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There are several points of view about collecting ethnic statistics, and just about all of them are used by the various countries of Europe.
French law completely forbids the collection of statistics concerning ethnic or racial origin, as well as religion, except for some very rare exceptions for certain scientific studies. That’s one of the reasons that you will find such wide variations in articles about France about the number of Muslims of the percentage of immigrants. However, a recent modification of the law will apparently permit census data regarding nationality and country of birth, and there is a proposal to also allow information on the national origin of one’s parents.
In the UK, the situation is the opposite. There is no law restricting the collection of data, and the Office of Statistics collects data on ethnic origin, religion, employment, education for the census and also for statistic like “victims of crime.”
Most of the other countries are situated between these two extremes. The Netherlands and Greece are closest to the UK. Ethnic origin is closely tracked in Greece, and the Netherlands uses ethnic origin in its crime statistics.
In Romania, ethnic origin is only recorded in the census data, which also has questions concerning religion and maternal language.
Spain and Portugal are the same as France – ethnic statistics are forbidden by law except for scientific studies.
Italy keeps track of nationalities both for the census and for crime statistics. Germany also tracks nationality but not religion or ethnic origin.
Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia do not oblige residents to declare their ethnic origin, but it may be declared optionally. For example, for a population of 38 million in Poland, 470,000 residents declare that they are not Polish.
Sweden keeps track of the country of origin for population and education statistics. Employment statistics keep track of the continent of origin, but not the country or religion.
Considering the number of wars, ethnic massacres, pogroms, nights of Crystal or Saint Bartholomew, purges, and all of the other things that have happened in Europe over the centuries, this will always be a touchy subject and there is quite a bit of room for debate.
Perhaps because I am completely used to it now, I approve of the French system which turns a blind eye on differences (or at least tries to). In any case, there are so many ethnic mixtures in the world now that it is really unfair to make people choose. French children with one European parent and one African or Asian parent are generally not going to look completely European, but should they automatically be called black or Chinese? Names often give away a person’s ethnic origin, but should everyone called Mustapha be considered a Muslim? I think it’s best to let each person define himself individually and not affix labels on people from childhood that will inevitably affect their lives.
At the same time, I do understand that ethnic statistics are often used to try to help various groups rather than to discriminate against them. If you can’t find the people, it’s hard to help them!
I always find it odd that any American Wikipedia or City Data article on any town or city contains a detailed ethnic breakdown of the population. Maybe I was just brought up in the ebony & ivory ideal that it shouldn't matter. No doubt such statistics are used by homebuyers, and make racial separation more likely. As for Europe, many countries have language minorities from neighbouring countries, and maybe data collection (or not) reflects local sensitivities. France and the UK have always had opposing views on multiculturalism.
As a European I was surprised to see that US requires and closely records data on race and ethnicity.
I understand that the data collected by the census bureau, for example, is used for a variety of statistical studies. However, information is power and with technology making it so readily available to anyone,
there is potential for misuse.
Last edited by learningCA; 02-07-2010 at 08:38 AM..
I think there's a difference of opinion on whether it SHOULDN'T matter and whether it ACTUALLY DOES matter. People always talk about a race-blind world. It will never truly exist. You can better and worse "racial" relations, but human tribalism and prejudices based on our dominant sense, sight, will always exist to some extent. Even in Latin America, where the population is perceived to have closer to range of shades, colors, and types rather than discrete "races", these visible factors matter and prejudices exist. In America, look into a single "race", say black Americans, and there are subdivision based on shade, cultural background, neighborhood, and other class markers. The fact is: do we admit it and look into it, or do we ignore it on the idea that drawing attention to it makes it worse. Both ideas have some merit to them, IMO.
I think there's a difference of opinion on whether it SHOULDN'T matter and whether it ACTUALLY DOES matter. People always talk about a race-blind world. It will never truly exist. You can better and worse "racial" relations, but human tribalism and prejudices based on our dominant sense, sight, will always exist to some extent. Even in Latin America, where the population is perceived to have closer to range of shades, colors, and types rather than discrete "races", these visible factors matter and prejudices exist. In America, look into a single "race", say black Americans, and there are subdivision based on shade, cultural background, neighborhood, and other class markers. The fact is: do we admit it and look into it, or do we ignore it on the idea that drawing attention to it makes it worse. Both ideas have some merit to them, IMO.
Agree.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Neutre
It's exactly the lack of a solid, separate identity like that of the Blacks in the USA, that renders anything comparable to the Civil Rights Movement almost impossible.
Brazil has tried to introduce Affirmative Action, yet such thing is -regardless of whether you support it or not- difficult to implement because they can't even agree on who is Black and who is not.
So Latin American societies easily remain oblivious to their minorities, and these can hardly gain recognition for the reason mentioned.
Quote from another thread:
It's true that the US is a very race conscious society, but the existence of such grouping facilitates the minority to gain recognition.
If you look at the situation in many Latin American countries, those who are not White don't really have a separate identity; thus it's difficult to gain recognition and so they remained "invisible".
It's not like there are no changes, but some things are harder to achieve exactly for the lack of such open racism as in the US.
It's difficult for many countries to accept other "races" because they don't realize or they deny the existence of others.
Quote:
Originally Posted by kerouac2
French law completely forbids the collection of statistics concerning ethnic or racial origin, as well as religion, except for some very rare exceptions for certain scientific studies. That’s one of the reasons that you will find such wide variations in articles about France about the number of Muslims of the percentage of immigrants. However, a recent modification of the law will apparently permit census data regarding nationality and country of birth, and there is a proposal to also allow information on the national origin of one’s parents.
The policy doesn't keep Frenchmen from using the expression BBR, (bleu|blanc|rouge (blue|white|red), the colors of the French flag), widely recognized in the French recruitment world as a code for white French people born to white French parents.
As a European I was surprised to see that US requires and closely records data on race and ethnicity.
I understand that the data collected by the census bureau, for example, is used for a variety of statistical studies. However, information is power and with technology making it so readily available to anyone,
there is potential for misuse.
.
Also, the census does not "require" race. Supposedly you are constitutionally required to be counted, but nothing will happen if you don't fill out that question (or if you choose not to full out the census at all for that matter)
Of course with data comes the power of misuse. This is true for the rest of the data in the census as well. If you are worried about this to a large extent then you should be campaigning against the census as a whole, or the general free-flow of information. Publicly available information is used by the public for better or worse.
Perhaps because I am completely used to it now, I approve of the French system which turns a blind eye on differences (or at least tries to). In any case, there are so many ethnic mixtures in the world now that it is really unfair to make people choose. French children with one European parent and one African or Asian parent are generally not going to look completely European, but should they automatically be called black or Chinese? Names often give away a person’s ethnic origin, but should everyone called Mustapha be considered a Muslim? I think it’s best to let each person define himself individually and not affix labels on people from childhood that will inevitably affect their lives.
The census form doesn't require you to limit your answers to one "race". In addition, Islam is a religion. That would not be a race/ethnicity question. Chinese is a nationality, although its separation from ethnicity is not quite complete yet.
Last edited by bluebeard; 02-09-2010 at 04:29 PM..
Also, the census does not "require" race. Supposedly you are constitutionally required to be counted, but nothing will happen if you don't fill out that question (or if you choose not to full out the census at all for that matter)
Of course with data comes the power of misuse. This is true for the rest of the data in the census as well. If you are worried about this to a large extent then you should be campaigning against the census as a whole, or the general free-flow of information. Publicly available information is used by the public for better or worse.
The census is necessary for adequate political representation, for one thing, that fact is cristal clear to me.
You are correct, bluebird, publicly available information is used by the public with little control over its uses.
I still wonder though if life wouldn't be easier without official race collection data.
I must confess that I am still amazed of the silliness of judging people based on the color of their skin.
I look at my bicolor cat and ask myself if I should judge him based on his abdomen or maybe his back color?! Yeah, yeah, I know, group and cultural identity, blah blah blah, I heard it all before!
Most Jews remained Jews, for example, with or without government collection data reminding them of who they were! The fact remains that such determinations do validate prejudice, the French are right.
Last edited by learningCA; 02-09-2010 at 06:02 PM..
As fascinating as this topic is, the relevance to the World forum is a little hard to find.
Perhaps this topic is more suited to the Politics forum.
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