Unwilling Citizens? Muslim Young People and Identity

Abstract

The empirical data explored in Chapter 4 around how community cohesion is actually being understood and practised in work with young people suggested that the characterisation of community cohesion as a retreat to previous policy approaches of coercive assimilationism (Back et al., 2002) is misplaced. Instead, the community cohesion youth work practice in Oldham has accepted and worked positively with distinct ethnic, religious and geographical identities, and its aim has been to augment those identities with overarching, common identities and experiences through work that follows the principles of ‘contact theory’ (Hewstone et al., 2007). However, this does suggest the need for greater understanding of what these separate identities held by young people are and how they impact on their receptiveness towards cohesion based efforts to promote shared identities and values. Furthermore, this empirical evidence does not necessarily contradict the implicit thesis of community cohesion (Cantle, 2001; Ouseley, 2001) that ethnic segregation and policy approaches that have re-enforced it (Malik, 2009) have encouraged separate ethnic identities that are inherently problematic in their antagonism to the ‘other’ and their lack of interest in and commitment to commonality.