Prepared by: Kais Al‐Momani Nour Dados Marion Maddox Amanda Wise C
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CHAPTER 3: LITERATURE REVIEWPOLITICAL PARTICIPATION AND BELONGINGThe most basic and obvious reason for political participation is in order to be heard. As Sinno notes, ‘Politicians need to feel the presence of Muslims in their communities and to understand that they matter’ (2009: 287), and are only likely do so when Muslims are present in parliaments, parties, volunteer associations and so on in more‐than‐token numbers (2009: 283, 286). Tokenistic representation, he warns, only leads to the representatives being discounted by their constituencies, who then look for leadership elsewhere. However, participation also brings less direct benefits. Owen and her colleagues find that citizens in liberal‐ democratic systems experience higher levels of subjective well‐being than citizens of other kinds of state; and citizens who take advantage of liberal‐democratic systems’ opportunities for political participation are more satisfied with life than those who do not (Owen et al. 2008: 998‐9). Moreover, they find that some forms of representation are more conducive to happiness than others. They conclude that: ‘In addition to being desirable in and of itself, happiness levels influence vital political goods like stability and societal generosity’ (2008: 1003). Moreover, the international literature supports the idea that these beneficial social effects of political participation come into play well before children reach voting age. Fridkin et al. (2006) examined the practice of democratic skills among children too young to vote. They found that forms of political participation appropriate to the children’s age, such as talking to parents about politics, reading the newspaper and making speeches at school correlated positively with trustfulness, civic duty, attachment to party and positive attitudes towards government. Both opportunities for participation, and the characteristics to which they give rise, were significantly more prevalent among Anglo‐American children than among members of ethnic minorities (2006: 613‐618). Their results parallel known patterns for adults; ‘Nonetheless’, Fridkin et al. observe: it is startling to hear firsthand that some young people already feel that they are on the margins of democratic life. In fact, it appears that the desire to engage in politics is already forming at the tender age of 14. (2006: 606) Sinno finds that electoral system and form of political institutions has an effect on minority groups’ political participation. Muslims are spectacularly underrepresented in the US system, whether compared to the general population or to other religious minority groups (2009:91). He attributes this to ‘an unfavourable mix of a majoritarian first‐past‐the‐post system … and hostility from the Evangelical, pro‐AIPAC and ultraconservative sections of the American voting public that deters Muslims for running for elected office and discourages the two large parties from recruiting them’ (2009:91). Although Australia’s electoral system is preferential rather than first‐past‐the‐post, it is majoritarian and replicates the FPP system’s effect to the extent that even quite large minority groups, unless they are geographically concentrated, stand next‐to‐no chance of winning an electorate. This point is illustrated by comparing the fortunes of the National Party and the Australian Democrats through the 1990s. Although they consistently polled within a few points of one another, the Australian Democrats never won a lower‐house seat, where as the National Party was represented in every parliament. Australia lacks the strong evangelical pro‐Israel voter base of the USA; nevertheless, the 2004 (Greenway), 2007 (Lindsay) and 2010 (Chifley) elections demonstrated the existence of anti‐Muslim electioneering. We can therefore expect that the deterrent effects in the USA would be similar for Muslims considering running for office in Australia.
PARTICIPATION AND ETHNIC MINORITIESFor reasons to be discussed below, literature addressing the political participation of Muslims is sparse and recent; however, the political participation of ethnic minorities has been extensively studied, both in Australia and overseas, for at least forty years. The literature on ethnic minority participation is useful for the present study, although it needs to be approached with several caveats. Not all Australian Muslims are recent migrants: they include, for example, Indigenous and non‐Indigenous converts, and the descendants of nineteenth century cameleers. The association between ethnic minority status and lower political participation is reiterated in numerous studies (eg Jacob 2006; Jacobs et al 2004; Togeby 2004). Jupp (2004) argues that, in Australia, as far as political representation is concerned, the time since immigration is more important than migrant status as such. A couple of UK studies have found that Asian migrants vote at a higher rate than the ‘white’ population, while some other migrants (notably Afro‐Caribbean) vote less than ‘white’ citizens do. These studies are summarised by Düvell (2005: 32). Jupp (2004: 19‐22) pointed out that Australian democracy serves migrant minorities fairly well in several respects. Since 2002, dual citizenship arrangements have meant that Australian‐born children of immigrants can vote in Australian elections without having to renounce their parents’ citizenship. However, dual citizens cannot stand for parliament: they must first renounce their non‐Australian citizenship. We note that some of the conditions for new migrants applauded by Jupp have tightened since his study. One is the waiting period for naturalisation, reduced to two years in 1984, but increased to four years in 2007. Directory: sites -> default -> files -> documents -> 01 2014 documents -> Ace abi catair customs and Trade Automated Interface Requirements documents -> Mobile audio/video recording systems documents -> The south australian government gazette documents -> All public acts appearing in this gazette are to be considered official, and obeyed as such documents -> Union interparlementaire inter-parliamentary union 01 2014 -> Voices Shaping the 01 2014 -> Muslim Voices – Hopes and aspirations of Muslim Australians Centre for Muslim Minorities & Islam Policy Studies 01 2014 -> Editors: Kerry Download 16.24 Mb. Share with your friends:
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