On the eve of May 1, researcher Pascal Debruyne questions Vooruit’s ‘strong’ positioning in the run-up to the elections.
On Wednesday, May 1, ‘the Internationale’ will blare through the loudspeakers on various stages in our cities. Comrades in red attire sing loudly “The state oppresses, the law is lying. The rich man lives on selfishly. The poor man is sucked to the marrow and his justice is an empty word. We are tired of living according to someone else’s will. Brethren, hear how equality speaks: No right where duty is abolished. No duty, she teaches, where justice is lacking.”
However, the question must be asked which ‘poor’ we are talking about today, and who is participating in the plea for more equality? In short, who are “the wretched of the earth” who need to awaken for Vooruit? Not that Vooruit is the only one that embodies May 1st. PVDA and Groen are also actively present today in the May 1 parade and festivities. But Vooruit is the historical herald of socialism, together with the pillar organizations such as the trade union and the health insurance fund (Solidaris).
The ghost of De Man?
In contrast to the internationalism of Emile Vandervelde, who describes himself in his memoirs as ‘un peu nomade’ because of his faith and work in the development of a workers’ movement, he also had to organize internationally as a counterpower to global capitalism, the spirit of Hendrik de Man out of the bottle. Although both figures also had a bond with each other in the everyday affairs of the party. The flirtation with nationalist ideas that support strong positions mainly ripens minds for another ideology at the end of the right-wing spectrum, which people (un)consciously reproduce.
Repeating again and again that Vlaams Belang is right in “naming problems” and superficially calling for “less migration” without further ado – I refer, among other things, to the debate between Melissa Depraetere and Tom Van Grieken in Terzake, strengthens Vlaams Belang instead of combating the extreme right . Vooruit positions itself, in political scientist language, on the left on the socio-economic axis and (rather) on the right on the socio-cultural axis when it comes to migration and integration. The latter is popularly translated as “strong”. Academic literature refers to “welfare chauvinism”: expanding social rights along ethno-cultural fault lines.
The big bend
The sharp turn in which people are going to reproduce prosperity chauvinism is of course not new. From “refugees like seagulls on the social security dump” by Louis Tobback, who recently in Knack made a plea for a separate social security for newcomers, to the plea for “For something, something is worth it” under Patrick Janssens, and the untold swipes at minorities by Conner Rousseau in which he plays the dog whistle of “repopulation” in Molenbeek,… at Vooruit rather the eternal recurrence of the same applies. Today is no different. “No power yet, but already a lot of influence? Vlaams Belang’s grip on migration“, headlines De Standaard of April 29. In contrast to the past, Vooruit shares half of the (anti)migration statements from ‘De Votetest’ with Vlaams Belang. Only Groen and PVDA present themselves as “more tolerant” on migration.
‘Deserving migrants’
Vooruit is not anti-migration, nor does the party neglect the social struggle for all ‘migrants’. In many paragraphs, the party program addresses labor migration as a practice of legal migration, with a plea for the expansion of the shortage occupation list, a (much needed) improvement of “the human trafficking procedure” and an extension of ‘the application time’ to one year for exploited workers. to start working for another employer. Migrant workers are clearly ‘deserving migrants’.
At both Vooruit and CD&V there is no real problem with their positions on labor migration. Except that they both actually have nothing to say about (European) Union citizens, where a large part of the problems are surrounding bogus self-employment and third-country nationals who are posted via other European countries. You would expect more thoroughness from parties with serious study services, cabinets and pillar organizations, with layered proposals that match research and everyday practice.
Human rights under pressure
The Vooruit program becomes especially problematic when it describes “undeserving migrants”: for refugees, both in the asylum process, the integration process and in terms of family reunification, institutional violence and stigmatization are the rule. As far as “asylum” is concerned, Vooruit, together with large parts of the European Social Democratic faction, supports the European Migration Pact, where detention becomes virtually the rule, second-class asylum procedures are common, but the concept of a ‘third safe country’ also applies in practice to deals with authoritarian regimes. which are strengthened and lead to…more refugees. Investments in our own region are justified, but where has the plea with concrete figures regarding resettlement gone? Host countries that already bear all the burden today are simply left with the message that they have to do even more. So no redistribution agenda for a socialist party?
Vooruit goes even further with its proposal for ‘integration support’ instead of a living wage. That newcomers are being abandoned, as Depraetere states in ‘De Zondag’, is absolutely correct. It is a fact that they end up in a maze of various government services without much cooperation, let alone an integrated approach. Vooruit is trying to address this problem through its “integration support” plan. It is good that Vooruit indicates that language acquisition should be free again. The plan on ‘integration support’, which is sold as “Those who do not want to integrate, will lose their money”, comes in response to the OECD study on integration and integration in 2023. The statement there is mainly that an integrated approach should primarily aim sustainable outcomes instead of superficial activation because many people “relapse”. In particular, more training and integrated long-term programs must be provided. That part is missing from the election manifesto.
However, Vooruit subjects recognized refugees to separate measures, without making it clear whether integration support is as high as a living wage or whether the program entails other conditions than the Integrated Plan for Social Integration (GPMI) at OCMWs (which has attracted much criticism regarding the arbitrariness per OCMW and the liberal ideology where rights are turned into more obligations) is until furthermore simply illegal and a violation of the Geneva Convention. The fact that Vooruit also subjects rights – such as the right to housing – to language conditions, instead of using rights (to housing) as leverage, but also says nothing about the problem of extensive “local ties” for access to social housing for newcomers, is speaking for the strong ideology that Vooruit propagates today.
The right to a family life
Vooruit also wants to make family reunification stricter by raising income conditions. Today, that income limit is already 2,048 euros net per month with a permanent contract, in addition to the requirement for suitable housing and health insurance. That proposal will most likely encounter European legal boundaries for violating ‘the right to family life’ and ‘family unity’. In practice it will lead to family dramas. The much suffering that the family reunification procedure is already causing will be exacerbated.
But also with regard to “integration”, raising income limits will make family reunification even more unfeasible. It is at odds with existing research, including in my book “Family reunification under pressure. Transnational Social Work.” where I discuss the impact of the many barriers that lead to loss at the level of the entire society. Refugees whose future is unclear because they have no certainty about living together with their families do not invest in a future today or tomorrow. In short, Vooruit’s proposal, which aims to achieve more integration, will cause the opposite in practice.
Chairwoman Depraetere repeatedly argued for ‘less migration’. But that is meaningless. What does that mean? In practice, migration covers a range of residence statuses and entry points: refugees, labor migrants, Union citizens, family reuniters, people with tourist visas and study visas, etc. What does “less migration” mean? Go ahead is playing tricks on people in this regard.
Perhaps it is good to remember the words of Fannie Lou Hamer, an icon of the civil rights movement from 1971: “Nobody’s free until everybody’s free.” to understand how freedom requires collective emancipation across diverse groups in society. Because if you look through the lens of migration, ‘the Internationale’ from the throats of Vooruit representatives will soon sound like a song with many false notes.
