A Common Life amidst Fragmentation: A Consideration of German and French Approaches to the Integration of Muslims

Abstract

In early 2010 the French and German governments published reports that examined the situation of Muslims in their respective countries. The reports represent part of the ongoing public discussions around integration, assimilation, and national cohesion in the face of increasing ethnic, religious, and cultural diversity. This paper places these reports in conversation with a ritual theory as espoused by Adam B. Seligman et al. in Ritual and Its Consequences: An Essay on the Limits of Sincerity. The ritual theory Seligman et al. propose provides an opportunity to contrast the French and German approaches to Muslim integration. This theory is a frame from which to understand the divergent contexts because they articulate a ritual and social theory that endeavors to explain the possibilities of social cohesion while considering the realities of a “modern” life, which to its authors includes ethnic, religious, and social diversity. I argue in this paper that we need to understand the lived realities of the populations using a social scientific approach while maintaining a sense of being one through shared norms that bind us as a society. The Germans consider the lived realities too heavily while the French focus too much on the shared norms.