The challenge of cultural integration

Oh, that's an easy one.  From Why Sweden struggles to curb gang violence in The Economist.  I lived in Sweden as a child in the early seventies, a period when there were strains between the US and Sweden.  The Vietnam War was one major issue but there were others, including Sweden's very strong neutrality during the bi-polar world of the Soviet Union and the US.  Exacerbating some of those tensions was Sweden's vociferous condemnations of US racial issues.  

Having lived in many countries, it was striking, even to a ten or fifteen year old, how naive much of the Swedish criticism was.  I loved Sweden and greatly admired Swedish culture in general, but most of the critics were posturing.  At the time, the extent of Sweden's experience with multiculturalism was 1) a Finnish minority, 2) a tiny number of Sami in the far north, and 3) a small number of refugees from the Soviet Union or other totalitarian regimes - usually doctors, lawyers, mathematicians, poets, writers and musicians.  Their experience of integrating highly variant cultures into the communitarian, high trust society of Sweden was extremely limited.

And yet, from political choice, that is what is having to happen now.  A couple of years ago they admitted some 165,000 refugees from Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq and other places in the Middle East.  Low skill in general, low trust cultures, insular cultures.  And it has not, so far, played out well.

In August a criminal clan set up roadblocks in Gothenburg to catch members of a rival gang. The police intervened and made several arrests, but failed to charge anyone. The gang war in Gothenburg eventually ended not because the cops stopped it, but because the gangsters negotiated a truce. Swedes are shocked to see such instances of the forces of law and order losing control of the country’s streets.

Sweden remains exceptionally safe—its murder rate is only a fifth of America’s. But a surge of spectacular gang crimes has captured public attention. This summer two Swedish teenagers were tortured and raped in a cemetery in a so-called humiliation crime. In the first half of this year 20 people, mostly young men, were killed in 163 shootings. A study in 2018 found that a man aged 15 to 29 in Sweden is ten times more likely to get shot than in Germany.

The problem is concentrated in highly segregated immigrant neighbourhoods. In Husby, a suburb of Stockholm, more than 80% of the population are migrants or the children of migrants, most of them from Iraq, Somalia, Syria and Turkey. The scene of ugly riots seven years ago, Husby is officially classified as one of 22 “extremely vulnerable areas” prone to crime and violence. Unemployment in such neighbourhoods is high. Thanks to restrictive labour rules, it is hard for unskilled newcomers to find jobs. Many teenage boys skip school; gangs offer a sense of purpose and belonging.

Around half the street-gang members are foreign-born; 85% have an immigrant background. The gangs are loosely organised, without a strict hierarchy. Their frequent use of extreme violence is a sign of immaturity, says Amir Rostami of Stockholm University. More mature gangs in Germany are less violent, he explains, because it is “bad for business”.

Many native Swedes are calling for tougher policing. So are many immigrants, who suffer most from crime. Sweden has only two cops per 1,000 inhabitants, compared with three in Germany. The government recently decided to hire 6,000 more police and 4,000 in supporting jobs by 2024. Erik Nord, chief of the Gothenburg police, wants 10,000 more officers (and the 4,000 support staff), and more camera surveillance too. The police were only recently allowed to tap criminals’ phones.

Operation Hoarfrost, launched after the fatal shooting of a 15-year-old in November last year, brought in police from across Sweden to crack down on crime in Malmo, a southern city. In recent years the culprit has been arrested in only 20% of gangland murders. The city hopes that more officers and better policing methods will improve this dismal record.

I wish the Swedes well in climbing a steep and difficult learning curve that does not have many examples of significant success other than the Anglo countries including the US.

It is a bit ironic though.  Sweden is going through a reverse "Defund the police" event.  They have always had a low police presence with a very light touch - workable in a highly communitarian society with high trust and a still deep cultural reservoir of Lutheranism (despite low church attendance).  

Their challenge is how to staff up police for the new challenge of an increasingly multi-cultural society which is more violent than historically acceptable.  And policing doesn't scale easily.  There are all sorts of second order effects.