Lebanese Muslims in Australia and social disadvantage

People and Place

Volumn 14, Issue 1, 2006, Pages 24-42

  Betts, Katharine ^a   Healy, Ernest ^b  

^a SWINBURNE UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY   (Australia)

^b MONASH UNIVERSITY   (Australia)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EDUCATIONAL ATTAINMENT; HOUSEHOLD STRUCTURE; IMMIGRANT POPULATION; UNEMPLOYMENT;

AUSTRALASIA; AUSTRALIA;

EID: 33748804429     PISSN: 10394788     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Article

References (63)

1. J. McKay, Phoenician Farewell: Three Generations of Lebanese Christians in Australia, Ashwood House, Melbourne, 1989, pp. 17-18
2. ibid., p. 18;
3. J. McKay and T. Batrouney, 'Lebanese immigration until the 1970s',
4. and C. M. Young, 'Lebanese immigration since 1970', in J. Jupp (Ed.), The Australian People, Angus and Robertson, North Ryde, 1988, pp. 666-670, 673.
5. Numbers of Lebanon-born Muslims are calculated from Young, p. 675.
6. Young, op. cit., p. 675
7. M. Humphrey, 'Muslim Lebanese' in Jupp (Ed.) op. cit., p. 677. (There were also small numbers of Druse and Alawi.)
8. ibid., p. 678
9. ibid., p. 680
10. The overseas-born Lebanese data are from the customised matrix of the 2001 Census purchased from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS). (They exclude 3763 for whom birthplace was not stated.) Numbers as a proportion of migrants from the Middle East are calculated from the one per cent users' file of the 2001 Census, ABS.
11. Calculated from customised matrix of the 2001 Census
12. See Humphrey, op. cit., p. 678.
13. Such data as are available show a high crime rate and a high rate of imprisonment for people born in Lebanon. Indeed these rates are generally exceeded only by those born in Vietnam. In the late 1990s the Lebanon-born imprisonment rate for violent offences was the highest of all birthplace groupings. See S. Mukherjee, Ethnicity and Crime: An Australian Research Study, Australian Institute of Criminology, 1999 , pp.51, 97-89, 93-94.
14. See also T. Priest, 'The rise of Middle Eastern crime in Australia', Quadrant, vol. XLVIII, no. 1-2,2004, pp. 9-16;
15. and P. Carlyon and J. Lyons, 'Cops, Lebs and the new civil war', The Bulletin, 2006, 7 February, pp. 15-21.
16. See J. Stapleton, 'Mufti condemns raids as race-driven', The Australian, 2005, 12 November, p. 8.
17. See M. Chulov, 'Downer condemns Hilali's "provocative" sermon', The Australian, 2004, 1 March, p. 3, and T. Harris, 'Cleric's call to terrorist for "divorce advice"', The Australian, 2004, 31 March, p. 7.
18. and T. Harris, 'Cleric's call to terrorist for "divorce advice"', The Australian, 2004, 31 March, p. 7.
19. For overviews of both the Cronulla riots and the revenge attacks see C. Overington and D. Warne-Smith, Countdown to conflict', The Australian, 2005, 17 December, p. 20;
20. J. Sexton and D. King, 'Race warfare divides city', The Australian, 2005, 13 December, p. 1.
21. These events were followed by arson attacks on churches: N. Leys and D. Box, 'Now churches are targeted - Race-warrioters turn on religious differences', The Australian, 2005, 15 December, p. 1.
22. See T. Ahmed, 'Coming to grips with a Lebanese problem in Australia' (Cut & Paste section), The Australian, 2005, 19 December, p. 9;
23. A. Bolt,'It's time to think', Herald-Sun, 2005,14 December, p. 21.
24. P. Walters, 'Suspects "have no links to terror groups"', The Australian, 2006, 3 March, p. 2
25. See Fadi Rahman and Amir Butler quoted in C. Stewart and A. Hodge,'Isolated and angry', The Australian, 2005, 14 December, p. 11;
26. J. Wakim, 'Lost between war and peace, the Leb wild Westies', The Age, 2005, 14 December, p. 2 1;
27. and E. Tadros, 'Years of rejection erupted in open rebellion', Sydney Morning Herald, 2005, 17 December, p. 7.
28. See Mustapha Kara-Ali quoted in R. Kerbaj, 'Shrouded in strife', The Australian, 2006, 25 February, p. 26;
29. Keysar Trad quoted in N. O'Brien and E. Wynhausen, 'Where Santa meets hijab, faiths clash', The Australian, 2003, 13 December, pp. 1, 12;
30. T. Priest, 'Don't turn a blind eye to terror in our midst', The Australian, 2004, 12 January, p. 9;
31. and T. Ahmed, 'Alienation that foments terror', The Australian, 2004, 16 February, p. 7.
32. T. Modood, 'Muslims and the politics of difference', in S. Spencer (Ed.), The Politics of Migration: Managing Opportunity, Conflict and Change, Blackwell, Oxford, 2003, p. 109
33. S. Akbarzadeh, 'Freedom is not a right to abuse', The Australian, 2006, 7 February, p. 12. (Akbarzadeh is a senior lecturer in global politics at Monash University.)
34. J. Wakim, 'A police disservice to paint race relations with broad-brush labels', Sydney Morning Herald, 2006, 1 February, p. 15;
35. Tadros, 2005, op. cit.
36. Report to Parliament 2004-2005, Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO), Canberra, 2005, p. 17
37. H. Dekmejian, 'Islamic revival: catalysts, categories, and consequences', in S. Hunter (Ed.), The Politics of Islamic Revivalism, Indiana University Press, Indiana, 1988, p. 10
38. R. Wright, 'Lebanon', in ibid., p. 58
39. See for example P. McDonald, Community Profiles 1996 Census: Lebanon Born, Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs, Canberra, 2000.
40. N. O'Brien and R. Kerbaj, 'A complex cultural divide', The Australian, 2005, 15 December, pp. 1, 4
41. N. O'Brien and E. Wynhausen, 'Where Santa meets hijab, faiths clash', The Australian, 2003, 13 December, pp. 1, 12
42. That is, who gave their first response to the question 'What is this person's ancestry? as Lebanese. (Respondents were told that they could give two or more answers. Only 6.5 per cent of Muslims gave more than one ancestry.)
43. Just over eight per cent of Muslims in the 2001 Census gave their first ancestry as Australian, New Zealand, or European and their birthplace as also being in these countries or regions. (This figure excludes ancestries coded 32, except for sub-code 3205 Greek, and thus excludes Bosnians.) Presumably most of this eight per cent would be converts. Data calculated from the one per cent users' file.
44. This growth was most rapid between 1971 and 1981 when the average annual rate was 13.15 per cent, compared to 1981 to 2001 (average annual rate 6.74 per cent).
45. B. Cleland, 'The history of Muslims in Australia', in A Saced and S. Akbarzadeh (Eds), Muslim Communities in Australia, University of New South Wales Press, Sydney, 2001, p. 26
46. Calculated from the one per cent users' file of the 2001 Census
47. Data for 1959 to 1998, Overseas Arrivals and Departures, ABS, Cat. no. 4304.0 (various issues) and Australian Demographic Statistics, ABS, Cat. no. 3101.0 (various issues); data from 1999 to 2005 are unpublished and provided by the ABS.
48. At the 2001 census, 43 per cent of people who said that their ancestry was Middle Eastern or North African were Christian and 42 per cent were Muslim (and of this latter group 48 per cent said that their ancestry was Lebanese). The Christian/Muslim balance from the region may be changing: Middle Easterners who arrived in Australia between 1996 and 2001 were 35 per cent Christian and 43 per cent Muslim. Data derived from the one per cent users' file of the 2001 Census.
49. Data source: customised matrix of the 2001 Census purchased from the ABS
50. Age data calculated from the one per cent users' file of the 2001 census
51. ibid.
52. G. Carmichael and P. McDonald, 'Fertility trends and differentials', S.-E. Khoo and P. McDonald (Eds), The Transformation of Australia's Population: 1970-2030, University of New South Wales Press, Sydney, 2003, pp. 61-62, 66
53. See for example McDonald, 2000, op. cit.
54. On the possibility of self segregation see W. Omar and K. Allen, The Muslims in Australia, Australian Government Publishing Service, Canberra, 1996, p. 47.
55. Edmund Tadros writes of Lebanese Muslims in Sydney that, 'An isolationist message is often reinforced at home and, once an attitude of rebellion takes root, itcan spiral out of control'. See 'Years of rejection erupted in open rebellion', Sydney Marning Herald, 2005, 17 December, p. 7.
56. John Stone argues: 'the fact is that Islam is an exclusive culture, not an inclusive one'. See 'Some will not integrate', The Australian, 2005, 18 November, p. 17.
57. The CPUR bought a customised 2001 Census data set to identify the location of men and women of Lebanese ancestry in Sydney and to explore their socio-economic circumstances. Ancestry rather than country of birth was selected so as to capture both the first and subsequent generations of Lebanese. Religious affiliation was included to distinguish Christian and Muslim Lebanese. Five age groups were specified to enable an examination of persons of prime working age. Year of arrival was included to control for time of arrival in Australia and to identify second (and subsequent) generation Lebanese. Second (and subsequent) generation Lebanese are classified as 'not applicable' under year of arrival. Two measures were specified to enable a comparative insight into socio-economic circumstances: highest non-school qualification and labour-force status.
58. The area we have named Parramatta fringe includes parts of the Holroyd and Aubum Statistical Local Areas (SLAs), Rockdale includes parts of the Canterbury and Marrickville SLAs, Ryde includes parts of Parramatta SLA, and Bankstown (core and fringe) includes much of Canterbury SLA.
59. We are discounting here the index of dissimilarity.
60. E. Healy and B. Birrell, 'Metropolis divided: the political dynamic of spatial inequality and migrant settlement in Sydney', People and Place, vol. 11, no. 2, 2003, pp. 65-87
61. The data here were calculated from the one per cent users file of the 2001 census. For comparable data from the 1991 census see R. J. Birrell and S.-E. Khoo, The Second Generation in Australia: Educational and Occupational Characteristics, Australian Government Publishing Service, Canberra, 1995, p. 7.
62. See E. Healy,' "Disability" or "disadvantage": spatial variation in the disability support pension recipient rate 1996-2001', People and Place, vol. 10, no. 3, 2002, pp. 68-82.
63. The breakdown was: Lebanese Muslims, 12.7 per cent unemployed, 34.1 per cent not in the workforce; Lebanese Christians, 6.6 per cent unemployed, 21.7 per cent not in the workforce; all men, 5.4 per cent unemployed, 15.3 per cent not in the workforce. Calculated from the customised matrix of the 2001 Census.