, Pakistan or Bangladesh. Almost all of these people are already first-generation British citizens. The party and electoral preferences of these citizens is not an issue that can be easily ignored by a democratically governed country. In short, our agreement with Syria and our determination to prevent illegal entry could be quite fruitful, but the UK does not have many such options. We don’t seem to want them either… Let’s see where things go…
