Ramadan in Europe: Inclusion or Submission?

But today, the challenge is no longer military in nature: It is demographic, cultural, and ideological. Immigration has made the struggle internal, rather than external. Ramadan has become a focal point, as Europa asks itself whether it can integrate its growing Muslim population, or whether it will itself be forced to adapt. Can these two civilizations coexist, or is one destined to reshape the other?

Let’s talk numbers

While Europe is caught between secularism and its pledge to protect minority rights, unsure of how to reconcile Islam with its political values, parts of the Muslim world are moving in the opposite direction. Saudi Arabia, once the stronghold of Islamic conservatism, is moving away from strict Wahhabi interpretations, and as it is dismantling this  rigid framework under Vision 2030. Spearheaded by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Vision 2030 aims to diversify the economy, reduce religious conservatism in public life, and promote a more open, modernised society. Key reforms include curbing the power of the religious police, allowing women to drive, increasing women’s workforce participation, and expanding entertainment sectors once deemed un-Islamic. 

Meanwhile, pressure mounts for  European institutions. This once marginal minority is not shrinking, but  expanding. With higher birth rates and continuous immigration, the Muslim population in Europe is set to swell even more. Can Europe remain secular while its Muslim population continues to grow, especially when a significant portion identifies as practicing their religion? In the UK, 64% of Muslims consider themselves highly religious, while in France, the figure stands at 33%. As demographics shift and religiosity remains strong, will Europe's secular foundations hold? Or will they gradually erode under the weight of cultural and religious pressures?

In addition, Europe finds itself bound by its own human rights policies, which have shifted from protecting European citizens to extending rights to the entire world. What began as a regional safeguard has evolved into a universal doctrine. 

A key player is the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), whose rulings have redefined migration policies and, at times, overridden national decisions. In Hirsi Jamaa v. Italy (2012), the Court ruled that Italy violated human rights by intercepting and returning migrants to Libya without assessing asylum claims, reinforcing the principle of non-refoulement. Similarly, in M.S.S. v. Belgium and Greece (2011), the ECHR found that Belgium and Greece subjected an asylum seeker to inhumane conditions, influencing the enforcement of the Dublin Regulation.

These cases illustrate how the ECHR’s growing intervention in migration policies has expanded protections for migrants, often at the cost of state sovereignty and national control over borders. Europe, in its quest to be a global human rights champion, now faces a dilemma: how to reconcile its legal commitments with growing migration pressures and rising domestic tensions? And beyond migration, how can Europe navigate religious practices when its own institutions increasingly undermine its secular foundations? This is the core tension in the Ramadan and religious practice debate: the friction between Europe's secular foundations and its shifting demographics, forcing a reassessment of its accommodating of other cultures and religions.

Practice and practice

Europe, once the proud torchbearer of secularism, is now the ever-indulgent host of a paradox. While Muslim-majority countries like Saudi Arabia shed religious rigidity, loosening laws and modernizing under Vision 2030 (a very modern and secular plan for the country), Europe finds itself nurturing a brand of fundamentalism it never asked for.

Migration trends paint an interesting picture. In 2015, 1.2 million people sought asylum in the EU, a number that barely waned. By 2021, 3.7 million new arrivals landed, with 2.3 million from outside Europe, a fair number of which hailing from Muslim-majority nations. In 2022, asylum requests surged 50% to 966,000, with a substantial proportion from Islamic countries. 

France, long considered a bastion of freedom, now has 7.3 million immigrants (10.7% of the population), with approximately 48% coming from the African continent.

And yet, rather than absorbing the reformist winds of the Middle East or the classic European secularism, Europe’s Muslim population appears to be moving in the opposite direction. A 2013 study from the WZB (Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin für Sozialforschung) found that among Turkish and Moroccan immigrants in Germany, France, the Netherlands, Belgium, Austria, and Sweden:

• 60% wished to return to the ”roots” of Islam
• 75% believed in a single true interpretation of the Quran
• 65% prioritised religious law over secular law
• 44% agreed with all three prior statements

The study, however, did not compare these views with those of Muslims in their countries of origin.: Yet, could it be that  Islam is becoming more fundamentalist in Europe than in the Middle East, as new arrivals cling to their culture all the more fervently in an unfamiliar environment? 

Europe grapples with secularism, religious accommodation, and the delicate matter of integration, all while an increasingly religious  population tests its commitment to neutrality. As Ramadan and public religious practices turn into annual political flashpoints, one might wonder: is Europe fostering integration, or is it unwittingly creating its own homegrown fundamentalism?

Football, Halal and polemic

Here is the heart of the matter: growing numbers of migrants  and Islamic fundamentalism in Europe is turning into a problem for both European institutions and migrants themselves. Frustration grows among those who feel neither fully accepted nor respected as Muslims. Who could blame them? Who wouldn’t resist being stripped of their identity?

Indeed, to many, Islam is the last remaining link they have with their country of origin. With efforts towards integration only being done half-heartedly and national belonging remaining elusive, religion becomes their defining identity:.it turns Ramadan from a spiritual observance into a cultural statement.

Brussels’ example is illustrative:there, each year the end of Ramadan turns into a peculiar ritual, as sanitation workers collect thousands of carcasses from lambs, which at least officially had been slaughtered illegally at people’s homes Any public questioning of this is immediately met by a fierce backlash from the community. 

The same phenomenon is seen in football. The French Football Federation (FFF) recently banned religious accommodations for players—Muslim or Catholic—sparking controversy. Some saw it as an erasure of identity. ”You want to forbid them to be Muslim. Whether we like it or not, it’s part of their identity that we’re trying to erase”, said Demba Ba, former Senegal international and French-born player.

Who could be surprised here? Nothing was ever truly done to make them feel French. France, like much of Europe, in its pursuit of universalist ideals, forgot its own culture; if no one is really French anymore, and no one is even trying to be, what exactly is there left to integrate into?

In the throes of globalisation and mass immigration, European institutions face an impossible task: integrating thousands of newcomers while trying to preserve their own cultural identity. Cracks are already visible in French schools, as a government report recorded 720 secularism breaches during Ramadan 2023: students refused participating in activities for religious reasons, as they insisted on wearing religious symbols in defiance of secular rules. In response, Education Minister Pap Ndiaye warned of a growing challenge to France’s principle of laïcité. 

Europe’s Grand Dilemma?

Europe stands at a moment of decision. It can either reclaim its secular, cultural, and national identity, demanding that newcomers integrate into the societies they freely chose to join, and , should some remain unhappy, suggest they seek a home elsewhere. Alternatively, Europe can continue its flirtation with cultural relativism, watch while parallel societies flourish, national cohesion fractures, and secular institutions unseemly contort themselves to avoid giving any ”offense”. It is either a strong nationalism rooted in cultural identity or complete Balkanization, with the civil clashes and ethnic conflicts that inevitably follow. 

Europe’s current situation resembles less a balancing act than a slow-motion collapse where neither European institutions nor those of Muslim heritage feel at ease, as both feel trapped in a system that neither fully respects nor fully rejects religious identity. The choice is stark: will Europe reassert itself as a cultural power, or will it, in its desperate bid to accommodate, find itself accommodating its own demise?

Statement

The increased importance of Ramadan in Western society represents a civilisational shift as Europe’s Muslim population is ever growing. Europe, in prioritising human rights as it accommodates Muslim religious practices, may be undermining its own cultural identity, and is on course for deep societal fragmentation. Yet, despite Europe’s trajectory, the Middle East is shifting toward secularisation.