Immigration and imagination of nationhood in the German parliament

Nationalism and Ethnic Politics

Volumn 15, Issue 1, 2009, Pages 1-26

  Bauder, Harald ^a   Semmelroggen, Jan ^b  

^a RYERSON UNIVERSITY   (Canada)

^b LOUGHBOROUGH UNIVERSITY   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

ETHNOPOLITICS; EUROPEAN UNION; IMMIGRATION POLICY; NATIONALISM; PARTY POLITICS; POLITICAL DISCOURSE; POLITICAL SYSTEM; STATE BUILDING;

CENTRAL EUROPE; EURASIA; EUROPE; GERMANY;

EID: 61849134324     PISSN: 13537113     EISSN: 15572986     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/13537110802672321     Document Type: Article

References (112)

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2. Martin Hell, Zuwanderungsland Deutschland? Die Zuwanderungsdiskussion 1998-2002 (Wiesbaden: Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, 2005).
3. Rogers Brubaker, Citizenship and Nationhood in France and Germany (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1992)
4. Christian Joppke, "How Immigration is Changing Citizenship; A Comparative View," Ethnic and Racial Studies, Vol. 22, No. 4 (1999), pp. 629-52
5. Dieter Oberndörfer, Der Wahn des Nationalen: Die Alternative der offenen Republik (Freiburg: Herder Verlag, 1992).
6. Harald Bauder, "Humanitarian Immigration and German National Identity in the Media," National Identities (in press)
7. Harald Bauder, "Media Discourse and the New German Immigration Law," Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, Vol. 34, No. 1 (2008), pp. 95-112
8. Harald Bauder, "Neoliberalism and the Utility of Immigration: Media Perspectives of Germany's Immigration Law," Antipode, Vol. 40, No. 1 (2008), pp. 55-78
9. Gabriele vom Bruck, "Naturalising, Neutralising Women's Bodies: The 'Headscarf Affair' and the Politics of Representation," Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power, Vol. 15 (2008), pp. 51-79
10. Elisabeth Beck-Gernsheim, Wir und die Anderen: Kopftuch, Zwangsheirat und andere Miβverständnisse (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 2007).
11. Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities (New York: Verso, 1991)
12. Eric J. Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism (London: Cambridge University Press, 1989)
13. Adrian Hastings, The Construction of Nationhood (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997).
14. We treat "nation" as a historically constructed category, "nationhood" as the state of being a nation, and "national identity" as possessing a sense of national belonging.
15. Richard Münch, Nation and Citizenship in the Global Age: From National to Transnational Ties and Identities (New York: Palgrave, 2001)
16. Goekce Yurdakul, "State, Political Parties and Immigrant Elites: Turkish Immigrant Associations in Berlin," Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, Vol. 32, No. 3 (2006), pp. 435-53.
17. Andreas Osiander, "Sovereignty, International Relations and the Westphalian Myth," International Organization, Vol. 55, No. 2 (2001), pp. 251-87.
18. Brubaker, "Citizenship and Nationhood".
19. Oberndörfer, Der Wahn des Nationalen.
20. James Sheehan, "State and Nationality in the Napoleonic Period," in John Breuilly (ed.), The State of Germany (New York: Longman Publishing, 1992), pp. 47-59.
21. Ulrich Preuss, "Citizenship and the German Nation," Citizenship Studies, Vol. 7, No. 1 (2003), pp. 37-55.
22. Brubaker, "Citizenship and Nationhood"
23. John Breuilly, The Formation of the First German Nation State, 1800-1871 (London: Macmillan Press Ltd, 1996)
24. Preuss, pp. 37-55
25. Andreas Fahrmeir, "19th Century German Citizenships: A Reconsideration," The Historical Journal, Vol. 40, No. 3 (1997), pp. 721-52.
26. The German term Volk is often translated as "people" but it incorporates meanings of ethnic nationalism.
27. Preuss, pp. 37-55.
28. Sheehan, pp. 47-59
29. Liah Greenfeld, Nationalism (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1992).
30. Brubaker, "Citizenship and Nationhood"
31. Hobsbawm; Preuss, pp. 37-55.
32. Jonathan Sperber, The European Revolutions, 1848-1851 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005)
33. Dieter Langewiesche, "Germany and the National Question in 1848," in John Breuilly (ed.), The State of Germany (New York: Longman Publishing, 1992), pp. 60-79.
34. Fahrmeir, pp. 721-52.
35. William Allen, "The Collapse of Nationalism in Nazi Germany," in John Breuilly (ed.), The State of Germany (New York: Longman Group, 1992), pp. 141-54
36. Peter O'Brien, "German-Polish Migration: The Elusive Search for a German Nation-State," International Migration Review, Vol. 26, No. 2 (1992), pp. 373-387.
37. Rogers Brubaker, Nationalism Reframed: Nationhood and the National Question in the new Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996)
38. Oberndörfer, Der Wahn des Nationalen.
39. Jürgen Habermas, "Einleitung," in Jürgen Habermas (ed.), Stichworte zur geistigen Situation der Zeit; (Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 1979), pp. 7-35.
40. Oberndörfer, Der Wahn des Nationalen
41. Karl-Heinz Meier-Braun, Deutschland, Einwanderungsland (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 2002).
42. Michael Minkenberg, "The Politics of Citizenship in the New Republic," West European Politics, Vol. 26, No. 4 (2003), pp. 219-39.
43. Klaus J. Bade, Europa in Bewegung: Migration vom späten 18. Jahrhundert bis zur Gegenwart (Munich: Verlag C.H. Beck, 2000)
44. J. Oltmer, Migration und Politik in der Weimarer Republik (Göttingen: Vanderhoek & Ruprecht, 2005)
45. Bundesministerium des Inneren (BMI), Zuwanderungsrecht und Zuwanderungspolitik (Berlin: BMI, 2005).
46. Bade, Europa in Bewegung
47. Klaus J. Bade, Ausländer, Aussiedler, Asyl (München: C. H. Beck, 1994).
48. Hermann Kurthen, "Germany at the Crossroads: National Identity and the Challenges of Immigration,quot; International Migration Review Vol. 29, No. 4 (1995), pp. 914-38
49. R. Münz, W. Seifert, and R. E. Ulrich, Zuwanderung nach Deutschland: Strukturen, Wirkungen, Perspektiven, 2nd Ed. (Frankfurt am Main: Campus Verlag, 1999)
50. Bundesministerium des Inneren (BMI), Zuwanderungsrecht und Zuwanderungspolitik.
51. Bade, "Europa in Bewegung."
52. Since 1 Jan. 1993, Aussiedler are legally referred to as Spätaussiedler, or "late"-Aussieder.
53. Bundesministerium des Inneren (BMI), Zuwanderungsrecht und Zuwanderungspolitik.
54. Beck-Gernsheim, Wir und die Anderen.
55. Yurdakul, "State, Political Parties and Immigrant Elites," pp. 435-53.
56. Bade, Europa in Bewegung.
57. Harald Bauder, Labor Movement: How Migration Regulates Labor Markets (New York: Oxford University Press, 2006)
58. vom Bruck, "Naturalising, Neutralising Women's Bodies," pp. 51-79.
59. Minkenberg, "The Politics of Citizenship," Zuwanderungsland Deutschland? pp. 219-39
60. Hell.
61. CDU (2001), Zuwanderung steuern und begrenzen. Integration fördern. Beschluss der CDU Deutschlands vom 7. Juni 2001 in Berlin. www.cdu.de [accessed 3 March 2008].
62. Meier-Braun; Hell C. Storr and R. Albrecht, Kommentar zum Zuwanderungsgesetz (Stuttgart: Boorberg, 2005)
63. T. Zinterer, Politikwandel durch Politikberatung? Die kanadische Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples und die Unabhängige Kommission "Zuwanderung" Deutschland Einwanderungsland/ Zuwanderungsland Deutschland? im Vergleich (Wiesbaden: Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, 2004).
64. Bauder, "Media Discourse," pp. 95-112
65. Bauder, "Neoliberalism," pp. 55-78.
66. According to a Hegelian understanding of dialectics, identity, and self-awareness emerge from a process of negation, outward looking, and reflection.
67. Bauder, "Humanitarian Immigration," Beck-Gernsheim; Wir und die Anderen.
68. That is, Roger W. Brubaker, Citizenship and Nationhood in France and Germany. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1992)
69. Joppke, pp. 629-52
70. Preuss, pp. 37-55
71. Yurdakul, pp. 435-53
72. Ruud Koopmanns and Paul Statham, "Challenging the Liberal Nation-State? Post-nationalism, Multiculturalism, and the Collective Claims of Making Migrants and Ethnic Minorities in Britain and Germany," The American Journal of Sociology, Vol. 105, No. 3 (1999), pp. 652-96.
73. Opinion polls present another perspective that can be compared with parliamentary debate. Prior to the reforms initiated by the SPD-Green government coalition, public resistance against immigration and the social integration of foreigners tended to decline, see Marcel Coenders and Peer Scheepers, "Changes in Resistance to the Social Integration of Foreigners in Germany 1980-2000: Individual and Contextual Determinants," Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, Vol. 34, No. 1 (2008), pp. 1-26.
74. Nevertheless, public opinion continued to favor migration by Aussiedler and Spätaussiedler over non-German immigrants. The majority also preferred to restrict asylum-based immigration but supported controlled labour migration, see Rainer Münz and Ralf E. Ulrich, "Zuwanderung und Staatsburgerschaft: Was will die Mehrheit der Deutschen?, Migration und Bevölkerung, Vol. 7, No. 98 (1998), pp. 1-2.
75. A different poll found that 90% of the German population would require from foreigners who settle in Germany to adopt the basic principles and values of German society, see Institut für Demoskopie Allensbach, Von Luftballons und Schicksalsfragen: Eine Dokumentation des Beitrags in der Frankfurter Allgemeinen Zeitung No. 93 (2000), Table 9
76. Polls commissioned by the European Union indicate that support for multiculturalism actually declined in the territory of the former FRG after 2000, see European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia, Majorities' Attitudes Towards Minorities: Key Findings from the Eurobarometer and the European Social Survey (Vienna, Manz Crossmedia, 2005), p. 13.
77. In addition, Germans are increasingly suspicious of the Muslim population living in Germany. While in 1995, 40% of a sampled population perceived Muslims as a threat, this number increased to 55% in 2006, see Der Spiegel, "Umfrage: Wachsende Kluft zwischen Deutschen und Muslimen," Feb. 8 (2006), www.spiegel.de [accessed 9 September 2008].
78. Thomas Niehr, Einwaderungsdiskurse (Wiesbaden: Westdeutscher Verlag GmbH, 2000)
79. Ruth Wodak, Rudolf de Cillia, Martin Reisigl, and Karin Liebhart, The Discursive Construction of National Identity (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1998).
80. Bundesministerium des Inneren (BMI), Zuwanderungsrecht und Zuwanderungspolitik.
81. Due to confidentiality issues and the high public visibility of the respondents, we are unable to offer a more detailed profile of the interviewees. For this reason, we also are not presenting the political and institutional affiliations when we quote interview respondents below.
82. Jane Ritchie and Jane Lewis, Qualitative Research Practice (London: SAGE Publications, 2003).
83. Matthew David and Carole Sutton, Social Research: The Basics (London: SAGE Publications, 2004).
84. Guy Robinson, Methods and Techniques in Human Geography (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1998).
85. Bauder, "Media Discourse," pp. 95-112
86. Martin Wengeler, "Von 'Belastungen', 'wirtschafltichem Nutzen' und 'politischen Zielen.' Die öffentliche Einwanderungsdiskussion in Deutschland, Österreich und der Schweiz Anfang der 70er Jahre," in T. Niehr and K. Böke (eds.), Einwanderungsdiskurse: Vergleichende diskurslinguistische Studien (Wiesbaden: Westdeutscher Verlag, 2000), pp. 135-57.
87. Niehr, Einwanderungsdiskurse.
88. Traditionally, the CDU forms a partnership with the Bavarian "sister"-party, the Christian-Social Union (CSU).
89. We cross-tabulated party affiliation with the coded text passages rather than total speaking time or words spoken because we are interested in the substantive contribution of parties to the debate.
90. Due to space limitations we are not showing the tables containing the cross-tabulations for each party.
91. With a total of only 13 observations (that is, coded text passages) the distribution across 17 thematic and six origin categories is not very meaningful for the Linke.
92. While we indicate party affiliation in the quotes, we do not separate the narratives based on political party affiliation of the speaker because we are interested in the general categories, narratives, and models of argumentation that frame the entire debate.
93. Harald Bauder, "Media Discourse"
94. P. Bendel, "Totgesagte leben länger: Das deutsche Zuwanderungsgesetz," Gesellschaft-Wirtschaft-Politik, Vol. 53, No. 2 (2004), pp. 205-12.
95. Government statistics confirm that immigrants in Germany are more likely to be unemployed and on government assistance than German citizens; Bundesamt für Migration und Flüchtlinge (BMF), Migration, Integration und Asyl in Zahlen (Nürnberg: BMF, 2004)
96. Beauftragter der Bundesregierung für Migration, Flüchtlinge und Integration (BBMFI), Bericht über die Lage der Ausländrinnen und Ausländer in Deutschland (Berlin: BBMFI, 2005).
97. One interview respondent did not answer these questions because this person rejected the idea that German nationhood exists.
98. When prompted what he or she meant with the term "Arabic world," this respondent referred to "Middle Eastern and Turkish" migrants.
99. Despite this legal distinction, several respondents were critical of the legal privileges bestowed upon the Aussiedler and denied to other migrant groups. For example, one respondent argues: The issue with the Aussiedler is problematic because they are considered to be Germans and once they come to Germany they are immediately granted full rights as citizens. We do not have anything against this practice but we would like to see that other migrants who have lived in Germany for generations are given the same rights and privileges as the Aussiedler.
100. Beck-Gernsheim, p. 74.
101. CDU, p. 23.
102. Ibid., p. 14.
103. Jan Herman Brinks, "Nationalism in German politics as Mirrored by the Print Media Since Reunification," Nationalism and Ethnic Politics, Vol. 13 (2007), pp. 555-79.
104. Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1996).
105. Benno Werlen, Zur Ontologie von Gesellschaft und Raum: Sozialgeographie alltäglicher Regionalisierung-Band 1, 2nd Ed. (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1999), p. 130.
106. In their attempt to define a European cosmopolitanism, Ulrich Beck and Edgar Grande lament precisely the construction of European identity through a "mode of exclusion (Exclusionsmodus)" based on Christianity and religion
107. see Ulrich Beck and Edgar Grande, Das kosmopolitanische Europa: Gesellschaft und Politik in der Zweiten Modern (Frankurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 2007), p. 274.
108. Bauder, "Media Discourse," pp. 95-112
109. Bauder, "Neoliberalism," pp. 55-78.
110. Klaus J. Bade, Sozialhistorische Migrationsforschung (Göttingen: V & R Unipress, 2004), pp. 443-448
111. see also Bauder, "Neoliberalism," pp. 55-78.
112. A finding that is supported in debates in the German Bundestag in general by André Báchtiger, Dominik Hangartner, Pia Hess, and Céline Fraefel, "Patterns of Parliamentary Discourse: How 'Deliberative' are German Legislative Debates?," German Politics, Vol. 17, No. 3 (2008), pp. 270-92.