Gary D. Bouma, Mosques and Muslim Settlement in Australia (Canberra: Commonwealth of Australia, 1994)
In this book Bouma considers the ways in which mosques have been influential in the settlement of migrant Muslims in the last 25 years. There were 57 mosques in Australia in 1994 – 20 in NSW (56).
The vast majority of Muslims who have migrated to Australia have arrived since 1971 (22). They came from over 67 countries, with Lebanon and Turkey being the main places of domicile. In the 1991 Census 35% of Australia’s Muslims were born in Australia (23). Bouma sees Muslims becoming an increasingly important part of Australian society. He anticipates that Muslims will grow faster than many other religious groups [currently Buddhism, Hinduism and Sikhism are all growing faster] because they have a high percentage of young, with large families. Most Muslim women are married by their early twenties (28). Muslims also have the highest rate of marriage and the lowest rate of divorce, plus the lowest proportion of women with no children, despite its very young age profile (19) – the majority of Muslims are under the age of 25 (54% in 1991). Conversion from other religious groups constitutes a very negligible factor in the growth of Islam.
Bouma points to ways in which he sees Muslim migration as benefiting Australia:
1. By increasing trade with Muslim nations.
2. By enriching Australian culture.
3. By leading to the development of social services suited to particular groups.
4. By providing another perspective on Australian society.
Educationally, Muslim migrants match it well with the wider Australian population. Indeed, they are overrepresented among those with higher degrees. Bouma attributes this to two factors:
1. The high value placed on learning and knowledge by Islam.
2. The fact that immigrants with qualifications are favoured in the selection process.
Bouma advocates increasing social service funding via Islamic societies.
Bouma observes that it is important for Muslim migrants to “settle religiously” (98); that Australia is not home till they have a mosque:
Far from retarding settlement or participation in Australian society, this study concludes that the practice of Islam in Australia can facilitate settling into a new life here (100).
With the establishment of Islamic societies, mosques and other community infrastructures has come a greater commitment to Australia and greater satisfaction with life here (100).
Here Bouma dissents from the view that religion only impedes the settlement of immigrants whose homelands are less industrialized than Australia. Rather, he evidently follows Weber, Parsons, Jung and Berger in considering “religion to be an effective mechanism in the introduction and legitimation of social change” (1). Although Bouma does not openly say so, he appears to favour the view that Islam, like other religious groups, socializes its members into the dominant values of Australian society, provides “the value orientations necessary to adopt the ways of industrial society” and provides support in the process of learning about Australia as a new society and gaining access to social services and employment (1).
Bouma admits that his research, while allowing for some ways in which Islam might be unique, assumes “that Islam would function in much the same way in the process of immigrant settlement as Christian religious groups have in the past” (2).
Bouma notes that it has been relatively rare for religion to serve as the motivation for migration to Australia. Nor did his own interviews with Muslim migrants show religion to be a motivating factor of any significance.
He considers religion in general terms as a factor in the settlement of migrants, pointing out that it:
1. Helps a group of immigrants to settle.
2. Affects the patterns of settlement of certain groups. In Chapter 5 Bouma considers arrival, housing, securing employment, use of English language, and educating children.
3. Sustains and motivates the migrant in the process of settlement.
Muslim women encounter more problems than men in settlement:
1. They are more visibly different due to dress.
2. They have limited mosque involvement.
3. They have limited employment opportunities.
Bouma thinks it is an open question as to whether national origins or religion will predominate in shaping the identities of Muslim migrants. He sees anti-Islam sentiments as being part and parcel of the typically negative Australian reaction to any serious religion. Though Bouma does raise some questions about the treatment of women in the Muslim community, he tends to treat all criticism of Islam as expressive of prejudice and indicative of a failure to understand Islam.
It is ironic that Bouma should highlight ignorance about Islam as a fundamental problem facing Muslim settlement in Australia (83). For Bouma’s study suffers from the fact that he himself does not adequately understand Islam. In particular Bouma fails to appreciate the immense importance of group solidarity within Islam. In his monumental The Christian Message in a Non-Christian World, Hendrik Kraemer accurately states that the “secret of the iron rigidity of Islam is that its real ‘holy’ and its real ‘god’ is group solidarity, conceived with passionate religious directness” (353). Writing just before the outbreak of World War 2 Kraemer comments:
“A very pertinent way to define Islam would be to call it a medieval and radically religious form of that national-socialism which we know at present in Europe in its pseudo-religious form. As with all militant creeds of group solidarity Islam evinces a bitter and stubborn resistance to any effort that might involve change of religion, or, to put it more adequately, to any break in the group solidarity” (353).
At no point, as far as I can see, does Bouma ever pay any attention to the fact that it is extremely difficult for any Muslim to leave Islam and convert to another religion. I would challenge Bouma to name one Muslim society in the world where converts from Islam are not generally subject to persecution, often extreme in form. In Australia the size and situation of the Muslim minority makes it more difficult for Muslims to place extreme pressure on those who might convert from Islam, but even in Australia it is in practice extremely difficult for any Muslim who wishes to do so, to cease to be a Muslim.
It misses the point to depict how secular and nominal many Muslims in Australia may be (becoming such is not apostasy and such persons are still Muslims). Various points arising from Bouma’s own research and observations, when combined, rather than treated in isolation, serve to indicate the underlying strength of Islamic group solidarity, whether these are due to discrimination or factors peculiar to Islamic communities:
- Muslims have the lowest rate of religious itermarriage of any religious group in Australia (19). In 1991 the percentage of religiously intermarried Muslims was only 6%, in contrast to far higher percentages for Anglicans (34.7), Catholics (29.9), Buddhists (15.6), Greek Orthodox (12.1) and Jews (13.1). Bouma comments: “This indicates the importance of religious identity for Muslims as well as the fact that a strong Muslim community able to channel and facilitate the marriage patterns of its youth has already been established” (35). Bouma contests what he dubs the assimilationist perspective that a low rate of intermarriage indicates incomplete settlement or interrelation with the larger society and sees this rather as an indication of healthy institutionalization. But Bouma fails to see that the implications of a low rate of intermarriage among Muslims cannot be papered over by an appeal to multicultural policy. Yes, with many groups social cohesion is not necessarily compromised by preservation of their distinctives. However, because Bouma has not come to terms with the nature of Islamic group solidarity he fails to see the threat this poses to social cohesion in Australia.
- Muslims are underrepresented among those with skilled vocational qualification (30). Although overrepresented among those with higher degrees, Muslim men and women are underrepresented in every other category of qualification (30).
- Employment of Muslim males and females is well below the national average (32), with Muslims overrepresented in labouring and related work.
- Naturally enough, most Muslims interviewed by Bouma, expressed a desire to live nearer a mosque or Muslim neighbourhood. Bouma comments: “Australia is not home for [Muslim immigrants] until there are mosques in which to pray, until there are Islamic symbols atop buildings, until there are communities in which halal food can be obtained and Islamic education available for their children” (66).
- Of those Muslims interviewed by Bouma, those who made clear to their employers “what the demands of Islam were for them and suggested ways that these demands could be met, found the usual response was increased respect for themselves and for Islam, as well as creatively negotiated ways of meeting their religious requirements” (47). He also observes, “Young Muslims are more likely to insist in prayer facilities because there has been an increase in commitment to religious practice and because these facilities are becoming readily available both at mosques and in workplaces” (47).
- Bouma comments, “One of the strongest sources of evidence of the increased vitality of Islam in Australia is the degree of excitement with which many Muslim young adults are committing themselves to religious practice” (76). He identifies three reasons for this:
- Participation in Islamic youth groups.
- The “enthusiasm with which some young Muslims have decided to stake their claim to full and uncompromised acceptance in the multicultural society Australia professes to be.”
- Parental concern to instil Islamic beliefs and values in the children.
- Bouma recognizes that in Australia being Muslim is a differentiating identity, since Muslims are a minority group. For those who focus on their identity as Muslims “can be expected to increase in religiosity” (69).
- The very dynamics of migration itself often cause Muslims to become more religious as migrants attach themselves to religious organizations, beliefs and practices that remind them of their origins, help them to stay distinct from other Australians (I add here especially when they are critical of some features of Australian society and culture such as promiscuity and modes of female dress), and help provide meaning, social support and community. Even if such connections are made for primarily social rather than religious reasons this still illustrates the depth of group solidarity in the wider Muslim community.
- Anglicans, Presbyterians, Methodists and Catholics have had their own private schools for generations. Therefore, Bouma sees it as fully appropriate that Muslims too should have their own schools, observing that most Muslim parents express a preference for Muslim schools (52).
- In NSW the Islamic Council of NSW oversees the provision of Islamic Awareness Programs in schools and community (54).
- Bouma observes: “although each mosque may be limited to one or a few ethnic backgrounds, the Islamic symbols cut across ethnicity and provide the basis for a kind of trans-ethnic unity grounded in religious identity” (66). He comments, “For many Muslims religion is more important than, or at least as important as, language or national origins. As these communities form, they become valued first as sources of support and friendship, then for the religious meaning they provide” (71).
- Bouma also recognizes that what he calls the worldwide revitalization of Islam is also serving to increase the religiosity of Muslims in Australia.
Bouma makes a common mistake in his treatment of Muslim settlement in Australia by failing to discriminate between Islam and Muslims. For example, when seeking to highlight the problem of ignorance about Islam he does not look at Islam itself (admittedly outside the scope of his study), but at what his Muslim interviewees have to say about public perceptions about Islam. There is nothing unexpected about individual Muslims expressing the view that people don’t understand that Islam is not inherently violent or does not have leanings towards violence. But what must be understood is that Islam is not what individual Muslims say Islam is, however sincerely they may voice such sentiments. Islam is what the collectivity of Muslims cause it to become.
The Australian values statement that must be signed by all persons aged 18 years or over who are migrating to Australia on provisional or permanent visas is as follows:
I understand:
• Australian society values respect for the freedom and dignity of the individual, freedom of religion, commitment to the rule of law, Parliamentary democracy, equality of men and women and a spirit of egalitarianism that embraces mutual respect, tolerance, fair play and compassion for those in need and pursuit of the public good
• Australian society values equality of opportunity for individuals, regardless of their race, religion or ethnic background
• the English language, as the national language, is an important unifying element of Australian society.
It seems undeniably the case that fundamental Islamic values do indeed clash with essential Australian values, if Islam is to be judged by its contemporary expressions in Muslim societies and in non-Muslim nations where the Muslim collectivity is of substantial proportions (after all this is where many of our Muslim migrants are coming from). Muslim migrants may sign the Australian Values Statement. It is not for me to judge the sincerity or otherwise of those who do so, depending on how widespread the practice of taqqiyah (deceit for the sake of Islam) may be – a very difficult thing to determine. But let’s assume that all Muslim migrants sign the Values Statement with full understanding and full intention to observe such values. Here again we must remind ourselves of the need to discriminate between Islam and Muslims. At the end of the day it is not what individual Muslims want or decide to do that tells the story, but what Islam produces as the collectivity of Muslims in Australia.
For example, at a recent NCEIS (National Centre for Excellence in Islamic Studies), I personally heard outspoken Muslim women protesting at major entrenched inequalities in the Muslim community. This clearly indicates that whatever intentions Muslim migrants may have had upon entering Australia to comply with Australian values, Islam as the collectivity of Muslims continues, in a blatant disregard for those Australian values, to fail to treat women as equals.
Bouma’s naivete is expressed in the following statement:
A multicultural society should be characterized by religious pluralism, a willingness to live and let live among religious organizations, with a spirit of respect for religion and of willing cooperation from governments and their agencies at all levels (88).
With few exceptions Christian churches and organizations accept freedom of religion as a fundamental value for Australian society. For, as Bouma recognizes, this is a development arising under the umbrella of common law and the British Protestant tradition (90). Typically, it is only with respect to Islam, not Buddhism, Hinduism or Sikhism, that there are expressions of unease. Strip away the layers of stereotyping, being sucked in by media hype and tarring Muslims with the terrorist brush. Now add in acknowledgment of positive expressions of Muslim interaction with the wider community through individuals and perhaps some Islamic organizations. Still the unease remains. This is because Islam is radically different from any other major religion. Whatever claims to the contrary individual Muslims or Muslim leaders may make, we must return to a consideration of the reality. Look at the contemporary Islamic world. It is extremely difficult to find any significant contemporary examples of Islam enshrining the value of the freedom of religion. What basis for confidence do we have that a much more strongly developed Islam in Australia would truly embrace this value? Bouma fails to provide this basis.
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