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Home » About Norwich » SGS Today »
News Article
Islam in Europe: Integration or Marginalization?, Ashgate Publishing, May 2004.
Muslim communities in Europe present an object lesson for diplomacy students
by Amy Roach Partridge, correspondent
© Oct. 23, 2009 Norwich University Office of Communications
In today's globalized world, students and teachers of diplomacy must be keenly attuned to the roots — and potential causes — of international conflicts. Understanding the source of rifts between countries and discord within communities is essential to the quest for peaceful global interaction. As a professor in Norwich University's Master of Arts in Diplomacy (MDY) program and an expert on Muslims in Europe, Robert Pauly is particularly well suited to teaching these pressing international issues.
Since 2003, Pauly has taught courses in the International Conflict Management and International Terrorism concentrations. He is also the author of a 2004 book, Islam in Europe: Integration or Marginalization?, which looks at the effect of the growth of Muslim communities on Western European demographics.
"Dr. Pauly's expertise is of great importance to our students," said Harold J. Kearsley, associate dean of academic programs and director of Norwich's MDY program. "The world is no longer a world — it has become a village. If there is conflict in one part of the village, you have to worry about the rest of the village because we all interact so quickly. Understanding that dynamic is crucial for anyone who wants to work in the international arena in business, government or the private sector."
The part of that global village which Pauly focuses on — and the lessons it holds for diplomacy students — has become increasingly significant. As the world marked the eighth anniversary of the September 11 attacks, the struggle to quell Islamic terrorism continues. Pauly believes gaining a better understanding of how Muslims function in Western society is crucial.
"Terrorist acts like September 11th, the 3/11 attacks in Madrid, and the 2005 subway bombings in London have added to the percentage of people who equate Muslims with terrorism, which is not fair," said Pauly.
"One of the consequences of the continued marginalization of Muslims in Europe is that some members of those communities that feel rejected by society can become potential recruits for terrorist organizations," he added.
The history of Muslims in Europe parallels that of immigrants throughout the world. The existence of Muslim communities in France, Germany and the United Kingdom dates to the aftermath of World War II, when those countries implemented guest-worker programs attracting Muslims from India, Pakistan, Turkey, Morocco and Tunisia, among other nations.
"Over time, the families of these workers ended up migrating to those countries and developed a more permanent Muslim community," said Pauly.
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“One indicator of positive progress is that Muslim individuals have been elected to national parliamentary office in the UK and Germany.”
— Prof. Robert Pauly |
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A few generations later, the Islamic communities in Europe should be more entrenched in the ways of Western society, he said. Instead, the opposite has happened.
"Islam is a religion that transcends social, religious and political issues, so there is no separation of church and state — this conflicts directly with Europe's secularism, and has kept many Muslims out of place with mainstream European society," said Pauly.
Pauly finds some reasons for optimism, however. "One indicator of positive progress is that Muslim individuals have been elected to national parliamentary office in the UK and Germany," he said.
He believes that increasing Muslims' political representation at the regional, national and supranational level is key to helping these communities forge a European Islamic identity. For lasting change and improvement to occur, the drive ultimately has to come from within the Muslim community, he stressed.
The idea of change from within can be applied to many diplomatic situations — and is one of the cornerstones of Pauly's approach to teaching diplomacy.
"One of the focal points I stress in the conflict resolution/post-conflict reconstruction seminar is that reconciliation solutions cannot be imposed by outside actors or governments," said Pauly. "When seeking to build long-lasting stability, the affected population must be behind any possible solutions or it is not going to happen."
Although policy ideas are developed to improve the future of a country or population, they must be developed with an eye toward the past. "What students need to learn as they become policymakers is to take a closer look at past operations to see what worked and what didn't work, and apply those lessons in the future," said Pauly.
In the ongoing American intervention in Iraq, for example, Pauly noted that the failure of policymakers to thoroughly examine previous nation-building efforts in the region led them to underestimate the challenges involved.
"Policymakers — and the future policymakers currently studying at Norwich — really need to draw insight from the past when they are planning and implementing foreign policy," he said.
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