Germany seeks to assimilate new arrivals
Leader’s proposal would add rules for work and residency
BERLIN — Chancellor Angela Merkel’s cabinet Wednesday backed a plan seeking to better integrate migrants, virtually assuring that Germany will move ahead with efforts designed to stop the creation of ethnic ghettos and compel refugees to learn German and European values.
The plan reflects wider questions across Europe about how to assimilate the huge flow of migrants and asylum seekers from the Middle East and beyond that overwhelmed the continent last year and continues despite attempts to curb the exodus.
Germany has become a key test as the nation handling the largest number of migrants and a center for debates over how to balance the needs of the new arrivals while safeguarding Western traditions and culture.
The carrot-and-stick approach backed by Merkel’s ruling coalition is almost assured passage in Parliament this summer.
The law creates new economic opportunities for migrants to find work while ending benefits for those who do not comply. Merkel hailed it as “a milestone.”
“We are a country that makes a good offer to those who come to us, to those who are fleeing war, persecution, terrorism,” she said. “But we’re also saying very clearly — because we have learned from the past when we did not provide these integration opportunities — that we’re also expecting people to accept this offer.”
Although the migrant waves have slowed dramatically following European steps to block sea and land routes, Germany still faces the prospect of integrating more than 1 million newcomers.
The most contentious aspect of the bill is the bid by the government to prevent the rise of new and larger ghettos in big cities across Germany.
In places such as Berlin and Hamburg, waves of guest workers from Turkey settled down in the 1960s and ’70s, with many of them living and working in largely Muslim neighborhoods that critics say became isolated from mainstream German life.
Under the new plan, refugees would be compelled to stay at least three years in the municipalities to which they were first assigned unless they have a clear job offer elsewhere. That could leave many migrants stranded in small towns and villages far away from the urban neighborhoods where refugees have tended to find easier prospects for jobs and community ties.
Critics say the measure fails to recognize that such communities offer a “soft landing” for migrants, providing the chance to socialize with people who share a language and faith.
But the government counters that the new law will create employment for migrants in places across Germany by subsidizing the creation of 100,000 new jobs. These positions — such as maintaining public parks and aiding the elderly — will be paid at an exceedingly low rate of less than one euro per hour. But Labor Minister Andrea Nahles on Wednesday called them “an alternative to doing nothing.”
Refugees can also face government benefits cuts if they are found not to be seriously looking for work.