From Exclusion to Inclusion? Islamic Organizations in Welfare Delivery in Germany, the Netherlands, and the UK

This Paper deals in a discourse analysis with the role of Islamic organizations in welfare de-livery in three countries with divergent state-church regimes, traditions of immigrant integration and welfare state traditions: Germany, the Netherlands, and the UK. The focus is on the (changing) role of Islamic organizations as providers of social services (on behalf of the state) against the background of European wide trends such as secularization and religious pluralization in general and decentralization and marketization in welfare policy in particular. Referring to assumptions of the concept of Political Opportunity Structures the paper asks what views actors involved in the debate on the inclusion of Islamic organizations in welfare delivery represent in the three countries compared. The methodological basis of the project is a content analysis of interviews conducted with politicians and representatives from Christian as well as Islamic organizations. Furthermore, documents are examined that reveal positions on the issue by actors involved in the discourse. The study reveals that national debates on the role of Islamic organizations in welfare work indeed are influenced by national contextual factors which – however – in all of the countries rather indicate ongoing exclusion instead of increasing inclusion.