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Matt Murrell

30 November 2009 - 7:55pm

Would you have expected these high figures?

Sadly, yes.

There's always going to be a high level of suspicion towards "others". That just seems to be how people are. But I also suspect that the "too many immigrants" camp spans a fairly wide spectrum. Some of them will be hard-line racists, but there are probably also quite a few who are simply concerned about how immigration is handled.

Although, to be honest, the "natural hierarchy between black and white people" one is a bit of a (nasty) surprise. I thought we'd moved further beyond such attitudes.

Every day a new proposal what to ban next, probably.

Assuming the Swiss ban survives the European Court of Human Right.

One good thing about this whole sorry Swiss business, however, is that it does seem to lend a bit of weight to the theory that close contact with immigrant communities erodes negative attitudes towards them. According to European Voice:

The only German-speaking canton to reject the initiative was Basel-Stadt, one of Switzerland's most urban cantons with the highest share of Muslim residents - around 10%, double the national average.

So perhaps there's some hope for the future.