Can German Religion-State Institutions Integrate Islam?

A number of authors have argued that the decentralized nature of (Sunni) Islam combined with traditional religion-state institutions emphasizing corporatist structures have prevented the successful integration of Muslims into Western European polities. Muslim groups will not establish organizations along corporatist lines because they fear a loss of autonomy. Here it is useful to distinguish between corporatism as a system of interest representation and a policymaking mode. I question this claim focusing on four concrete issues in German debates on the place of Islam in German politics: the recognition of Islam as a corporation under public law, Islamic religious instruction in public schools, Islamic burial, and Halal slaughter. Toward the end of the paper I extend the discussion to Austria and Switzerland. I argue that institutional and structural arguments cannot account for the observed variation across countries and issues. In all three countries there is a corporatist bias in religion-state institutions. In Austria this bias is stronger than in Germany. Yet, in Austria Muslims in the 1970s took up the opportunity presented by legal recognition and established the officially recognized Islamic Religious Community in Austria. The decentralized and nonhierarchical nature of Islam did not present an insurmountable obstacle. At the same time Muslim organizations in Germany have made more progress on a number of issues than in Switzerland.Besides variation across countries I also show variation across issues. In all three countries issues surrounding Islamic burial have been resolved more easily than the other issues discussed in this paper. The lack of recognition as a corporation under public law prevents the establishment of purely Muslim cemeteries in most German Länder, but Länder, cantons, and local communities have found pragmatic solutions to most Muslim concerns. The case of halal slaughter in Germany also shows that the traditional practice of conditioning some religious privileges on corporatist organizational structures can be broken. Thus, corporatist organizational structures, or the lack thereof, present less of a problem for the integration of Islam than is frequently assumed. At the same time, the limited success of round tables shows that corporatist policymaking may not be much of a solution to the existing problems either. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]