The False War between Immigrants and the Poor

Street art in working class section of Rome.

In trying to understand the most recent outburst of racist and anti-immigrant violence in Italy, many mainstream analysts have described the clashes - in the poor peripheral neighborhoods of Rome or the public housing projects of Milan and the industrial North - as a war between domestic poor and immigrant poor. But this understanding of the violence, distorts the reality of the events and, in my view, leads to false conclusions. To depict xenophobic violence as a clash between local poor and global poor, is a convenient way for the Italian elite to let itself off the hook of institutional racism and political failure.

At first glance, of course, the idea of a war between national poor and immigrant poor seems reasonable. Poor and poorly educated immigrants do compete with local unskilled labor. They also compete, in Italy, for certain social benefits, like subsidized public housing.  Both of these competitive elements are highlighted by right and left-wing opponents of immigration. Particularly during a time of economic crisis, the argument runs, when there are no jobs and benefits to be had, these should go to citizens only. 

The argument has popular appeal. Xenophobia has done wonders for the National Front in France and is beginning to do the same for the racist Lega Nord in Italy. On the left, too, xenophobia has its converts. The anti-establishment 5 Star Movement  adopted an anti-immigration platform after vigorous internal debate. In the old Red Belt of Italy, old Communist Party voters, have begun drifting to the proto-fascist Lega, on the strength of the immigration issue. And, politically, what politician would pick to defend someone else's poor over one's own?

White Supremacist tag of Communist graffito.

But the very conception of this war between poor and poor is flawed. First, if immigration into a country has to wait for a moment in which there is no competition with locals for jobs and public resources, then it will never occur. In Italy, even during fat years, unemployment and lack of state aid are always issues for the poor. In this sense, Italy is always failing it's poor: failing to create enough jobs to bring unemployment and underemployment down to even US levels, and failing to provide sufficient benefits - public education, housing, social services like day care and health care - to lift the poor out of poverty.  There is never a time when these resources, jobs and benefits, for the poor, are not scarse. The precondition of no competition with the local poor, is tantamount to saying no immigration, ever.

Second, in this struggle of the poor against the poor argument, job competition is privileged to the exclusion of all other forms of social and economic activity.  Immigrant do compete for jobs, but they also rent rooms in poor neighborhoods, and buy food and clothing in local stores, and, if given a chance, open new businesses which create new jobs. In the United States, 17 percent of all new businesses are started by immigrants, according to the Small Business Administration. Almost all studies show a net positive effect between immigration and job creation - more growth and more jobs, eventually for all.

But for Immigrant to fully contribute to an economy, they have to be allowed to contribute to the society as well. Rules limiting what immigrants can do, and achieve, make immigration less valuable to the society. Ironically, by trying to protect the country's poor in the short-run, by making jobs and benefits harder to get for immigrants, Italy hurts their own economy, and their poor, in the long-run. 

By excluding immigrants from subsidized public housing, Italy closes it's eye to unsafe and unsanitary living conditions in illegal, but openly tolerated, camps and abandoned buildings. By making it harder to legalize one's status, Italy makes it likely to force people into informal and casual labor arrangements. The government drives people and jobs underground, in effect, reducing the amount of money that goes to the poor, and the local businesses that cater to the poor.

Public housing outside Rome, complete with swastika graffiti.

Not only has the Italian government chosen to make the life of immigrants more difficult, in a failed effort to discourage immigration - or rather partly failed, it has succeeded in keeping away educated, affluent professionals - but it has also made it difficult for their Italian born children to gain citizenship. This, of course, weakens the immigrant communities loyalty and commitment to life in Italy. It denies immigrants in Italy with one of the fundamental forces that bind immigrants in America to their new country, the future welfare of their American children. As a result, Italy is in danger of replicating a Middle Eastern rather than a New World model - not immigrants, rather guest workers, without rights or commitment or full involvement with the country.

But immigrants are not abstract entities, they have their own histories, religion and culture - and skin color - and here we come face to face with the social and cultural issues that fueled the anti-immigrant riots outside Rome, in the poor area of Tor Sapienza, Tower of Knowledge. The immigrants and political refugees huddled in fear inside the "welcome center" while a rampaging mob attacked the building with clubs and stones and fought with police, were black and Muslim, the rampaging mob was white and Christian. And this racial and cultural fact cannot be white-washed, as it were, in a discussion of poor vs. poor.  The mob was very clear about what it thought of black people. And that Italian racism deserves to be examined on its own, unqualified by discussions of poverty, in a post of its own. The next post.