Situational Diversity: Understanding Modes of Migration-Driven Differentiation in Urban Neighbourhoods

237 Pages·2020·3.76 MB·English

by  Matthias Klückmann

GLOBAL DIVERSITIES
Situational Diversity
Understanding Modes of Migration-Driven
Differentiation in Urban Neighbourhoods
Matthias Klückmann
mpimmg
Global Diversities
Series Editors
Steven Vertovec
Department of Socio-Cultural Diversity
Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and
Ethnic Diversity
Göttingen, Germany
Peter van der Veer
Department of Religious Diversity
Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and
Ethnic Diversity
Göttingen, Germany
Ayelet Shachar
Department of Ethics, Law, and Politics
Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and
Ethnic Diversity
Göttingen, Germany
Over the past decade, the concept of ‘diversity’ has gained a leading place
in academic thought, business practice, politics and public policy across
the world. However, local conditions and meanings of ‘diversity’ are
highly dissimilar and changing. For these reasons, deeper and more com-
parative understandings of pertinent concepts, processes and phenomena
are in great demand. This series will examine multiple forms and configu-
rations of diversity, how these have been conceived, imagined, and repre-
sented, how they have been or could be regulated or governed, how
different processes of inter-ethnic or inter-religious encounter unfold,
how conflicts arise and how political solutions are negotiated and
practiced, and what truly convivial societies might actually look like. By
comparatively examining a range of conditions, processes and cases
revealing the contemporary meanings and dynamics of ‘diversity’, this
series will be a key resource for students and professional social scientists.
It will represent a landmark within a field that has become, and will con-
tinue to be, one of the foremost topics of global concern throughout the
twenty- first century. Reflecting this multi-disciplinary field, the series
will include works from Anthropology, Political Science, Sociology, Law,
Geography and Religious Studies. While drawing on an international
field of scholarship, the series will include works by current and former
staff members, by visiting fellows and from events of the Max Planck
Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity. Relevant manu-
scripts submitted from outside the Max Planck Institute network will
also be considered.
More information about this series at
http://www.palgrave.com/gp/series/15009
Matthias Klückmann
Situational Diversity
Understanding Modes of Migration-
Driven Differentiation in Urban
Neighbourhoods
Matthias Klückmann
Independent Researcher
Kornwestheim, Germany
ISSN 2662-2580 ISSN 2662-2599 (electronic)
Global Diversities
ISBN 978-3-030-54790-5 ISBN 978-3-030-54791-2 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-54791-2
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To my mother for her support through all the years
and to my uncle for making me curious about the world.
Preface
Some moments gain a deeper meaning only in retrospect. As I look back
on the events this book is the final chapter to, one conversation in par-
ticular has remained in my memory. It took place during my second stay
in Glasgow in 2013, when I had an appointment in a gurdwara. I was
offered something to eat and was waiting in the Langar for a while when
a woman sat down with me. We got into a conversation, talked about my
research, her volunteer work as a teacher in the gurdwara and her experi-
ences in Pollokshields. She told me how she increasingly felt that social
cohesion was breaking down. She sensed an increasingly negative, some-
times aggressive attitude towards immigrants or their descendants. She
expressed her fear that demagogues created a toxic atmosphere and that
nationalist parties were becoming stronger again. Maybe it was because
of my presence that she drew the comparison to Germany’s way into
totalitarianism in the 1930s. At that very moment on an afternoon in a
gurdwara in Glasgow, the summer of 2015 and the decision to open the
borders within the European Union for the refugees of the conflict in
Syria were still far away. Likewise, the withdrawal of the United Kingdom
from the European Union (EU) and nationalist developments in various
countries were beyond the imagination of many people. Yes, the United
Kingdom Independence Party was already very much present, in the
media, in conversations and often in the form of leaflets on our kitchen
vii
viii Preface
table. One day, I took the chance and spoke to one of my Pakistani flat-
mates about these leaflets. During our conversation I found out that he
considered the party’s cause as good. He supported the greater indepen-
dence of the country from the EU while at the same time not being aware
of the racist and xenophobic attitude of the party at all. It still gives me
the shivers when I think of how this party with an anti-immigration
rhetoric has managed to attract people who have benefited from
immigration.
Almost 30 years ago, Stuart Hall considered the capacity to live with
difference as the question of the coming century. The question of how
humans deal with people who they consider to be different was the start-
ing point of the research that underlies this book. To answer why and
how people are seen as different has a long history within social sciences.
My intention was to understand how people handle difference; what are
they actively doing to live with difference? In contemporary terms one
probably would ask how do they manage diversity. When I first began to
engage with these questions, I had no idea that I would one day be part
of this management as well. Now, engaged in the field of Inclusion and
Diversity, I am walking on a tightrope every day. On the one hand, I
work to foster equity, belonging and inclusiveness, while on the other
hand, I want to avoid groupism. Groupism, as Rogers Brubaker once
forcefully argued, is scientifically insufficient. Yes, but in practice it is
alive and well. Groupism characterises the dark side of diversity. The side
where people move into ever-closer microcosms and echo chambers,
where recognition and redistribution—to paraphrase Nancy Fraser and
Axel Honneth—fall apart, and not least, where diversity is thought to be
managed best when groups are parcelled out as small as possible. How do
people handle difference? In the present book I try to give one answer to
this question. I try to answer it by exploring how the handling, the deal-
ing, the managing—in short, the doing itself—bring about differences. I
see myself as a historical thinking social anthropologist. My conviction is
that most of the ways how people today deal with difference have devel-
oped through time and space. These cultural repertoires have not neces-
sarily developed in the context of diversity. However, each of them might
enact a different diversity.
Preface ix
The conversation, mentioned at the beginning, gains a deeper mean-
ing in retrospect for me, because many of the events, that she sensed,
took place. They had not yet taken place when I completed my field work
at the end of 2014. They were palpable, but they did not find their way
into the following analysis. Many of the developments that have taken
place since 2014 show that Stuart Hall could not have been more right.
All I can hope for is that this book and the ideas expressed within add a
tiny piece to our capacity to live with difference.
Kornwestheim, Germany Matthias Klückmann
May 2020
Acknowledgements
First and foremost, I wish to thank the people in Nordbahnhofviertel and
Pollokshields. The open, uncomplicated and cordial way in which they
welcomed me exceeded my expectations. The time and patience they
took to answer my questions, and the trust they placed in me made this
research possible. Furthermore, I am grateful to people from the various
churches, mosques, gurdwaras and NGOs in both districts who not only
provided information but served as a first contact to various groups.
A book is a joint project. It is like a knot where many threads come
together and so numerous people, places and organisations each in their
own way contributed to it. This book is drawing on my doctorate at the
University of Tübingen. I am happy about having had the chance for
discussions with my colleagues, fellow PhD candidates as well as the
guests of the Tübingen Institute for Historical and Cultural Anthropology.
Among all these people, I would especially like to thank Reinhard Johler
for taking over the supervision of my research project and for accompa-
nying the work up to publication. Likewise, I want to thank Alexa Färber
from the Institute for European Ethnology at the University of Vienna
for her advice and comments as member of my thesis committee.
My research and especially the travels to Glasgow were made possible
with kind financial support. The German Academic Exchange Service
xi