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Sean Dardine
How have cultural perceptions shaped the socioeconomic conditions of
Muslim immigrants in Western Europe?
Introduction
The socio-economic statuses of Muslims in Europe have generally seen little
improvement since the first generations of Muslims arrived in Europe as guest-
laborers shortly after WWII (Krausz 2012b). As native Europeans have enjoyed a
trend of economic improvement for most of the 20th and 21st centuries, the Muslim
immigrant populations have found themselves ghettoized and excluded from the full
benefits of European life. Experts such as Samuel P. Huntington have pointed to
fundamental cultural differences between Muslims and Western Europeans as
leading to an inevitable “clash of civilizations”, and making multiculturalism an
unachievable goal (Huntington 1993). However, there are counterarguments to this
theory that point to the discriminatory practices and anti-Muslim sentiments in
Western Europe as the true barrier to integration (Abdelkader 2015).
In this paper, we decipher to what degree discrimination against Muslims has
been a barrier to success in Western Europe, and to what extent Muslims have been
held back by their own cultural values and religiosity. In order to measure
integration and socio-economic status we will use research pertaining to the
employment and education of Muslims in Western Europe. We will also use studies

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that examine the effects of Islamic values on the ability of Muslim immigrants to
assimilate in to Western European culture and adopt European values.
We found significant evidence in support of the idea that Muslims have been
discriminated against in terms of employment and educational opportunities and
that such barriers have lead to the dismal socio-economic status experienced by so
many Muslims in Europe today (Connor and Koenig 2015). We also learned that
while levels of religiosity in Muslims are related to social values that fall outside of
the mainstream (feelings towards homosexuality, abortion, etc.)(Valerie 2013),
Islamic values may have little to no relation with the perceptions of Muslims
towards the governments of Western European countries (Doerschlerand Jackson
2011), or feelings of national identification with those countries (Maxwell and
Bleich 2014).
The discrimination of Muslim immigrants in Europe can be largely attributed
to anxieties and fears driven by the radicalization of European-born Muslims (Foner
2015). Muslims in Europe have become broadly associated with the barbaric acts of
terrorist organizations such as ISIS. However, the perception of there being a strong
correlation between religion and terrorism is counterintuitive to the war on terror.
“In the last five years, less than 2 percent of all terrorist attacks in the E.U. have been
‘religiously motivated’” (Ahmed 2015). The role of non-religious factors is often
overlooked when discussing agitations between Muslims and Europeans. In this
paper we observe the socio-economic status of European Muslims for the purpose of
finding better solutions to the epidemic of terrorism in Europe as well as improving
conditions for the millions of Muslims trying to live in western countries.

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Employment
According to 2011 U.K. census data, 19.8% of the Muslim population was in
full-time employment, compared to 34.9% for the general U.K. population in 2011
(Ali 2015: 58). The same dataset showed that, excluding students, the rate of
unemployment for Muslims was “nearly double that of the general population (7.2%
compared to 4.0%)” (Ibid.). During the economic recession of the late 2000’s,
Muslims were affected the most by the rapid growth in unemployment within the
U.K. (Khattab and Johnston 2014). This data shows that Muslims have typically been
worse off than the rest of the U.K., but does not provide any details on causality.
It is difficult to determine whether or not Muslims have been discriminated
against specifically for their religion. For one thing, anti-Muslim sentiment often
overlaps with ethnic prejudices (Foner 2015). Another complicating element is that
unemployment can often be attributed to individual-level factors such as education.
A comprehensive survey of Muslims and Non-Muslims across Western
European countries showed that significant differences in employment
opportunities between the two groups existed in all of Western Europe, not just the
U.K. (Connor and Koenig 2015). 94% of Non-Muslim respondents to the survey
were employed as opposed to only 82% for Muslim respondents. When controlling
for individual-level differences, specifically human capital, immigration status, and
cultural aspects, about half of the employment gap was still unaccounted for. Since
there is a significant portion of the employment gap that cannot be attributed to
individual-level factors, there is a strong implication in this data that Muslims are in
fact being discriminated against in the labor market because of their religion.

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Another commonly referenced factor contributing to Muslim unemployment
is the relatively lower labor force participation rates of Muslim women. Although
Islamic law allows for women to work, they are expected to adhere to conditions
that are much stricter than the conditions set for Muslim men. Female modesty is
valued across many cultures, but it is particularly explicit in Islam (Syed et al.,
2005). This can often lead to discomfort for Muslim women working in Western
countries. A study on Muslim women in Australia showed that the majority of
women did not feel comfortable socializing in non-Muslim environments (Scott &
Franzmann, 2007). In particular, Muslim women usually are uncomfortable in social
settings where alcohol is openly consumed. This lack of socializing may hurt the
ability of Muslim women to professionally network, something that is especially
important to career progression in the western workplace (Ali & Kramar, 2015).
Furthermore, it has been proven that the participation of women in the
workplace is closely related to household income. (Ali et al., 2016). Although women
in Islamic culture are generally expected to stay at home, participation in the labor
force is also affected by economic factors. A survey of 634 Muslim migrant women in
the U.K. found that a significant majority (57%) was seeking work, and that most of
the women could not find employment due to lack of training, appropriate childcare
facilities, tailored engagement, and basic lack of confidence (Dyke and James 2009).
A person’s socio-economic background plays a major role in determining the
individual-level factors that affect employment opportunity. With the socio-
economic status of Muslims in Europe being generally worse than the socio-
economic status of non-Europeans, there exists a “chicken or the egg” dilemma

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when trying to quantify religion-based boundaries to employment. Are Muslims less
employed because they are poor? Or are Muslims poor because they are less
employed? In future research we would like to look in to which variable,
employment or income, has the stronger effect on the other. Regardless, there is
clear and quantifiable evidence that some Muslims in Western Europe have been
excluded from the work force because of their religion. The U.K. has implemented
programs such as the Employment Equality Religion or Belief Regulations of 2003,
and in future research we would like to investigate the outcomes of such policies. It
is likely that further intervention is necessary if we hope to ensure that religious
discrimination becomes less common in the future.
Education
There is also proof that traditions of education and religion in Western
Europe are making it more difficult for Muslims to assimilate. For Muslim parents, it
is of great importance that their children receive distinct moral training in
accordance with their Islamic faith (Holger 2008). Since Islamic values are not
taught in any of the public European schools, parents must send their kids to special
schools for Muslims if they want their kids to receive moral training. The problem is
that Islamic schools are rare in Europe and are usually poorly funded. “There are
6,500 Church of England or Catholic faith schools in the UK, but only 11 Islamic
schools (in a country with 3 million Muslims)” (Foner 2015). In France, 20% of
students go to state funded Catholic schools, but there are only 2 state funded
Muslim schools in the entire country (Ibid). As a result, most Muslim parents in

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Europe feel that they must make a choice between their child’s faith and their
education.
2011 U.K. census data showed that Muslims actually had a larger rate of
participation in higher education than the rest of the U.K. population in 2011 (60%
for Muslims, 41% for general population)(Ali 2015: 60). It would appear that the
educational opportunities for Muslims in the U.K. improved during the 2000s. In
2001, census data indicated that 38.6% of Muslims had “no qualifications” for
employment. In 2011, the “no qualifications” number shrank to 25.6% for Muslims.
Although the percentage shrank significantly, it may have been caused by national
improvements for the U.K. as a whole rather than a specific effort to help Muslims.
During the same time frame, the percentage of the total U.K. population with “no
qualifications” also fell from 29.1% to 22.7%, indicating that there is a strong
positive correlation between the Muslim and general populations. The percentage of
unqualified Muslims was 3% higher than the national average even after a decade of
improvement (Ibid).
No single party can be entirely blamed for the relative lack of education
amongst Muslims. While it is clear that educational inequality exists, most research
focuses on ethnical differences in educational obtainment as opposed to religious
differences. In the future, we would like to do more research on educational
outcomes specifically for Muslims in Europe. Some may blame educational
inequality on an apparent unwillingness of Muslims to participate in the traditional
educational system; opting to send their children to poorly funded Islamic schools.
Others might hold the governments of Western Europe responsible for not

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prioritizing funding for Islamic schools. The high participation rates in higher
education for Muslims provides clear evidence that Muslims in Europe generally
value education as much as their non-Muslim counterparts, and while the
educational situation has improved for Muslim immigrants in the 21st century, there
is still room for further advancement.
Islam and Assimilation
Feelings towards Democracy
Many people cite Islamic values as the main reason why Muslims have failed
to integrate in to European society. One of the most influential sentiments towards
this was Huntington’s (1993) Clash of Civilizations thesis:
“The Muslim world lacks the core political values that gave birth to representative
democracy in Western civilization: separation of the religious and secular authority,
rule of law and social pluralism, parliamentary institutions of representative
government, and protection of individual rights and civil liberties as a buffer
between citizens and the power of the state.”
A recent study on the levels of trust that Muslims have for democratic
institutions may partially disprove Huntington’s thesis (Doerschler and Jackson
2011). The study showed that Muslims and Non-Muslims in Germany shared
approximately the same level of support for democracy as a theoretical concept.

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However, Muslims were significantly more supportive than Non-Muslims when
asked about democracy as currently practiced in Germany. Muslims and non-
Muslims also held equal trust for police, despite the proliferation of surveillances in
Muslim neighborhoods. 39.1% of Muslim respondents to the survey considered
themselves “deeply religious” as opposed to only 8.2% for the non-Muslims,
implying that there may be little correlation between the Muslim faith and views
towards democracy.
There have been studies on Muslim trust of political institutions in other
countries that have had similar results. In England, Muslims were typically more
satisfied with parliament than most Christians (Maxwell 2010: 96-7). In the
Netherlands, Muslims were slightly more likely than Catholics to trust Dutch
parliament, legal systems, and the European Parliament (Schmeets and te Riele
(2010: 13-16). In France, Muslim families and girls “set aside their headscarf when
required by authorities, rather than miss the opportunity for advancement provided
by educational attainment” (Locerie 2010:67). These findings provide evidence
against any notion of Muslims being incapable of accepting rule of law or
institutional governance in western society.
Social Values
One of the most prevalent concerns amongst Europeans who are anti-Muslim
is the fear that Islam will threaten the liberal values of western societies (Foner
2015). “Questions about compatibility between Islam and modern principles of
gender equality and sexual liberalism have become commonplace in European

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public discourse” (Valerie 2013). A comparative survey of Muslims and non-
Muslims in England (Ibid.) shed some light on how levels of religiosity affect social
values.
The results of Valerie’s survey showed that Muslims are generally more
religious than non-Muslims in England. 36% of Muslims surveyed claimed to attend
weekly religious services as opposed to 17% for Christians and other religions.
Higher levels of religiosity were linked to more conservative social attitudes. 73% of
Muslims surveyed believed that homosexuality is always wrong. 68% believed that
premarital sex is always wrong. However, higher religiosity can usually be
connected to more conservative social views for just about every religion. Valerie’s
study showed that if you standardize socio-economic status, education, and
religiosity, Muslims and non-Muslims are more similar in their attitudes towards
gender roles and divorce. Standardizing these factors also revealed that there is an
independent effect of Islam on attitudes towards premarital sex and homosexuality.
In other words, there is evidence that Muslims are more likely than non-Muslims to
have a negative view on homosexuality and premarital sex regardless of socio-
economic status, education, or religiosity.
National Identification
A simple and effective indicator of assimilation for immigrants is whether or
not they identify as citizens of the host country. A lot of contemporary literature
hypothesizes that Muslims are less likely than other immigrants to accept the
national identities of the countries they come to (Levitt 2007; Roy 2006). There is

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evidence to suggest that such a hypothesis might be false, and that being Muslim has
little to no effect on national identification
In a 2009 survey of metropolitan Muslims and non-Muslims in France, 75
percent of Muslims said that they “felt French” (Maxwell and Bleich 2014). The
survey focused on four independent variables: religiosity, socio-economic status,
participation in social networks, and immigration. Out of the four variables,
religiosity and socio-economic status had the smallest affect on identification. When
comparing Muslims to other religions, the survey found similar results. For example,
higher levels of religiosity were aligned with lower French identification for both
Muslims and Christians. The most important and relevant finding of Maxwell and
Bleich’s study is that religiosity is not the most important way of understanding the
national identification of Muslims.
Disclaimer
It is important to note that Islam is the 2nd largest, and fastest growing
religion in the world (Liu 2011). With approximately 1.6 billion members, Muslims
account for about a quarter of the world’s population. Despite common perceptions
held by Europeans, most Muslims are not even Arabic (Lippman 2008). Of the entire
global Muslim population, only 20% lives in the Middle East or North Africa (Liu
2011). There are many different denominations of Islam, all with different
interpretations of the Islamic doctrine. That being said, caution must be practiced
when dealing with any generalizations about the entire Muslim population.

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Conclusion
The economic struggle of Muslim immigrants in Western Europe is often
depicted as a clear-cut issue. There are those who would say that the blame should
fall mostly on the Muslim community (Huntington 1993; Levitt 2007; Olivier 2006;
etc.), while others will say that the governments of western countries have failed to
properly combat religious discrimination (Abdelkader 2015; Khattab and Johnston
2014; Ali 2015; etc.). Most perceptions of the Muslim-European crisis are based on
emotion and loose anecdotal evidence. Contemporary research and data paints a
much clearer picture of the conditions faced by Muslim immigrants in Europe.
Relatively high unemployment rates for Muslims can be attributed in part to
religious discrimination within labor markets (Connor and Koenig 2015). High
unemployment and poor socio-economic conditions may also be a result of lower
educational obtainment amongst Muslims (Ali 2015). It appears that while
employment and educational opportunities have gotten better for most Muslims in
the past decade, there is still a lot of room for improvement. In future research we
would like to see what correlations there are between educational obtainment for
Muslims and employment. There is already evidence that at least half of the Muslim
employment gap can be accounted for through individual-level factors (Connor and
Koenig 2015), and we are interested in gaining a better understanding of that
relationship.
It also appears that many of the theories regarding the negative outcomes of
Islamic immigration can be at least partially disproved. Studies discussed in this
paper have provided evidence that being Muslim does not affect the likelihood of an

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individual accepting democracy (Doerschler and Jackson 2011), and that a French
Muslim is just as likely as any other French citizen to nationally identify with the
country of France (Maxwell and Bleich 2014). These findings show that there is a
clear willingness and capability for most Muslim immigrants to assimilate in to
European society. Given this information, there is reason to believe that Muslim
integration in Western Europe is far from reaching its full potential. Something that
we would like to research further is the length of time from immigration to
assimilation. More research can also be done regarding differences between first
and second-generation immigrants and their feelings of national identity.
The struggles between native Europeans and Muslim immigrants have often
been manifested in horrifically violent ways. Islamic-related terrorism in Western
Europe exacerbates pre-existing fears towards Muslim people and fuels
discriminatory anti-Muslim behavior (Foner 2015). It is in the best interest of
Western European countries to put a stop to this destructive cycle, but in order to
solve the conflict at hand we must gain a better understanding of why it exists.
Through better research and a clearer understanding of Muslim-European relations
it is not impossible to imagine a more integrated and peaceful future for Europe and
for the entire world.

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