Racism & fascism - new material (53)
01 November 2005
Annual Report 2005. European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia, pp158. This report represents the first comprehensive overview of racist, xenophobic, anti-Semitic and anti-Muslim discrimination, and responses to it, to cover all 25 EU Member States: "It looks at evidence of discrimination in employment, housing and education, as well as racist crime data, and at measures being taken to combat this. The Roma emerge as the group most vulnerable to racism in the EU. They face discrimination in employment, housing and education - as well as being regular victims of racial violence. Other groups facing high levels of discrimination in many Member States are migrant workers from Africa, the Middle East, Asia, and Latin America. Muslim groups face particularly challenging conditions in many Member States. Also recent migrants from Russia or the Ukraine may be subject to discrimination in some Member States." The full report can be downloaded under http://www.eumc.eu.int/eumc/index.php?fuseaction=content.dsp_cat_content&catid=3fb38ad3e22bb&contentid=42b943c7300a2.
Southwest BNP exposed, Nick Lowles. Searchlight December 2005, pp16-19. Article on the British National Party in southwest England that includes a "Who's Who in South West BNP".
ZAG - Anti-rassistische Zeitschrift. Issue 10, no. 47, Fall 2005, pp 66, EUR 3.50. This issues includes articles on the collective EU charter deportation flights that started in July 2005 and the actions organised against them, the impact of the World Cup 2006 on security and repression and various background articles on post-colonial concepts of Diaspora, Orientalism, subaltern studies and Whiteness. Available from redaktion@zag-berlin.de
Fighting fascism, preserving democracy, Liz Fekete. European Race Bulletin no 35 (Winter) 2005, pp40. This issue has a feature article on Fighting Fascism across Europe as well as pieces on "Protecting Ethnic Minorities" and "Eliminating Electoral Racism" and an appendix on "Measures Targeting Religious Clothing".
Unions and Communities Unite to Stop the BNP, Jon Cruddas & Billy Hayes. Labour Research January 2006, pp9-11, 2006. With the British National Party threatening to stand 600 candidates in the 2006 local elections this article reminds us that the last TUC Congress committed itself to making anti-fascist and anti-racist activity a "central political focus". The article stresses that "the labour movement has a special responsibility to re-energise itself in our communities where the fascists have made headway."
"Informe anual 2005. Discriminación y Comunidad Gitana" [Annual Report 2005. Discrimination and the Gypsy Community], Fundación Secretariado Gitano, Colección Cuadernos Técnicos, n.34, Madrid 2005, pp.46, ISBN-84-95068-34-6. This annual report compiles cases of discrimination experienced by members of the Gypsy [*] community in Spain. It covers the fields of employment, housing, education, health services, general services and goods (such as the refusal, often disguised behind a different explanation, of access to certain bars or restaurants, or in "unequal, humiliating and vexatory treatment" in a given establishment), the justice system and forces of public order, and in the media. The conclusions highlight that - despite legislative improvements - there is "an important gap between anti-discrimination norms and an institutional practice that allows ethnic minorities to continue suffering discriminatory practices in numerous social milieux", that the Gypsy community suffers an "historic discrimination in fundamental areas", that "serious instances of direct discrimination persist" and that indirect discrimination also places them at a disadvantage. The report found that Gypsies can come to accept these practices as inevitable, and their lack of confidence in institutions and of knowledge of the legal means that are open to them to defend their right to equal treatment are factors that stop many of them from filing complaints