UK Conflict Between Immigrant Groups

In 1997, I wrote that immigration presents a challenge to a multicultural communities and that resolving racial tensions must be a high priority for our nation (To Be An American–Cultural Pluralism and the Rhetoric of Assimilation [NYU Press 1997]). In 2006, I argued that we waste a lot of time debating about immigration policy, when we should be implementing immigrant integration programs (Deporting Our Souls–Values, Morality and Immigration Policy [Cambridge Press 2006]). Kevin Johnson and I have written about how we need to look at class and experiential commonalities if we are to see a true new civil rights movement that brings together African American and other communities of color (The Immigrant Marches of 2006 and the Prospects for a New Civil Rights Movement, 42 Harv. Civ. Rights-Civ. Lib. L. Rev. 99  [2007]).

These issues are being raised very contentiously in Great Britain today.

Lewis Carter writes in the Telegraph:

Trevor Phillips, the chairman of the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC), said failed immigration policy risked nurturing racism among millions of Britons.

The gloomy assessment is the latest controversial outburst by Mr Phillips on the subject of immigration, he has previously warned of racial “segregation” in Britain, as well as “white families” being “cheated out of their right to social housing by newly arrived migrants”.

In an address to mark the 40th anniversary of Enoch Powell’s “rivers of blood” speech, in which Powell warned of the dangerous consequences of the rising level of immigration, Mr Phillips said such predictions had not come true.

However, he warned that out of control immigration policy had sparked a “war” which was just as concerning.  Click here for the full story.

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