Transnational Migration, Diaspora, and Identity: A Study of Kurdish Diaspora in London (Migration, Diasporas and Citizenship) 3031181689, 9783031181689

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MIGRATION, DIASPORAS AND CITIZENSHIP

Transnational Migration, Diaspora, and Identity A Study of Kurdish Diaspora in London Ayar Ata

Migration, Diasporas and Citizenship Series Editors

Olga Jubany Department of Social Anthropology Universitat de Barcelona Barcelona, Spain Saskia Sassen Department of Sociology and Committee on Global Thought Columbia University New York, NY, USA

For over twenty years, the Migration, Diasporas and Citizenship series has contributed to cross-disciplinary empirical and theoretical debates on migration processes, serving as a critical forum for and problematising the main issues around the global movement and circulation of people. Grounded in both local and global accounts, the Series firstly focuses on the conceptualisation and dynamics of complex contemporary national and transnational drivers behind movements and forced displacements. Secondly, it explores the nexus of migration, diversity and identity, incorporating considerations of intersectionality, super-diversity, social polarization and identification processes to examine migration through the various intersections of racialized identities, ethnicity, class, gender, age, disability and other oppressions. Thirdly, the Series critically engages the emerging challenges presented by reconfigured borders and boundaries: state politicization of migration, sovereignty, security, transborder regulations, human trade and ecology, and other imperatives that transgress geopolitical territorial borders to raise dilemmas about contemporary movements and social drivers. Editorial Board: Brenda Yeoh Saw Ai (National University of Singapore, Singapore) Fabio Perocco (Università Ca’Foscari Venezia, Italy) Rita Segato (Universidade de Brasília, Brazil) Carlos Vargas (University of Oxford, UK) Ajmal Hussain (University of Warwick, UK)

Ayar Ata

Transnational Migration, Diaspora, and Identity A Study of Kurdish Diaspora in London

Ayar Ata Freelance Researcher and a Member of Sustainability Research Group London South Bank University (LSBU) London, UK

ISSN 2662-2602     ISSN 2662-2610 (electronic) Migration, Diasporas and Citizenship ISBN 978-3-031-18168-9    ISBN 978-3-031-18169-6 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18169-6 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors, and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Cover image © CarolLynn Tice / Alamy Stock Photo This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG. The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

To Maheen, my sister, forever young and beautiful!

Declaration

The manuscript for this book is based on my PhD thesis, which was completed in April 2017 at London South Bank University (LSBU), School of Law and Social Sciences, 103 Borough Road, London SE1 0AA, UK

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Acknowledgements

A huge hug and thanks to my family: love and gratitude to Shabnam for her invaluable encouragement throughout, and love and admiration to Namo for his stimulating and positive input right from the beginning of my research. A big thank you to Elizabeth Graber, my editor at Palgrave Macmillan, for her vital support, patience, and speedy responses; and thank you to Chandralekha Mahamel Raja, from Springer Nature, and the publication team for their kind communication and preparation support. I would also like to thank my professional network and the Prisoners of Conscience (PoC) Appeal Fund for their kind and unconditional support for my research project 2011–2017 at London South Bank University (LSBU). A big thank you to Anita Fabos and John Nassari for introducing me to Forced Migration Studies at University of East London (UEL) in 2009. I would like to thank my supervisors, Professor Gaim Kibreab and Professor Tracey Reynolds, for their advice and guidance, and many thanks to Doctor Beverley Goring, Doctor Caitriona Beaumont, and Doctor Adrian Budd for their supportive roles. Here I must also mention the late Professor Michal Lyons, who made a huge contribution by guiding me to articulate my research methodology. My warmest thanks to all individual participants who contributed to my research. I am deeply humbled by the privilege of learning about their life stories and I am grateful to every one of them. A big thank you to Simon Taylor for his initial and crucial support. I would like to thank Rebaz Mohammad for enabling me to access key community meetings. My thanks to Janroj Keles and Ozlem Galip for sharing from their own ix

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

research. I would like to thank Omar Sheikhmous, Jalal Siadat, and Ahmad Eskandari for their expert comments, and Abdulla Pishdary for help with translation. A big thank you to my fellow researchers at LSBU—Argyro Kotsogianni, Diageo Canciani, Evangelia-Evdo Chaligianni, Jaya Khimji Gajparia, Mark Beachil, Robert Alexander Couch, Sean Kolade, Towhid Chowdhury, and Trevor Rendall—for sharing ideas from their own research and for their encouragement. I would like to express my gratitude to the following institutions for allowing me access to their invaluable resources, the use of their spaces, and the benefit of their professional advice and networks: first and foremost the International Association for the Study of Forced Migration (IASFM) for inviting me to join the ExCom of this positive and active international academic platform 2018–2020, and also for funding my travel to Kolkata in India in January 2013 and to Bogota in Colombia in July 2014 to participate in the 14th and 15th IASFM Conferences. Many thanks to the Kurdish Library in Stockholm, Sweden; and Saladin University Library in Erbil (Hawler), Iraq. The Kurdish and Turkish Community Centre in North London; the Croydon Translation Service; Croydon Voluntary Action; Southwark Day Centre for Asylum Seekers; Bakhan Restaurant and Adam Café in Croydon; the Centre for Armenian Information and Advice in Acton; London South Bank University Library; the University of East London Library and the Refugee Archive; SOAS Library; National Archive (Public Record Office) and the Huguenots Library in Kew, London; the British Library in London.

Praise for Transnational Migration, Diaspora, and Identity “Through the concept Kurdish Londoner the author explains the relationship between the Kurdish diaspora and the metropole city of London. Interviewees identify and express belongingness and attachment with two points of reference, two homes: Kurdistan and London. This book offers much valuable knowledge and insights on migration and integration.” —Minoo Alinia, Senior lecturer, Associate Professor in Sociology, Department of Sociology, Uppsala University “Ayar Ata’s carefully researched and partially auto-ethnographic book is an important contribution to the literature on transnational diaspora. In particular, the concept of ‘Kurdish-Londoner’ challenges fixed notions of nation state identity and highlights the geopolitical and cultural significance of cities as sites of meaning-making.” —Christina Clark-Kazak, Associate Professor, Graduate School of Public and International Affairs, University of Ottawa “Ayar Ata, Kurdish Londoner, combines the personal, the historical, and the socio-cultural aspects in the unparalleled contribution to the analysis of identity transformation and the challenging process of a host-land becoming a home-land. A must read for diaspora scholars and community leaders beyond the Kurdish diaspora.” —Elzbieta M. Gozdziak, Center for Social Justice Fellow, Georgetown University, Centre for Migration Studies Research Professor, Adam Mickiewicz University “In his beautifully-crafted auto-ethnography, Ata describes his becoming of a Kurdish-Londoner. With London as his base, Ata shows that people of today´s world become cosmopolitan and are at home in more than one local. Ata, himself with a first-hand refugee experience, who has gone through an arduous journey, uses his authentic voice, and he writes from a genuine and hard-earned position as a refugee scholar.” —Alexander Horstmann, SDAC Guest Professor, FAU, Erlangen-Nürnberg

“The book offers valuable insights into the background and developing identity of ‘Kurdish Londoners’, here described in the context of modern theories about migration. A welcome contribution to our knowledge of Kurdish communities.” —Philip G. Kreyenbroek, University of Göttingen “This book offers a comprehensive account of Kurdish modern history of dispersion and dispossession, and the formation of the Kurdish contemporary transnational identity. Based on the author’s personal experience and interviews with Kurds in London, the strength of the book rests in foregrounding the lived experiences of Kurdish diasporic communities and documenting an important shift from historic victims to active citizens.” —Giorgia Dona, Professor of Forced Migration, co-director of the Centre for Migration, Refugees and Belonging, University of East London, UK “It is still somewhat rare for academic analyses of diaspora identities and approaches to belonging to be written by scholars with lived experience of forced migration and displacement. In this fine study, Dr. Ata shares his intimate knowledge of the Kurdish diaspora--from its traumatic formation in the post-WWI Middle East to the socio-political marginalisation and resilience of Kurdish refugees across Europe--while gently guiding readers through the intellectual touchstones of the forced migration field. The study’s most rewarding contribution is Dr Ata’s empirical exploration of the dynamic formation of the ‘Kurdish-Londoner’ identity. This book demonstrates, through grounded research, how the shift in Kurdish cultural identity from victim to actor has occurred in the cosmopolitan city of London.” —Dr. Anita H. Fábos, Professor and Associate Director, International Development, Community & Environment Department, Clark University, Worcester, MA

Contents

1 Introduction  1 1.1 Reflexivity  1 1.2 Unpacking a Twofold Question  4 1.3 Definitions  6 1.4 Different Perspectives: Theory, Policy, Person  6 1.5 Lived Experiences: Different Perspectives—Personal Narratives  8 References 13 2 The  Geopolitics of the Middle East Post-WW1 17 2.1 Introduction 17 2.2 Land and Ecology 18 2.3 Language 18 2.4 Religion 20 2.5 Kurdish Cultural Diversity 21 2.6 Kurdistan as a Buffer Zone: Divisions, Displacements, and Dispossession 22 2.7 Nation-States Versus the Kurds 24 2.8 Turkey 27 2.9 Iraq 28 2.10 Syria 30 2.11 Iran 32 2.12 Conclusion 35 References 37 xiii

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3 Theoretical Framework 41 3.1 Introduction 41 3.2 Main Theoretical Trends Regarding Migration 45 3.3 The Diaspora and Transnational Debate 47 3.4 The Integration Debate 55 3.5 The Policy Debate on Social Integration in Brexit Britain 58 3.6 A New Home 61 3.7 Conclusion 66 References 68 4 The Kurdish Diaspora(s) 73 4.1 Introduction 74 4.2 Living in Diaspora: New Identities and Realities 75 4.3 Kurdish Diaspora: Understanding Patterns in Europe 77 4.4 London and Londoners 86 4.5 Explaining the Concept of ‘Kurdish-­Londoner’: I Wish to Belong and to Be Equal in London 92 4.6 The Integration Process: Diaspora Identities 99 4.7 Conclusion104 References107 5 Conclusion113 5.1 Overview113 5.2 Key Findings120 5.3 Progressive and Future Steps121 References122 Appendix125 Ayar Ata Book127 References133 Index147

Abbreviations

BAME BF BL CIC COMPAS DCLG EU IASFM ICC IMI IOM IMISCOE IRC IRiS HO KCC Khalk-Evi KRG KSN KSSO LGA LSBU LSE MRN

Black, Asian, and Minority Ethnic British Future (a think tank based in London) The British Library, London Commission on Integration and Cohesion Centre on Migration, Policy, and Society, University of Oxford Department for Communities and Local Government European Union International Association for the Study of Forced Migration Institute of Community Cohesion International Migration Institute International Organisation for Migration International Migration, Integration and Social Cohesion in Europe International Rescue Committee Institute for Research into Super-diversity, based at Birmingham University The Home Office, UK Kurdish Community Centre in North London Kurdish and Turkish Community Centre in Hackney, North London Kurdistan Regional Government in the Kurdish area in Northern Iraq Kurdish Studies Network Kurdish Students and Studies Organisation, SOAS Local Government Association London South Bank University London School of Economics Migrants Rights Network, UK xv

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ABBREVIATIONS

NA NASS NGO PICUM PoC RC RRN RSC SDCAS SOAS UEL UK UN UNHCR WKC WW1 WW2

The National Archive, in southwest London (Public Record Office) National Asylum Support Service, UK Non-Governmental Organisation Platform for International Cooperation on Undocumented Migrants Prisoners of Conscience Fund, UK The Refugee Council, UK Refugee Research Network, Canada Refugee Studies Centre, University of Oxford Southwark Day Centre for Asylum Seekers School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London University of East London United Kingdom of England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland United Nations United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees World Kurdish Congress, organised by the KRG World War I World War II

List of Figures

Fig. 2.1

The map of Kurdish majority areas in 1920 is now merely archival material, but it is still a powerfully emotional and visible manifestation of Kurdish nationalism. As described by O’Shea (2004), Kurdish areas are complex and highly disputed geographical areas. The map of Kurdistan is a clear demonstration of how the Kurds have been ‘trapped between map and reality’ since the formal partition of Kurdistan in the post-WW1 imperialist politics. For more information about Kurdish history, see Table 5.1 Kurdish history timeline. Map of the Kurdish majority area before partition in the 1920 (Izady, 1992) Fig. A.1 Archive photo of David Lloyd George with other delegates at the 1919 Peace Conference at Versailles-Paris, France. © Parliamentary Archives, London. Source: National Archives online catalogue. At the end of WW1, a conference was held in Paris to negotiate a peace settlement for Europe. The 1919 Paris Peace Conference resulted in a number of peace treaties. In this conference the creation of a Kurdish state was discussed, but this proposal was later abandoned by the Lausanne Treaty in 1923. Many Kurds call this ‘Year Zero’ in modern Kurdish history (Ahmad 1994; McDowall 2010; Bozarsalan 2014)

19

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List of Images

Image B.1 My photo with Ali Zalme, fellow panelist, at Kurdish Diaspora Conference at Middlesex University, London, 27 May 2016 Image B.2 My photo with Laurence Juma, fellow panelist, at IASFM conference in Poznan, Poland, 12 July 2016 Image B.3 My photo with Paul Dudman and Rumana Hashem (fellow members of the IASFM-working group) outside Adam Mickiewicz University, at International Association for the Study of Forced Migration Conference (IASFM) in Poznan, Poland, 12 July 2016 Image B.4 My photo with UNHCR poster at IASFM Conference in Bogota, Colombia, 15 July 2014 Image B.5 My photo the British 10K run in support of refugees, The Mall, outside Backinghmam Palace, London 14 July 2013 Image B.6 My photo outside central library Salahaddin University Hawler (Erbil) Iraq, 22 October 2012

127 128

129 130 131 132

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List of Tables

Table 5.1 Kurdish history timeline Table 5.2 Participant figures and analysis Table 5.3 Kurdish diaspora in Europe

115 118 119

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CHAPTER 1

Introduction

Abstract  On 31 October 1918, the First World War (WW1) ended. This book explores a common but almost forgotten historical argument that positions the Kurds as powerless victims of the post WW1 politics. It demonstrates the dire consequences of oppressive International and regional state policies against the Kurds which led to their mass displacement, dispossession, and forced migration from the 1920s on. The following parts then attempt to explain the history and ongoing mass displacements of the Kurds and the formation of Kurdish diaspora communities in different European cities and to describe their new and positive shifting position from victims in the Middle East to active citizens in Europe focusing on London. Keywords  History • Identity • Auto-ethnography • Person • Policy • Citizen

1.1   Reflexivity My reflexive approach means that I should reflect upon my different positions. I foreground grassroots views from the perspective of refugees and members of the diaspora community I interviewed, and I have used ethnography and qualitative data collection and analysis, including © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 A. Ata, Transnational Migration, Diaspora, and Identity, Migration, Diasporas and Citizenship, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18169-6_1

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‘auto-­ethnography’, which, as Nassari (2007) describes, also incorporates my own personal experiences and reflections and an insider researcher (Kingston, 1977; Ritchie & Lewis, 2003; Goring, 2004; Hirsch, 1997). The impetus for publishing this book on the modern history of Kurdish forced migration and mass displacement in the post- First World War (WW1) era and Kurdish cultural identity(ies) developed gradually over the course of my own life experience as a refugee. During the Iran-Iraq War between 1981 and 1986 I lived in several refugee camps, collective towns, and half-empty villages along the Iran-Iraq border. In July 1986, as the region became increasingly insecure and dangerous for everyone, especially for refugees and displaced people, I took a long walk through an area called dyhata sotawakan in Kurdish (literally ‘burned villages’). I was leading a group of five other young Iranian men who also wanted to escape this war zone. We walked through a stunning but abandoned and eerily silent triangular area bordering Iraq, Iran, and Turkey. We walked many days and nights until we reached a refugee camp in Hakkari, Turkey. Unlike the previous camps we had lived in, this one was recognised and supported by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). This was a reassuring factor for us and for the other hundred or so Iraqi and Iranian refugees, including families and individuals, who lived in some transit border camps waiting to be documented, fully recognised as refugees, and eventually relocated somewhere by the UNHCR. I was lucky, and three months later, on 9 November 1986, I arrived at Arlanda Airport in Stockholm, Sweden. I was held in a clean and tidy room at the airport, which helped me to rest a great deal, and I was able to reflect on my awful journey. I was released from the airport on 11 November to join hundreds of other forced migrants, some from Africa, but mostly from Middle Eastern countries in a large camp in Stockholm, and a few days later I found myself in a new reception camp in Sätrabroun village, which was covered in heavy snow; a beautiful small village which was not far from the city of Sala. This is how a new chapter of my life began in November 1986, when Sweden kindly opened a door to an exhilarating, stunning, and a safe society for me; and I am always grateful to Sweden. Few years later, I travelled to London with a suitcase.1 To cut a long story short, I am still here in London, a member of the Kurdish diaspora, and perhaps after three decades, I can claim that I have become a Kurdish-Londoner. Here I wish to rely on the brilliant definition of the notion of becoming as Michelle Obama (2019) describes in her book entitled: Becoming A Guide Journal for Discovering Your Voice: ‘becoming

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isn’t about arriving somewhere or achieving a certain aim. It’s forward motion, a means of evolving to reach continuously toward a better self’ (Ibid., preface). Following with admiration Michelle Obama’s well-­ defined words about becoming, I wish to say that I have used my time relatively wisely in London, that I’m better, and I’m certainly much happier, therefore; I am also hugely grateful to London, this vivid world city. My book is designed to further develop an ongoing dialogue within Kurdish community(ies) in London.2 The voice(s) of the first generation is in reality the recording of the refugee’s social history and a journey through their social memory as well as their lived experiences (Kuhn, 2000). The empirical data I collected and the relevant analysis have shown that each category (e.g. the first and second generations, men and women) experiences integration and expresses identity in different ways. This book analyses and reflects on these multiple, often complementary, and sometimes contradictory, voices with regard to history, identity, and integration. For example, a pattern clearly emerges that the nation-state identity, which looks like low-hanging fruit from a giant tree, and often given from above, while diasporic and transnational identities are mostly chosen, negotiated, fluid, and developed from the grassroot (e.g. Kurdish-­ Londoner; Black British; Roma Travelers), and as Hall (1996a, 1996b) describes this type of identity is transnational or ‘subaltern’ identity. Moreover, my book tells a tale of transformation of identity within diaspora within a relevant historical context, and describes the slow, complex, and challenging process of how a host-land becoming a homeland for refugees and migrants. Reflecting on my active academic involvements with International Association for the Study of Forced Migration (IASFM) 2018–20203 and my most recent professional advocacy work on social integration for Croydon Refugee and New Communities Forum 2019–2020, supported by Croydon Voluntary Action4 in South London, I would argue that most refugees and migrants are working hard to integrate, and that we desire to rebuild our lives for the better; generally speaking, most migrants are grateful for the safety, social space, and relative opportunities that host communities offer, albeit sometimes reluctantly. In the case of London, the generations of different migrants have historically contributed and continue to contribute a great deal to building London; and in the process they have become Londoners (see Sect. 4.4 about history of London and Londoners). My thoughts are now with the millions of forced migrants and displaced in this world who are living in precarious conditions; those who

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struggle to survive in urban settings inside shanty towns; or those who are still on the move, seeking protection in the global south or north. The most recent and major displacements since February 2022 include an estimated 7 million Ukrainians,5 which closely followed by the Afghans since the tragic events in August 2021,6 still the Syrians, and there are many others from and within Africa. I would like to pay tribute to all those forced migrants who lost their lives at sea,7 and admire the courage of those who made it! Let’s not to forget that all forced migrants and refugees are world citizens but with little or no access to formal RIGHTS! And let’s hope, by collective and positive actions taken by various refugee and Asylum support networks, such as the International Rescue Committee,8 British Red Cross,9 Refugee Council,10 Pro Asyl in Germany,11 and the UNHCR,12 naming just a few, the voices of all forced migrants are heard, recorded, and eventually would get a fair deal to help them to settle and make a new home somewhere safe. I do my bit to support forced migrants through my membership of the International Association for the Study of Forced Migration (IASFM)13 and as a member of the Sustainability Research Group at London South Bank University, championing positive social integration for all migrants in London. I do also continue my collaboration with Forced Migration and Refugee Studies: Networking and Knowledge Transfer (FFVT),14 and Pro Asyl in Germany helping to promote international cooperation in this field.

1.2   Unpacking a Twofold Question This book on Kurdish transnational migration, social integration, and identity in London sets out to explain, examine, discuss, and answer a twofold question about post-WW1 Kurdish history and cultural identity. To this end, the following two core subjects will be dealt with. First, the book will offer a brief and general history of Kurdish forced migration and displacement that is also to highlight the systematic socio-­ political marginalisation of the Kurds since the 1920s (see Fig. 2.1). Attempt has been made to look closely at the complex root-causes of Kurdish forced migration, aiming to explain the steady flow of (often) forced Kurdish migrants from the region, and the formation of Kurdish diaspora communities in Europe and elsewhere (Izady, 1992; van Bruinessen, 2000; Alinia, 2004; Ciment, 2006; Jongerden, 2007; Khayati, 2008; McDowall, 2010; Bozarslan, 2014). A specific evaluation of identity and integration within the Kurdish diaspora community(ies) is made,

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with a focus on the population of Kurds who have arrived for different reasons: those who sought asylum, migrant workers, students, businesspeople, diplomats, and those born in London since the 1990s (Wahlbeck, 1999; Griffith, 2002; Curtis, 2005; Holgate et al., 2009; Demir, 2012; Tas, 2013). Second, the issue of cultural identity is considered, which is important for most Kurds who live outside their homeland in significant numbers in various European countries. This book in its relevant section reviews and critiques some major and existing literature on the Kurdish diaspora in some European countries with sizable Kurdish populations, such as Germany, Sweden, and Finland. This is to gain a broader picture and draw some basic comparisons between the experiences and views of different Kurdish diaspora communities in Europe, and to better understand the integration of Kurdish diaspora community(ies) in London (Østergaard-­ Nielsen, 2003; Candan & Hunger, 2008; Khayati, 2008; Alinia & Eliassi, 2014; Toivanen, 2014; Eliassi, 2015). The book evaluates the specific place and space of London within the contemporary debate about integration and multiculturalism in England (Wahlbeck, 1998a, 1998b, 1999; Soguk, 1999; Griffith, 2002; Enneli et al., 2005; D’Angelo, 2008; Baser, 2011; Demir, 2012; Galip, 2012; Tas, 2013; Wessendorf, 2013; Keles, 2015). In short, this book attempts to answer two interrelated questions on Kurdish modern history and Kurdish diaspora identity by engaging with some integral elements of these big questions; in order to help to explain: Who are the Kurds? How have they become displaced and been forced to migrate? And what is their integration experience like in London and in some other European cities? The book explores the notion of Kurdish cultural identity through recognising Kurdish cultural heterogeneity and diversity, and a radical articulation has been made to evaluate the significance of the emergence of a new and a radical concept of a Kurdish-­ Londoner; a new self-identity as expressed mainly, although not exclusively, by the second generation of Kurds who were born to refugee and migrant parent(s) in London in the 1990s (Enneli et al., 2005; D’Angelo, 2008; Erel, 2013).

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1.3  Definitions The meaning of the term ‘diaspora’ has shifted over time, and in some migration and diaspora studies scholars use the terms ‘diaspora’ and ‘transnational’ interchangeably (Tololian, 1991). In this book, the term Kurdish diaspora is used to describe first-generation Kurdish refugees, with first-­ hand refugee experience, and those born to refugee parent(s); that is, the second generation. The term second generation, or young generation, also includes those children who came to London with their families at a very young age (under the age of ten, sometimes called the ‘one-and-a-­ half generation’). The use of Kurdish diaspora as an umbrella term also includes the wider network of Kurdish migrant workers, students, and businesspeople who sometime commute between London and elsewhere. The Kurdish terms for diaspora are ‘Ravandi-Kordi or Kordi-Handaran’, which literally means Kurds who live outside their area/country of origin. This Kurdish term does not imply that the Kurds who live abroad are victims or heroes. This book takes the same neutral position with respect to the term. Notably, the concept of a Kurdish-Londoner, a seemingly simple phrase/term, conveys in reality some complex and multiple meanings. The use of the term Kurdish-Londoner is open to different interpretations in the context of multiculturalism and integration debates in England and London. The idea behind the term Kurdish-Londoner is a reflection of the positive desire or claim of especially young Kurds to belong to a Kurdish diaspora/transnational community, as well as to London. This discussion is also a reflection on London as a large, cosmopolitan, and diverse capital city, influencing the shaping and reshaping of the process of integration of all its citizens, including the transformation of identity within the Kurdish diaspora in this city. The term ‘cultural diversity’ or ‘super diversity’ (Vertovec, 2007) with regard to London refers to all Londoners who are from the mosaic of different groups, and individuals born in different places and with varying migration experiences, lifestyles, incomes, education, values, beliefs, and perceptions (Appadurai, 1996; Griffith, 2002; Enneli et al., 2005).

1.4  Different Perspectives: Theory, Policy, Person This book presents different perspectives on integration, and it covers the domains of theory and policy as well as personal narratives in relation to integration in Britain and London. This is built upon, firstly, previous

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academic publications about refugees and migrants real-life integration experiences and views on Britain (Bloch, 2002; Lewis et al., 2013; Lewis & Craig, 2014), and, secondly, the extensive empirical data I collected as part of my research. It is an attempt to uncover real stories and perhaps help to shape a new argument for better presentation of current integration debates, by putting them within the relevant historical context, and in order to demonstrate both continuity and change in diaspora communities. I would argue that: (a) Integration starts from the first day a refugee or migrant arrives, despite the refugee or migrant’s lack of knowledge of newly arrived reception policy and what exactly to expect from the state and the host community. (b) Integration is a slow, complex, and, for some people, painful process that may start positively with successful physical settlement. The term successful settlement refers to fair access for people with refugee or migrant status to reasonable housing, meaningful education and/or training, employment, volunteering, and health services (Mcleod, 2001; Bloch, 2002; Sales, 2002; Mayor of London, 2004). There are also those refugees and migrants who are already disadvantaged on arrival because of their age, education, health, and other issues. According to a report produced by Southwark Day Centre for Asylum Seekers (SDCAS), a refugee charity that works in South East London, many asylum seekers live in limbo for long time and often end up destitute and homeless in London for several months or years (SDCAS, 2014).15 The integration debate that comes later in this book is relevant and important to all Black, Asian and Ethnic Minority (BAME) and refugee groups in London. The Kurds are relative newcomers and a smaller player in comparison, for example, to the Indians, Pakistanis, Arabs, Africans, and people from the Caribbean, as well as many other groups in London (Office for National Statistics (ONS 2021)). A range of different terms are used in the cultural and diaspora studies literature to define integration; for example, positive participation, successful settlement, acculturation, citizenship, and social cohesion (Cantle, 2001). This book aims to describe the social construction, fluidity, and plurality of identity, and the ambiguities surrounding old and new debates about home and belonging by looking beneath and beyond the acquisition of a British passport, which is ultimately a

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complex process. This debate in turn was coloured vividly by individual feelings, choices, decisions, and actions. The empirical data collected suggest that membership of a Kurdish group alone does not shape or determine the final outcome of the integration process (see Table 5.2). However, the diaspora community do ­certainly create a home-like space for newly arrived refugees who seek or need to re-establish a link with their original culture. Thus, a brief introduction given to help to evaluate the implications of the various British asylum, immigration, and refugee integration policies in the context of the British multiculturalism discourse. Some examples include the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG)16 on Social Integration’s inquiry into integration of immigrants (2017); The Mayor of London’s Strategy for Integration (2018)17; and Housing, Communities and Local Government Integrated Communities Green Paper (March 2018).18 There will be a brief discussion later on how the Brexit campaign and referendum in June 2016, and the subsequent political withdrawal of Britain from the European Union (EU) in January 2021 affected these policy and popular debates in Britain.

1.5  Lived Experiences: Different Perspectives— Personal Narratives Adapting a lived experience approach as an alternative to dominant policyand politics-driven research, the discussion is based on ethnographic and qualitative methods of data collection and analysis. Following Nassari (2007), emphasis is placed on the personal narratives of individual members of Kurdish diaspora communities in London. Personal narrative, including case studies, is used as a focal point to tell a story of present circumstances, which at the same time allows space for the recollection of real stories about the past, and for these to be expressed as freely and independently as possible. Discussing the ‘conventional wisdom of the use of the case-study’ as a powerful tool in qualitative social research, as Flyvbjerg (2006: 220) describes some misunderstandings about the usefulness of case studies in providing deep and exploratory answers to ‘why’ and ‘how’ questions in a given research project. This book therefore emphasises some cases chosen from a wide range of in-depth interviews in order to highlight patterns of similarities as well as differences in the experiences

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and views of participants in relation to Kurdish identity and integration in London. It is important here to mention a critical note about the use of personal narratives to describe Kurdish history. As pointed out rightly by Bamberg (2004: 360), there exist ‘master’ or official narratives that are produced from the top of a particular society or community, as well as grassroots or counter-narratives that are derived from individual memories and experiences. The problem is, however, that these two types of narratives are not exclusive, and they do not cancel each other out completely. Moreover, as Bamberg (2004: 365) argues, all sorts of narratives ‘co-exist’ within society, and therefore noting and recording different narratives will help us to better understand the bigger picture. The personal insights add valuable empirical data for discourse analysis. This method includes the use of ‘auto-ethnography’, which focuses on personal reflection and includes a voice for the researcher alongside that of the participants (see the section above on reflexivity). On the use of auto-ethnography, as Nassari (2007) puts it: I am not working in a void, so my place [as an insider researcher] is considered, not only in relation to the method of auto-ethnography, but to indicate how dialogically the researcher and the researched together shape the meaning of what gets said [and recorded] (Nassari, 2007: 15).

The research method used, which helped to shape the analysis section of this book, is defined by its radical and innovative emphasis on the lived experiences and views of members of the Kurdish diaspora communities in London. This represents a marked difference from previous, often policyand politics-driven, research on the Kurdish diaspora in London. This radical shift is based on looking at both individuals and the collective Kurdish community and recognising its diversity (Barth, 1953; Olson, 1965). The critical analysis is therefore an attempt to transcend much of the existing literature on the Kurdish diaspora in London, and to promote a radical epistemology in the study of the Kurdish diaspora in order to produce a new insight reflecting Kurdish diversity and differing perspective(s): that is, the perspective(s) of Kurdish men and women from both first and second generations. See Table 5.2 for participants’ analysis.

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The Group The group space, as Wahlbeck (1999) describes, is the diaspora’s collective social organisation space, which provides a starting point and a sense of continuity of belonging to the Kurdish community(ies) in London. Using social capital analysis, D’Angelo (2008), who studied Kurdish community organisations in London, suggests that these grassroots and voluntary organisations serve as a network for binding their members together and helping to enhance community cohesion from within. Moreover, most individuals need and want to learn English and to participate in other social milieus, and therefore move on from the initial welcoming places set up by the various Kurdish social and political organisations. Some Kurdish organisations in London; again, as Wahlbeck (1999) describes, are community centres that were initially set up by individual Kurdish activists with a social and political agenda. These organisations encourage voluntary participation and active contributions to the formation of the group as one promoting self-interest and self-help. The diaspora group formation is a good example of the positive interplay between individuals’ needs and interest in advice and information about integration in London, and the group’s interest in Kurdish socio-political mobility. This demonstrates both traditional continuity and changes when adapting to a new life in London (Office of the Third Sector, 2009; Tas, 2013). This interplay is happening in the face of the huge and challenging task of meeting complex needs for basic settlement and gradual integration in London. Thus, the community centres formed in different parts of London are working as a focal point for social networking and for exercising collective power in the local borough. There are also places to attend English language and computer classes, to look for a job through a familiar and informal network (albeit not necessarily expecting good pay and conditions and good quality services), and to drink tea and have a chat. The centres also provide a particularly important social and psychological safe space for the elderly through an extremely effective voluntary and community-based service for combating the social isolation of older Kurds in London (Blunkett, 2008). The Individual Individuals act to maximise their own self-interest, and there is an interesting and dynamic interplay between the Kurdish individual and the Kurdish group in the context of Kurdish social organisations in London. With

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respect to the complex and dynamic relationship between individual and group, on a theoretical level, this book is influenced by social constructionist anthropologists such as Barth (1969), who has studied the Kurds in the past. Barth looks at any group from a macro, or collective perspective, as well as on a micro, or individual, level. In his landmark study, Barth gives ‘primary emphasis to the fact that ethnic groups are categories of ascription and identification by the actors themselves, and thus have the characteristic of organising interaction between people’ (Barth, 1969: 10). For further theoretical discussion about the relationship between the individual and the group, see Olson (1965). Moreover, for a better understanding of the process of refugee integration, this book has considered at a micro level more specific and personal factors such as age, social and family background, gender, education, and the type of person an individual is or wants to be in the future. Reflecting on the extensive fieldwork, this book questions whether previous studies on the Kurdish diaspora were methodologically biased towards group identity and group behaviour, and were therefore functionalist and static in nature, without much consideration given to the role of individuals. First and Second Generations Most of the existing literature indicates that previous studies relied heavily on the experiences of first-generation Kurdish refugees, who are generally more realistic and relatively more sceptical with regard to integration. Most of the previous research did not consider direct input from the second generation of the Kurdish diaspora in London who were born in London/Britain. It was highly interesting and rewarding for me to discover that, in contrast to their parent(s), second-generation Kurds increasingly and positively claim belonging to London; and therefore, do create a new social space for themselves in this city. It is also worth noting, as the most recent research on Kurdish transnational activities suggests, that young Kurds (second generation) engage relatively more than their parent(s) in issues concerning Kurdish politics, and especially the promotion of peace and human rights in the Middle Eastern countries where most Kurds live. The young Kurds carry out these campaigns through their extensive and well-developed community networks as well as the new social media and the digital spaces now available to them in diaspora; moreover, they speak several European and Middle Eastern languages (Keles, 2015).

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Notes 1. Ata, Ayar ‘My Suitcase’ (a poem) In Exile Writers Magazine, issue 9, Spring/Summer (2008) Exile Writers Ink, UK My Suitcase Under my bed there it was my seemingly little suitcase. Inside it my few precious belongings. A present from my grand mum, an evenly shaped, light blue stone with white spots spread all over it. A familiar piece of early morning sky with tiny stars twinkling in the palm of my hand. A photo of my mother smiling at me in despair, waving and wondering. A broken watch with frozen hands. 2. The Kurdish Student Society organised a meeting at Birkbeck College, University of London on 7 March 2015 where I presented an outline of my research findings to the participants. The concept of the ‘Kurdish Londoner’ was introduced and discussed in a lively debate. 3. http://iasfm.org/ayar-­ata-­biogra 4. https://cvalive.org.uk/ 5. https://www.unhcr.org/uk/news/press/2022/6/62a0c6d34/unhcr-­ updates-­ukraine-­refugee-­data-­reflecting-­recent-­movements.html 6. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-­asia-­58283177 7. https://www.fmreview.org/technology/grant 8. https://www.rescue-­uk.org/ 9. https://www.redcross.org.uk/get-­h elp/get-­h elp-­a s-­a -­r efugee/ help-­for-­refugees-­from-­ukraine 10. https://www.refugeecouncil.org.uk/about-us/ 11. https://www.proasyl.de/en/what-we-do/ 12. https://www.unrefugees.org.uk/ 13. http://iasfm.org/ayar-­ata-­biography/ 14. https://ffvt.net/en/publicatio 15. https://www.sdcas.org.uk/about-us.html 16. https://www.belongnetwork.co.uk/resources/integration-­n ot-­ demonisation-­the-­final-­report-­of-­the-­all-­party-­parliamentary-­group-­on-­ social-­integrations-­inquiry-­into-­the-­integration-­of-­im 17. https://www.london.gov.uk/sites/default/files/mol_londons_ all_for_us_approach_to_social_intergration_report_digital_version_ only_fa.pdf 18. https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/ uploads/attachment_data/file/696993/Integrated_Communities_ Strategy.pdf

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References Alinia, M. (2004). Spaces of Diaspora: Kurdish Identities, Experience of Otherness and Politics of Belonging. PhD thesis, Department of Sociology, Goteborg University. Alinia, M., & Eliassi, B. (2014). Temporal and Generational Impact on Identity, Home(land) and Politics of Belonging among the Kurdish Diaspora. Nordic Journal of Migration Research, 4(2), 73–81. Appadurai, A. (1996). Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization. University of Minnesota Press. Bamberg, M. (2004). Considering Counter-Narratives. In M.  Andrews & M.  Bamberg (Eds.), Considering Counter-Narratives: Narrating, Resisting, Making Sense. John Benjamin Publishing. Barth, F. (1953). Principles of Social Organization in Southern Kurdistan. University Ethnographic Museum. Barth, F. (1969). Introduction. In F. Barth (Ed.), Ethnic Groups and Boundaries: Social Organisation of Culture. George Allen and Unwin. Baser, B. (2011). Kurdish Diaspora Political Activism in Europe with a Particular Focus on Great Britain. Report for Diaspora Dialogues for Development and Peace Project, Berlin. Bloch, A. (2002). The Migration and Settlement of Refugees in Britain. Palgrave Macmillan. Blunkett, D. (2008). Mutual Action, Common Purpose: Empowering the Third Sector. The Fabian Society. Bozarslan, H. (2014). The Kurds and Middle Eastern “State of Violence”: The 1980s and 2010s. Kurdish Studies, 2(1), 4–13. van Bruinessen, M. (2000). Transnational Aspects of the Kurdish Question. Working Paper. Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies, European University Institute. Candan, M., & Hunger, U. (2008). Nation Building Online: A Case Study of Kurdish Migrants in Germany. German Policy Studies, 4(4), 125–153. Cantle, T. (2001). Community Cohesion: A Report of the Independent Review Team. Home Office. Ciment, J. (2006). The Kurds: State and Minorities in Turkey, Iraq and Iran. Fact on File. Curtis, A. (2005). Nationalism in the Diaspora: A Study of the Kurdish Movement. Nationalism, Ethnicity and Conflict. Available from http://tamilnation.co/ selfdetermination/nation/kurdish-­diaspora.pdf. Accessed July 11, 2016. D’Angelo, A. (2008). Kurdish Community Organisations in London: A Social Network Analysis. Social Policy Research Centre, working paper series. Demir, I. (2012). Battling with Memleket in London: The Kurdish Diaspora’s Engagement with Turkey. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 38(5), 815–831.

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Eliassi, B. (2015). Making a Kurdistani Identity in Diaspora: Kurdish Migrants in Sweden. In N.  Sigona, A.  Gamlen, G.  Liberatore, & H.  Neveu Kringelbach (Eds.), Diasporas Reimagined: Spaces, Practices and Belonging. Oxford Diasporas Programme. Enneli, P., Modood, T., & Bradley, H. (2005). Young Turks and Kurds: A Set of “Invisible” Disadvantaged Groups. Joseph Rowntree Foundation. Erel, U. (2013). Kurdish Migrant Mothers in London Enacting Citizenship. Citizenship Studies, 17(8), 970–984. Flyvbjerg, B. (2006). Five Misunderstandings about Case-Study. Qualitative Enquiry, 12(2), 219–245. Galip, O. (2012). Kurdistan: A Land of Longing and Struggle: Analysis of ‘Home-­ land’ and ‘Identity’ in the Kurdish Novelistic Discourse from Turkish Kurdistan to its Diaspora (1984–2010). PhD Thesis, University of Exeter, UK. Goring, B. (2004). The Perspectives of UK Caribbean Parents on Schooling and Education: Change and Continuity. PhD thesis, London South Bank University, UK. Griffith, D. (2002). Somali and Kurdish Refugees in London: New Identities in the Diaspora. Ashgate. Hall, S. (1996a). Who Needs Identity? In S. Hall & P. du Gay (Eds.), Questions of Cultural Identity. Sage. Hall, S. (1996b). New Ethnicities. In D.  Morley & K.  H. Chen (Eds.), Stuart Hall: Critical Dialogues in Cultural Studies. Routledge. Hirsch, M. (1997). Family Frames: Photography Narrative and Post-memory. Harvard University Press. Holgate, J., Keles, J., & Polent, A. (2009). Diaspora, Work, Employment and Community. London Metropolitan University, Working Lives Institute. Izady, M. (1992). The Kurds. Taylor and Francis. Jongerden, J. (2007). The Settlement Issues in Turkey and Kurds: An Analysis of Spatial Policies, Modernity, and War. Iran and the Caucasus, 13(2), 422–424. Keles, J. Y. (2015). Media, Diaspora and Conflict. I. B. Tauris and Co. Ltd. Khayati, K. (2008). From Victim Diaspora to Trans-border Citizenship: Diaspora Formation and Transnational Relations among Kurds in France and Sweden. PhD Dissertation, Linköping Studies in Arts and Science No. 435. Kingston, M.  H. (1977). The Woman Warrior: Memoirs of a Girlhood Ghost. Alfred A. Knopf. Kuhn, A. (2000). A Journey through Memory. In S. Radstone (Ed.), Memory and Methodology (pp. 179–196). Berg. Lewis, H., & Craig, G. (2014). “Multiculturalism is never Talked about”: Community Cohesion and Local Policy Contradictions in England. Policy & Politics, 42(1), 21–38.

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Lewis, H., Dwyer, P., Hodkinson, S., & Waite, L. (2013). Precarious Lives: Experiences of Forced Labour among Refugees and Asylum Seekers in England. Research Report. University of Leeds. McDowall, D. (2010). A Modern History of the Kurds. I. B. Tauris. Mayor of London. (2004). Destitution by Design, Withdrawal of Support from in-­ Country Asylum Applicants, an Impact Assessment for London. GLA. Mcleod, M. O. (2001). Black and Minority Voluntary and Community, Their Role. The Policy Press University of Bristol, Great Britain. Nassari, J. (2007). Narratives of Exile and Identity: Experience of Turkish and Greek Cypriot Refugees in Cyprus and London. PhD thesis, University of East London, UK. Obama, M. (2019). A Guide Journal for Discovering Your Voice. Viking. Office of the Third Sector. (2009). Real Help for Communities: Volunteers, Charities and Social Enterprises. Cabinet Office. Olson, M. (1965). The Logic of Collective Action: Public Goods and the Theory of Groups. Harvard University Press. ONS. (2021). https://www.ons.gov.uk/census. Østergaard-Nielsen, E.  K. (2003). Transnational Politics: Turks and Kurds in Germany. Routledge. Ritchie, J., & Lewis, J. (2003). Qualitative Research Practice: A Guide for Social Science Students and Researchers. Sage. Sales, R. (2002). The Deserving and Undeserving? Refugees, Asylum Seekers and Welfare in Britain. Critical Social Policy, 22(3), 456–478. Soguk, N. (1999). States and Strangers: Refugees and Displacement of Statecraft. University of Minnesota Press. Tas, L. (2013). One State, Plural Options: Kurds in the UK. The Journal of Legal Pluralism and Unofficial Law, 45(2), 167–189. Toivanen, M. (2014). Negotiating Home and Belonging: Young Kurds in Finland. PhD thesis, University of Turku, Turku, Finland. Tololian, K. (1991). The Nation State and its Others: In Lieu of a Preface. Diaspora, 1(1), 3–7. Vertovec, S. (2007). Super-diversity and its Implications. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 30(6), 1024–1054. Wahlbeck, O. (1998a). Transnational and Diaspora: The Kurdish Example. In Paper Presented at the International Sociologist Conference. Wahlbeck, O. (1998b). Community Work and Exile Politics. Kurdish Refugee Associations Studies, 11(3), 215–230. Wahlbeck, O. (1999). Kurdish Diasporas: A Comparative Study of Kurdish Refugee Communities. Palgrave Macmillan. Wessendorf, S. (2013). Commonplace Diversity and the “Ethos of Mixing”: Perceptions of Difference in a London Neighbourhood. Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power, 20(4), 407–422.

CHAPTER 2

The Geopolitics of the Middle East Post-WW1

Abstract  This chapter looks critically at the historical and unfavourable political situations of the Kurds in the post-WW1 era, which started with the emergence of three new modern nation-states in the Middle East, namely Turkey, Iraq, and Syria, including relevant modernising events in Iran. This part sets out the context required to explain the historic and systematic socio-political marginalisation, forces migration, and diaspora formation of the Kurds since the 1920s until the present day. Keywords  Post-WW1 history • New nation-states • Heterogeneity • Kurds

2.1   Introduction To understand the history of forced migration and the displacement of the Kurdish people, it is important to set the context and to learn about their part of the Middle Eastern history and their diverse and ancient cultural heritage (see Table 5.1 Kurdistan timeline). The Kurds live mainly in four countries: south-eastern Turkey, northern Iraq, and northern Syria, a new three states geography which emerged in the 1920s. The fourth and much older part, the Kurdish population who have been living in Western Iran since the time of tribes and empires (McDowall, 2010). Most Kurds © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 A. Ata, Transnational Migration, Diaspora, and Identity, Migration, Diasporas and Citizenship, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18169-6_2

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consider the four parts as their traditional homeland of Kurdistan. A considerable number of Kurds do also live in diaspora, for example in Armenia, Azerbaijan, part, Russia, and Lebanon. There are growing numbers of Kurdish diaspora who now live in major cities in western and northern Europe, Canada, the USA, and Australia (McDowall, 2010; Ahmad, 1994). The status of the Kurds has changed throughout their history, and they have been defined as subjects (under the Ottomans and the Safavids), and now as minority groups within the different countries mentioned above. This chapter covers the modern period since the initial Peace Conference in Versailles-Paris, France in 1919 (see Fig. A.1) and the subsequent Lausanne Treaty on 30 January 1923 (McDowall, 2010) which formally and finally divided the Kurdish areas and Kurdish people (Fig. 2.1). The map of the Kurdish majority area was presented to the United Nations (UN) by Kurdish nationalists in 1948 (van Bruinessen, 1992).

2.2   Land and Ecology Kurdistan is a vast and largely mountainous area of about 230,000 square miles. The Kurdish areas primarily consist of the mountainous areas of the central and northern Zagros, the eastern one-third of the Taurus and Pontus, and the northern half of the Amanus ranges. The close connections and symbiosis between the Kurds and their forbidding and dramatic mountains have been so strong that they have become nearly synonymous: a Kurd’s home ends where the mountains end. According to Randal (1997), the Kurds as a distinct people have survived only when living in the mountains. The highest points in Kurdistan are now Mt. Ararat in northern Kurdistan at 16,946 feet, Mt. Munzur in western Kurdistan at 12,600  feet, Mt. Halqurd in central Kurdistan at 12,249  feet, and Mt. Alvand in eastern Kurdistan at 11,745  feet. Despite its mountainous nature, Kurdistan also has considerable arable land (Izady, 1992).

2.3   Language Language is an important indicator of diversity among the Kurds. Most Kurds believe that keeping the Kurdish language alive is a vital component of maintaining their culture, especially within Kurdish diaspora communities. The Kurds are speakers of Kurdish, a member of the north-western subdivision of the Iranic branch of the Indo-European family of languages, which is akin to Persian, and by extension to other European languages.

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Fig. 2.1  The map of Kurdish majority areas in 1920 is now merely archival material, but it is still a powerfully emotional and visible manifestation of Kurdish nationalism. As described by O’Shea (2004), Kurdish areas are complex and highly disputed geographical areas. The map of Kurdistan is a clear demonstration of how the Kurds have been ‘trapped between map and reality’ since the formal partition of Kurdistan in the post-WW1 imperialist politics. For more information about Kurdish history, see Table 5.1 Kurdish history timeline. Map of the Kurdish majority area before partition in the 1920 (Izady, 1992)

Kurdish is fundamentally different from (Semitic) Arabic and (Altaic) Turkish. Modern Kurdish is divided into two major groups: the Kurmanji and the Dimili-Gurani. Kurmanji itself is divided into north also known as Bahdinani, and south Kurmanji, known as Sorani. In the far north of

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Kurdistan and alongside the Murat River, a version of Dimili known as Zaza is spoken. In Iraq and Iran, a modified version of the Perso-Arabic alphabet is used for the south Kermanji or Sorani language (Hassanpour et al., 2012). The Kurds in Turkey have recently begun to publish written work in the north Kermanji dialect through publishing houses based in Europe, using a modified form of the Latin script. In short, the Kurds do not have a unified spoken or written language; however, many Kurds do enjoy listening to old Kurdish songs or poems from different parts of Kurdistan. These cultural and historical traditions—including poetry, music, dress, and dance—have been researched by social anthropologists and developed into the study of the visual and oral traditions of Kurdistan (Kreyenbroek & Allison, 1996). The use of Kurdish language has been highly politicised in Turkey, where the Kurds have been labelled as ‘mountain Turks’, and therefore the use of Kurdish language in public places has been forgotten, forbidden until recently, and is still considered undesirable (Besikçi, 1977; Randal, 1997). Kurds from Turkey, and indeed Kurds from other countries, face a huge challenge in keeping the Kurdish language (including all its local varieties) alive. In London, for example, there are a number of community-based Saturday schools where volunteer teachers step in to teach Kurdish to children.

2.4  Religion Most Kurds converted to Islam when the region was conquered by the Arabs in the mid-seventh century AD. The majority of Kermanji speakers are Sunni Muslim, of the Shafiite rite. There are also followers of Shi’ite Islam among the Kurds, especially in and around the large Kurdish cities of Kermanshah (Kermashan in Kurdish), Hamadan, and Bijar in Iranian Kurdistan. The vast majority of Muslim Kurds follow one of several mystic Sufi orders, namely the Bektashi order in the north-west, the Naqshbandi order in the west and north, the Qaderi order in eastern and central Kurdistan, and the Norbakhahi order in the south. The remainder of the Kurds are followers of various indigenous Kurdish faiths of great antiquity and originality, which are variations on and permutations of an ancient religion that can reasonably be labelled as ‘Yazdanisam’, or the ‘Cult of Angels’. The term itself, as Kreyenbroek suggests, is ‘an invention and not based on evidence of any kind, but it has gained a certain currency among Kurds’. The three surviving divisions of this religion are Yezidism, Ahl-­ Hagg, and Alavism. Minor communities of Kurdish Jews, Christians, and

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Baha’is are also found in various corners of Kurdistan. The ancient Kurdish Jewish community has gradually emigrated to Israel, especially since 1948, whilst the Kurdish Christian community is merging its identity with that of the Assyrians (Kreyenbroek & Allison, 1996; Allison, 2001; McDowall, 2010).

2.5   Kurdish Cultural Diversity Historians, cultural theorists and anthropologists, as well as political scientists, have long studied Kurdish culture and history. There is therefore a strong agreement about the various people who have lived in Kurdistan since the pre-Islamic period. The literature describes Kurdish heterogeneity and the differing political situation and status of the Kurds throughout ancient and modern history. The Kurds were recognised as subjects under the Ottoman and Safavid Empires. Thus, by definition, most Kurds are members of the Ummah (universal Islamic community). The Kurds became victims of WW1 and were denied statehood and categorised as minority groups under different modern state regimes, for example in Turkey, Iraq, and Syria. They have been pushed to assimilate, and denied self-expression of their identity in Turkey (particularly harshly until 2003), and now the Kurds have formed diverse diaspora communities outside Kurdistan, for example in London, since the 1980s (Wahlbeck, 1999; McDowall, 2010; Vali, 2012). Some scholars who have studied Kurdistan and the Kurds have focused on Kurdish culture, how it has evolved in the context of their socio-political and economic marginalisation in the Middle East, and, more importantly, what is different and distinct about the Kurds (Lynch & Ali, 2006; van Bruinessen, 1992; Barth, 1953). However, Eickelman (1989) suggests that the term ‘Kurd’ is applied by others as a ‘label’ indicating the political differences between different peoples in the Middle East. Kurds now have an official cultural and political minority status and identity in the regions where they reside, and are referred to formally as ‘Iranian Kurds’ and ‘Iraqi Kurds’, as well as being described by some in Turkey as ‘mountain Turks’, ‘Syrian Kurds’, and ‘Turkish Kurds’ (Randal, 1997; Vali, 2012). In social anthropology, the term ‘Kurd’ or ‘Kurdish’ is used to describe the cultural identity of those who do not identify themselves as Arabs, Turks, or Persians. Thus, the cultural and political characteristics of the Kurdish people are an important matter for discussion. The issue requiring attention is how they have been treated or ‘labelled’ as ‘Kurds’, and marginalised by other dominant cultural groups

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in the region (Eickelman, 1989: 210; Bozarslan, 2014). In a recent study, Vali (2012) has taken a constructivist approach and argued against the primordial existence of the Kurds as a united and fixed social group. This contradicts the static description of the Kurds within the functionalist tradition, which is evident in van Bruinessen (1992). The functionalist social anthropology of the 1970s typically ignored the historical and external factors in the construction of the Kurds as a sub-social subcategory in the Middle East following WW1 (Eickelman, 1989). Furthermore, in relation to Kurdish cultural diversity, people mostly voluntarily call themselves Kurds, and are referred to locally as ‘Kord’, ‘Kermanj’, ‘Sorani’, ‘Badiny’, ‘Zaza’, or ‘Hawrami’, to mention a few variations in different parts of Kurdistan. In English they are represented and known as the Kurds, who live mainly but not exclusively in south-­eastern Turkey, western Iran, northern Iraq, and north-eastern Syria. Under the Ottoman Empire, the name ‘Kurdistan’ was used for part of Diyarbakir. Similarly, in Iran the province of Kurdistan (pronounced locally as ‘Kordostan’) still exists, but comprises only one-third of the Kurdish inhabited area. The rest of the Kurdish province was attached to Western Azerbaijan after the Shah defeated the Republic of Mahabad in 1946 (Vali, 2012). There are several estimates of the total number of Kurds and their population in each part of the region. The Kurds believe there are between 30 and 35 million Kurds in total, of which an estimated three million live in diaspora. However, there are no independent or official statistics on the exact figures. The same uncertainty is reflected in the asylum seeking or refugee numbers. For example, in the UK, Home Office statistics with regard to the Kurds state their official nationality as Iranian, Turkish, Syrian, or Iraqi, with Kurdish ethnicity comprising only a footnote. Nonetheless, in the recent 2011 Census in Britain, some new social categories were introduced with respect to ethnicity and religion. The Office for National Statistics (ONS) indicates that there are 47,200 Kurds resident in the Greater London area, although many Kurds in London dispute this figure as very low and inaccurate.

2.6   Kurdistan as a Buffer Zone: Divisions, Displacements, and Dispossession The date 31 October 1918 marked the end of WW1. This date has been described by Kurdish nationalists as the starting point of the modern partition of Kurdistan, or what one might call it-Year Zero-in Kurdish history, because thousands of years of Kurdish history and culture were ignored in

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tearing apart much of Kurdistan as a territory. Millions of Kurds were forced to migrate or were systematically displaced in the process of the post-war nation-state-building project in the Middle East, which was designed and supported by the British and the French in 1916. On May 19 [1916], representatives of Great Britain and France secretly reach an accord, known as the Sykes-Picot agreement, by which most of the Arab lands under the rule of the Ottoman Empire are to be divided into British and French spheres of influence with the conclusion of World War I.1

Consequently, the Kurds became powerless victims of post-WW1 politics. However, they slowly organised and demonstrated their collective power by resisting systematic subordination, and by creating alternative knowledge about their history, language, and land. The discourse of power and knowledge that Foucault (1972) describes in The Archaeology of Knowledge is very telling about the unequal construction of the Kurds’ place in modern history (Yassin, 1995; Hilmi, 2007; McDowall, 2010). The French mandated Syria, and the British incorporated central Kurdish area, known as the Mosul Vilayat, and the rich oil fields in Kirkuk, into their newly created mandate to control Iraq. After WW1, some parts of Kurdish area were to be given the choice of independence by the Sevres treaty in 1919 (see Fig. A.1) (archive photo), but instead they were awarded to the newly founded Turkish Republic under a different treaty: the Treaty of Lausanne in 1923. The Kurds remain the largest ethnic group in the world with people represented in three major geopolitical blocs: the Arab world (Iraq and Syria), NATO (Turkey), and south and central Asia (Iran and Turkmenistan). There are also considerable numbers of Kurds who live in the former Soviet states (see Omarkhali, 2013), such as Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia. On 22 March 1919 General Sherif Pasha, the Kurdish president, referred to Woodrow Wilson’s twelfth point (of his Fourteen Points)2 and indicated a degree of hope that the Kurds might eventually govern themselves independently: ‘The Turkish portion of the present Ottoman Empire should be assured a secure sovereignty, but the other nationalities which are now under Turkish rule should be assured an undoubted security of life and an absolutely unmolested opportunity of autonomous development’ (Meiselas, 2007: 51). In stark contrast to Wilson’s principles, however, the British Lieutenant Colonel Sir Mark Sykes, in a report presented to the British Prime Minister, stated:

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A consolidated Kurdistan is [an] impossibility. There is no reason why the distribution of the Kurds should dictate frontiers or why Kurds should be regarded as people who require consolidation. And so, it is the powerful, the arrogant and the more developed nations with a modern army and technology that win (Meiselas, 2007: 52).

Furthermore, Koohi-Kamali (2003), who studies Kurdish nationalism in Iran, describes how the ‘systematic and forced settlement of Kurdish tribes in Iran had commenced in the nineteenth century’. Koohi-Kamali also writes about much earlier period in the history of Iran in which the ‘Safavi king used Kurds to guard the borders in Khorasan, in 1600’. Again, referring to the first formal division of Kurdistan, Koohi-Kamali explains how ‘after the Chaldiran war in 1514, Safavid was defeated and the Persian/ Ottoman border re-drawn through Kurdistan on 23 Aug 1514, Ottoman victory’. The Zohab Treaty resulted in ‘10,000 members of Jalali Kurds [being] sent to exile to central Iran, a few hundred returned in 1941’ (Koohi-Kamali, 2003: 36–42).

2.7  Nation-States Versus the Kurds Broadly speaking, the modern state versus people discourses falls into the following two main analytical categories: 1. The central feature of modern people’s identity within a given nation-state is rooted in a specific and defined geographical territory. Within this model, the state always assumes authority, legitimacy, and political power. This power is exercised by the different institutions of the state (Jenkins, 1995). Different states acquire, maintain, and use their power and control and manage their population or citizens differently, but not equally harshly. Some harsh states even impose new identities and label certain sections of the population under their jurisdiction to suit an image of the state designed from above. For example, in modern Turkey the Kurds are labelled as ‘mountain Turks’. This modern attitude has been justified by successive Turkish governments in order to reinforce the so-called unity of the new Turkish nation-state’s singular identity since its establishment in 1923 (Randal, 1997; McDowall, 2010). 2. The non-state-centric identity, for example migrant people who live in diaspora in a transnational setting. In diaspora studies literature,

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this is referred to as diasporic or transnational identity (Tololian, 1991). This is an identity that is not state-centric, and more cultural and community-based. Therefore, the diasporic identity is more fluid, negotiated, constructed, and more importantly de-­ territorialised. According to Malkki (1995), ‘the contemporary category of refugees is a particularly informative one in the study of the sociopolitical construction of space and place’ (Malkki, 1995: 25). Following Malkki (1995), this section sets out to further explore the question of history and identity for Kurds in the context of their diaspora and transnational living. The notion of identity, as Malkki critically describes, is presented in many sociology and anthropology textbooks as a ‘historical essence rooted in particular places’, or as a fixed and identifiable position, for example in a world order of nationality that is closely linked to the notion of the nation-state (Malkki, 1992). In the case of the Kurds, they lack a nation-state and, despite the harsh and systematic assimilationist politics and policies in the region that have been used against them, they have survived and still demand regional and international recognition of their culture and the right to self-determination. Ultimately, most Kurds dream of earning statehood after so many years of struggle, suffering, and pain. This is a point passionately repeated by some in both individual interviews and focus group meetings within this research; and as many Kurdish studies scholars argue, within a contemporary and complex trajectory of globalisation and modern migration, most Kurdish migrants have maintained their original culture or constructed new identities. For example, Kurds in London are also one part of a complex social and economic transnational network across different countries in Europe and the Middle East. This is because politically, the Kurds need to maintain and extend their social network, which they do extensively throughout the whole of western and northern Europe (Baser, 2011; Keles, 2015). It is important to further examine the origin of K ­ urdish displacement and forced migration, exploring the specific geopolitical situation and Kurdish resistance movements in the different countries of Kurdish residence. The Kurds are still fleeing persecution in the countries where they are considered a minority group, mainly Turkey, Iran, and Syria. The situation in Iraq has changed in the beginning of the 1990s—the Kurds in most of the Kurdish area of Northern Iraq now enjoy relative autonomy and self-rule, under the

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Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG). Kurdish self-rule initially started in 1992, and the KRG has developed further since the end of the Saddam Hussein era in 2003. The Kurdish refugee crisis at the beginning of the 1990s had a huge impact, raising awareness internationally about the victimhood and marginal position of the Kurds. In addition, the formation of the new and semi-federal Iraq in 2004 has helped the struggle of the Kurds for self-rule to be acknowledged by new Iraq and by the outside world (Hassan, 2015). Moreover, over a century the complex background conditions of the Kurdish diaspora have involved numerous forced migrations and displacement events, as well as voluntary migration and commuting. According to Koohi-Kamali (2003), over the course of the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries, vast portions of Kurdistan were systematically destroyed, and large numbers of Kurds were deported to the far corners of the Safavid and Ottoman Empires. This period could be marked as the beginning of recorded Kurdish forced migration and displacement. Scholars and others working within forced migration have argued for the history of refugees to be written or rewritten from the refugees’ perspectives in relation to the nation-state. In his comprehensive book on the current refugee problem, Marfleet (2006) argues that refugee history is very much underdeveloped, and the perspective given by much of the media is that forced migration and people seeking protection is a new phenomenon, whereas clearly it is not. Other scholars point to the uncontrolled power of states to include or exclude people within their borders and re-settle them by force within their territory (Jongerden, 2007; Houston, 2008). In the absence of reliable historical records from Kurdish migrants’ perspectives, there are only some estimates of the number of Kurds who are displaced in the region or forced to live as refugees in different countries in Europe or elsewhere. According to Gunter (2011), there are an estimated two million Kurds who live outside Kurdistan as migrant workers or refugees, and they have formed particularly strong Kurdish diaspora communities in Europe. The largest Kurdish diaspora community is believed to be in Germany, followed by the Scandinavian countries and France (see Table 5.3). In England, based on the 2011 Census, the official number of people who registered themselves as Kurds in England was 47,200, and there is no information released from most recent Census in 2021. Recent studies indicate that the Kurdish

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diasporas have also managed to re-establish their extensive social networks within Europe, the USA, and with Kurdistan (Wahlbeck, 1999; Griffith, 2002; Enneli et al., 2005; Gunter, 2011).

2.8  Turkey Once the new Kemalist State fully established itself in Turkey in 1923, it started assimilating the Kurds and other non-Turkish groups. Its policies turned very violent and brutal towards the organised Kurdish resistance movement, particularly the Ararat Revolt in 1925–1931, also known as the Sheikh Said Revolt. The result was a crushing defeat for the Kurds, and for almost two decades after the end of WW1 the Kurds remained at war, this time with a centralised and extremely nationalist Turkish state. High numbers of Kurds were exiled to central Turkey, and many left Turkey for Syria as refugees. Moreover, van Bruinessen (1992: 191) describes the persecution of the Kurdish people as follows: ‘Many landlords (aghas) and sheikhs were executed, put to fight or sent to exile; numerous tribesmen were deported to other parts of the country’. This description of the systematic pressure the Turkish state placed on the Kurds is supported by Randal (1997), who explains: In early 1925, in the name of Kurdish nationalism, Sheikh Said Piran led a short-lived revolt in Turkish Kurdistan. But Ataturk put it down handily. The Diyarbakir military prosecutor in a harsh, specially instituted Independent Tribunal told Sheikh Said and four dozen lieutenants, ‘you are all united on one point; that is to say, the constitution of an independent Kurdistan which inspired you. For that, on the gallows, you will have to pay.’ And so, they did. And the consequence of the defeat and persecution of the Kurdish people was that 7440 Kurds were arrested and 660 executed. Hundreds of Kurdish villages were burned, and between 25,000 and 40,000 peasants died and a million Kurdish men, women and children were uprooted and shipped to Western Anatolia. (Randal, 1997: 121)

There were further massive and systematic forced movements of the Kurds in Turkey between 1923 and the late 1930s, when the Kemalist regime celebrated the centralisation and successful suppression of the Kurds. The Kurdish displacement and forced migration from Turkey that started in the 1920s continued well into the 1990s, and by the end of the twentieth

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century there had been more extreme persecution from all corners, and more displacements. A Turkish scholar, Morvaridi (2004), who studied dam development in Turkey in the 1990s, explains that ‘twelve large dams have so far been completed, displacing up to 350,000 people, the majority of whom are of Kurdish origin’ (Morvaridi, 2004: 723). Further, as Randal describes, ‘in 1994 the fighting and insecurity had emptied more than 2600 hamlets and villages sending some two million rural Kurds into cities near and far, where no meaningful provision was made for their wellbeing’. It was not only that the displacements became a way of life in Kurdistan, but there was more horrific news for those who were displaced to remote shanty towns and refugee camps while waiting for their loved ones and relatives to join them, as ‘some 3200 Kurds disappeared in 1993 and 1994  in so called mystery killings’ in Turkey (Randal, 1997: 257–258). The Kurdish situation in Turkey is still unresolved and very volatile. According to Matin (2015),3 in July 2015 there was renewed hostility by the Turkish state against the Kurds during other national and regional crises, including the rise of the (then) newly formed extremist group, Islamic State (IS), in the Middle East.4 Most recently, there are new reports of high level of socio-political tensions and aggressions against the Kurdish population inside Turkey and this old tension has also been transmitted across the border against the Syrian Kurds by Turkish forces. Despite the positive role of the Syrian Kurds in the fight against the IS and their huge sacrifice. It is now evidently clearer that the so-called International Community did use the Kurds only tactically, and now they are left to fend themselves. The Kurds are trapped between hostile states of Turkey and Syria.5

2.9   Iraq The famous Kurdish leader Sheikh Mahmud Barzinji was appointed governor of Sulymani in 1918. Sheikh Mahmud had the idea of an independent Kurdistan in mind, and therefore declared himself as Malik, or ruler, and resisted British policy in Iraq. After a local battle against the British in the famous Berdapan, and a short-lived victory, his army was defeated in 1919, and he went to live in exile in India. The order that started his rebellion stated, as Meiselas writes: May 22, 1919. Under the order and the command of the General Hokemdar of Kurdistan, Mahmud the son of Said, it has been decided that the Kurdish army should resort to arms against the injustice and deception of the Kurdish people by the British, who broke their promises and denied the Kurds their rights. (Meiselas, 2007: 70)

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The political situation for the Kurds became more difficult after this defeat. The new Kingdom of Iraq was established in 1923, and the Kurds were now trapped between three newly formed and powerful nation-states in the region, namely Iraq, Turkey, and Syria. The question of how many Kurdish families and individuals had to leave their homes and seek refuge elsewhere or simply stay and obey the new administrations is yet to be answered. Some argue that Kurds in their thousands were internally displaced, and many sought safety and security in different parts of Kurdistan where they lived in exile. Some returned after many years, with others making a new home where they could. This initial and short-lived resistance movement led by Sheikh Mahmud in Iraqi Kurdistan provided inspiration for a later generation of Kurds to demand their national and cultural rights, and Mullah Mustafa Barzani (born in 1904) became a powerful and effective Kurdish leader, managing to organise yet another Kurdish movement against the Iraqi government in Baghdad between in the 1940s and the 1970s. Prior to this, the Ottomans hanged his grandfather, father, and one brother for acts of rebellion against the Ottoman rule. His brother, Sheikh Ahmad, had led a previous rebellion in Iraq in 1932, which was repressed with help given to Baghdad by the British RAF. In 1979 Saddam Hussein took power in Iraq, and he is also well-known for his anti-opposition stance and his brutal policies against the Kurds, as well as against the Shi’ites in Iraq. Regarding the destruction of the Kurdish area in Iraq and the internal displacement of Kurds, van Bruinessen (1999) states: Altogether some 4000 villages (out of a total not much higher than 5000) were evacuated and bulldozed during the period from 1970 to 1990, most of them during the Anfal offensives. An economy, a culture, a way of life, a society, a moral order has been brutally destroyed. (van Bruinessen, 1999: 6)

Furthermore, Kreyenbroek and Sperl (1992) describe the displacements of the Kurds in Iraq, stating that hundreds of thousands of Kurds were uprooted by the Iran-Iraq War between 1980 and 1988. The Iran-Iraq War was also used as a pretext by the Saddam regime to further physically uproot the Kurds, and Iraqi forces systematically destroyed Kurdish towns and villages. In addition, Iraq implemented a deportation programme of Shi’ite Kurds (Fili Kurds) to Iran, with an estimated 130,000 other Kurds who lived in border villages expelled from their homes and forced to settle in a ‘new town’ with the local name ‘Mojam-maa-aah’. The latest and most well-documented Kurdish refugee crisis was recorded in December 1991, when 1.5  million Kurds tried to escape Saddam’s special guard

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(Human Rights Watch/Middle East 1994). They feared another gas attack after the first Gulf War: 60,000 Kurdish refugees were put in a temporary refugee camp set up by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), and a ‘safe haven’ was created to protect refugees, as well as preventing them from travelling further into Europe. More recently, after the oppressive and brutal Baath regime under Saddam Hussein collapsed in 2003, on 28 June 2004 a new type of Iraq was formally announced by the USA. This new Iraq had to deal with existing and new waves of internally displaced people (IDPs), refugees, and the stateless, reaching up to three million people. In 2014, the Islamic State fighters took over Mosul, Iraq’s second city, and started their brutality against the local population. In this context, the world now recognises the name of Nadia Murad, a Yezidi woman who was captured by the IS fighters and used as a sex slave. Thankfully Nadia managed to run away from them and has since become a courageous international campaigner against enslaving women, speaking publicly about her experiences while imprisoned and raped by members of IS. Nadia Murad from Iraqi Kurdistan, together with Denis Mukwege from the Democratic Republic of Congo won the Nobel Prize for Peace in 2018.6 In 2018, according to the UNHCR Global Focus Report,7 the number of total IDPs, refugees, and stateless persons in Iraq, as well as vulnerable returnees to Iraq, was over one million; only about half are properly documented, and there is much work to be done before the other half have access to essential services and formal protection. Even more worryingly, these figures do not indicate how many refugees are children, and how many of those children are unaccompanied. For a comprehensive and relatively recent assessment and analysis of the current crisis facing the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in Iraq,8 including recommendations for much needed state-­ building, peace, and improving human rights in the region, see the report by Soderberg and Phillips (2015) published by Colombia University.

2.10  Syria In Syria, since its independence from France in 1946, almost all mainstream Kurdish cultural activities have been banned.9 However, under the French mandate (1923–1946) the situation for the Kurds in Syria was slightly different; for example, publication in a Kurdish language was encouraged, but immediately after Syrian independence Kurdish became a

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marginalised and even forbidden language, similar to the official policy against the Kurds in neighbouring Turkey since 1923. Writing about the Kurds in Syria, McDowall (2010) explains that Kurdish communities in Syria have different origins, with their presence dating back to different times, descending from large numbers of fugitive Kurds who were forced to leave Turkey in the 1920s, and from those who fought with Saladin, the famous Kurdish Muslim leader, in ‘Damascus in the Middle Ages’. Moreover, McDowall (2010) describes the overly marginalised position of Kurds in Syria since the 1950s. According to Lynch and Ali (2006), there were a large number of Kurds who were de jure stateless in Syria, which means that these Kurds have been systematically deprived of full citizenship in Syria. Similarly, another Kurdish studies scholar, Gunter (2011), explains that many Kurds were denied a Syrian passport and marginalised by the governing Baath Party under both Hafez Al-Assad and his son Bashir Al-Assad, who is still somehow power in 2021. The Kurds in Syria have been influenced by their fellow Kurds in Turkey, because many tribes who now live in Syria originated in or were closely connected with similar tribes in Turkey, and they became divided after the partition in 1923. Continuing to struggle for their cultural survival, the Kurds from Turkey started to use their Kurmanji language abroad, writing in a modified Latin script devised by Prince Bedir-Khan in Syria during the French mandate. The Bedir-Khan brothers also started the journal Hawar in 1930, which was used to promote the new Latin script that had been developed to be used for Kurdish. Publications in Kurdish were never allowed to develop fully in Syria and Turkey, and therefore much Kurdish literature is only available to the Kurdish diaspora in Europe, and is often transported to the region clandestinely. Turning to the most recent events in Syria, especially in 2011–2014 the world was shocked by the scale and magnitude of the atrocities committed by the newly formed and extremely violent Islamist group known as Islamic State (IS) against civilians and minority groups in Syria and Iraq, including the Christian population and Yezidi Kurds. In 2014, people in Kobanê successfully resisted the systematic military attacks of IS against their city, and they sacrificed and suffered a lot as a result. However, and sadly, adding to the misery of the already wounded Kurdish people in northern Syria, following their ongoing struggle against the brutal forces of IS and the loss of 11,000 mostly young Kurdish men and women, Turkey seized an international diplomatic opportunity in 2018 to inflict even more wounds, first on the Kurdish city of Afrin.10 Tragically again, in

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October 2019 and following a green light given to Turkey by then US President Donald Trump, despite the dismay of most of the allies and supporters of the Kurds within the international community, Turkey carried out a ruthless and full-scale military incursion, this time against all Kurdish towns and villages in northern Syria, displacing and dispossessing some 300,000 people in that region.11 The ongoing Syrian refugee crisis is the most pressing and urgent issue in the Middle East since WW2, and still in 2022 this region need a sustainable, just, and lasting solution for refugees, displaced, and for peace. In 2015, Dionigi called for an international understanding and a ‘regional compact’ approach in order to deal with the Syrian refugee crisis: Although the end of the Syrian conflict is not in sight, a regional compact for refugees’ protection could be an important instrument for limiting of the damage done by this conflict. It may seem ambitious, and indeed premature, but it is a fundamental policy option which is worth exploring further (Dionigi, 2015).12

Dionigi’s call for peace and protection for all Syrian citizens is still relevant and much needed.

2.11   Iran The first waves of recorded forced migration of the Kurds in Iran began as early as 1534 when the defeated Safavid army, retreating from the Ottoman troops, systematically destroyed Kurdish towns and villages and burned their crops. Later in the same century, Shah Abbas Safavid started the process of uprooting hundreds of thousands of Kurds, and even Armenians, Azeris, and Turkomans, forcing them to live in different parts of the country. In the case of the Kurds, they were sent mainly to neighbouring Azerbaijan, but many more were sent as far afield as the province of Khorasan in eastern Iran (Koohi-Kamali, 2003). Some historians argue that the Kurds were forcefully sent to settle in the Hindu Kush mountains, present day Baluchistan, a similar displacement to that experienced by the Kurds under the Ottomans, when Sultan Selim deported the entirety of the Kurdish tribes to central and northern Anatolia and to the south of Ankara, where many Kurds still live today (Randal, 1997: 22). In the early twentieth century, Iran was given a new constitution, an army, a flag, and a centralised nation-state by the British in exchange for cheap oil and

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influence in the region. Reza Shah of Iran, a pawn of the British, established brutal policies against non-Persian ethnic and tribal groups in Iran. This brutality came as the unintended consequence of so-called modernisation and centralisation programmes, because in the period post-WW1 leading to the 1919 Peace Conference in Paris, Iranian intellectuals such as Taghizadeh attempted to present Iran as one ‘homogenous’ nation. Ansari (2012) writes about a memorandum prepared by Taghizadeh, a leading intellectual: Memorandum on Persia’s Wishes and Her aspirations which sought to address these hopes and fears; it offers a useful insight into the manner in which Iranian intellectuals sought to present Iran to the world. After first emphasising the importance of Iran for world peace, the memorandum goes on to stress that the nation is homogenous, ‘belonging nearly all to the same race and having the same culture, habits and faith and almost the same language throughout’ (Ansari, 2012: 69).

Unlike Mustafa Kemal in Turkey, Reza Shah was not able to carry out all the centralised programmes he had planned. However, what affected the Kurds in Iran was the forced settlement of nomadic Kurds, the exile of leading Kurdish figures, and the mass forced migration of the major tribes into different regions, making it easier to police and control them. In 1941 the Shah himself was removed from power and the British facilitated his exile to South Africa, where he died. Reza Shah, who had shown a strong interest in Nazi Germany, was forced to abdicate in favour of his son, Mohammad Reza, who became a loyal, obedient, and close ally of the West, especially the USA, after WW2, assuming power in Tehran on 25 August 1941. During the WW2 Iran was occupied by the Russians in the north and the British in the south. The Kurds used the opportunity, in close association with their Azeri neighbours, and with some but significant support from the then-Soviet Union they organised a nationalist movement, locally called Komaly Jinawey Kord (known as KJK) which later became the Kurdistan Democratic Party, or the KDP.  The whole struggle was not successful; and after the defeat of the Mahabad Republic in 1947, the Shah of Iran introduced harsh military and security measures to make sure the Kurds did not regroup and could not rebel again. He continued with the programme of forcible relocation of the Kurdish population, and sent many to live outside of Kurdistan. He also divided the province of Kurdistan itself and attached more than half of it to the

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neighbouring province of Azerbaijan, including the Kurdish city of Mahabad, which had been the centre of the Kurdish uprising in 1946. The Kurds, fearing further persecution, left in their thousands to hide and seek work in different parts of Iran (Vali, 2012). The current Islamic Republic of Iran was founded in 1979, and based on UNHCR’s global trend report in 2017, Iran paradoxically produces a considerable number of its own refugees as well as hosting about one million Afghan refugees.13 The Kurds in Iran continue to be politically persecuted and economically marginalised by the Islamic Republic. Kurdish migrant workers continue to seek jobs, often as manual workers in the construction industry, in other, more economically developed parts of Iran. Many Kurdish migrant workers, including those from Iran, have migrated to the neighbouring Iraqi Kurdistan. This movement of workers and cross-border businesses have been increasing since the collapse of Saddam’s regime in 2003 and more development of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in Northern Iraq. The Kurdish population in the KRG area, despite many ups and downs in their relations with the central government in Baghdad, and indeed unhelpful internal divisions, do enjoy a considerable degree of selfrule through an elected local collusion which is best known as the KRG. No official figures or reports are available about Iranian or Kurdish migrants in Iraq. However, the plight and harsh working conditions of Kurdish manual workers from Iranian Kurdistan, known as kolbar in Kurdish, who carry boxes of goods across the Iran-Iraq border is well-documented. These workers carry loads on their backs over the border for a small wage in order to support their families, and they are often targeted by the border guards who shoot them mercilessly and with impunity.14 Since 16 September 2022, and following the tragic death of Zhina Mahsa Amini, a young Kurdish-Iranian girl, at the hands of the “morality police” in the capital city Tehran, there have been widespread and popular uprisings and protests in most towns and cities in Iran. Many political and social commentators both inside and within Iranian diaspora emphasized/predicted an important sea change in Iran in 2022/2023, as the whole country has now been united in their strong opposition to the Islamic Republic’s regime, and their deep-rooted violation of women’s rights, human rights, hostility against non-conformist, and against different cultural and religious groups. The Zhina upraising, as it’s now known, provided just the trigger in the context of the current economic crisis, sky-high inflation, environmental mismanagement, and also a brutal and

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systematic crackdown by the security forces most loyal to the Islamic regime, including imprisonments and public executions of young protesters. There is also a good global awareness and support for Iranians in Europe and North America, where most Iranian diaspora communities live, and elsewhere. The Islamic Republic has now also been condemned internationally for its violation of human rights/women’s rights and the Islamic Republic was voted out of an important United Nations body for women!15

2.12  Conclusion There is not much written material about the history of the Kurds as a separate nation, partly because the modern concept of nationhood developed much later among the Kurds in comparison to their immediate neighbours. The pre-Islamic records show that most Kurds lived under the Persian Empire (now Iran), and since 1514, when the Ottoman Empire (now Turkey) won the historic Chaldiran War against the Safavid Empire and took control over the majority of the Kurds, the Kurds have always been subject to these two empires and never managed to form a united front. In the aftermath of WW1, the most significant and disappointing event in the political history of the Kurds was the signing and later abandonment of the Treaty of Sevres on 10 August 1921. The Sevres Treaty represented a glimmer of hope for the statehood of the Kurds, but later France and Britain helped to divide up Kurdistan between Turkey, Iraq, and Syria. This partition was later formalised by the Lausanne Treaty on 24 June 1923, which is still in force today (Houston, 2008; McDowall, 2010). Many scholars have emphasised the link between Kurdistan and the West, and van Bruinessen (1992), a celebrated anthropologist who studied Kurdish society in the 1960s, suggests: ‘The struggle between the United States and the Soviet Union and the conflicts related to the oil crisis affected Kurdistan more directly than my own country, the Netherlands’ (van Bruinessen, 1992: 7). Consequently, the Kurds in the Middle East have been systematically subjected to marginalisation, frequent displacement, and forced migration since the 1920s (Jongerden, 2007; McDowall, 2010). This process has led to political and cultural oppression and the subsequent suffering, pain, and displacements that have shaped the future of millions of Kurds for generations to come. We have seen the emergence of Kurdish diaspora communities in Europe,

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Canada, and the USA (Wahlbeck, 1998). A Swedish scholar, Emanuelsson (2008), describes these emergent Kurdish diaspora communities as a potential force for democratic change and for positive social and economic developments in the region. This type of positive thinking could turn a huge displacement ‘problem’ into a development ‘solution’, an interesting subject for development studies. The Kurdish case has been a complex tale of resistance, disunity, displacements, Trojan Horse policies, and dependency on foreign support and influence, and has faced several heavy defeats in the past century. The Kurds, although divided and exhausted, still demonstrate resistance and hope to achieve a rightful political solution with the central authorities in Turkey, Syria, and Iran, that is to say the accommodation of their cultural rights to self-determination and self-­government within a semi-federal and democratic model. This improvised model is now operating relatively successfully in northern Iraq, where most of the Kurdish area is now administered by an elected Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG).16 The human cost of the Kurds’ current struggle is extremely high, and a lasting peace seems unlikely, considering the ever-­ complex socio-political situation, especially in Syria and Iraq today (Bozarslan, 2014).

Notes 1. https://www.histor y.com/this-­d ay-­i n-­h istor y/britain-­a nd-­f rance­conclude-­sykes-­picot-­agreement 2. US presidential declaration after WW1 recognising the rights of minorities, including the Kurds in the Middle East. This is known as Woodrow Wilson’s Twelfth Point. 3. https://www.opendemocracy.net/arab-­a wakening/kamran-­m atin/ why-­is-­turkey-­bombing-­kurds 4. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-­middle-­east-­29052144 5. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/nov/20/turkey-confirmsairstrikes-kurdish-groups-syria-iraq-bombing 6. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-­europe-­45759669 7. http://reporting.unhcr.org/node/2547?y=2018#year 8. https://uk.gov.krd/ 9. ‘In 1962 in the Hassakeh Governorate under Decree No. 93, an estimated 120,000 people, about 20 percent of Syrian Kurds, lost their citizenship, a number which has since more than doubled to approximately 300,000 today. Many people who lost their nationality also later lost rights to their property, which was seized by the government and used for the resettle-

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ment of displaced Arabs. The Kurds whose land was seized were not compensated for their losses’ (http://www.refworld.org/cgi-­bin/texis/vtx/ rwmain?docid=47a6eba80). 10. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-­east/syria-­civil-­ war-­assad-­regime-­afrin-­kurdish-­kurds-­turkey-­ypg-­militia-­a8219651.html 11. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-­east/syria-­turkey-­ invasion-­w ar-­e rdogan-­t rump-­u s-­k urds-­m iddle-­e ast-­a 9146391.html (access November 2019) 12. Dionigi, F. (2015) ‘Do we need a regional compact for refugee protection in the Middle East?’ http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/mec/2015/10/30/do-­we­need-­a-­regional-­compact-­for-­refugee-­protection-­in-­the-­middle-­east/ 13. http://www.unhcr.org/5b27be547.pdf 14. https://www.voanews.com/a/iranian-­f orces-­k ill-­k urdish-­p orter-­o n-­ border-­path-­to-­iraq/4431117.html 15. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/dec/14/iran-likely-tobe-ousted-from-un-womens-body-bloody-crackdown 16. The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) was formed in 1992 by the Kurdistan National Assembly, the first democratically elected parliament in Kurdistan (and in Iraq), following the establishment of the no-fly zone designed to protect the Kurdistan region from the violence of Iraq’s former regime: http://cabinet.gov.krd/p/page.aspx?l=12&s=030000&r=31 4&p=390&h=1

References Ahmad, K. M. (1994). Kurdistan during the First World War. Saqi Books. Allison, C. (2001). The Yezidi Oral Tradition. Curzon Press. Ansari, M.  A. (2012). The Politics of Nationalism in Modern Iran: An Iranian Enlightenment [online]. Cambridge Books. Available at xxx. Accessed date. Barth, F. (1953). Principles of Social Organization in Southern Kurdistan. University Ethnographic Museum. Baser, B. (2011). Kurdish Diaspora Political Activism in Europe with a Particular Focus on Great Britain. Report for Diaspora Dialogues for Development and Peace Project, Berlin. Besikçi, I. (1977). Kürtlerin ‘Mecburi Iskan’I Komal [The Forced Resettlement of the Kurds]. Ankara Press. Bozarslan, H. (2014). The Kurds and Middle Eastern “State of Violence”: The 1980s and 2010s. Kurdish Studies, 2(1), 4–13. van Bruinessen, M. (1992). Agha, Sheikh and State. Zed Books. van Bruinessen, M. (1999). The Kurds in Movement: Migrations, Mobilisations, Communications and the Globalisation of the Kurdish Question. Working paper no. 14, Islamic Area Studies Project, Tokyo, Japan.

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Dionigi, F. (2015). Do we Need a Regional Compact for Refugee Protection in the Middle East? Name of Blog. Day and Month Published. Available at: http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/mec/2015/10/30/do-­we-­need-­a-­regional-­compact-­ for-­refugee-­protection-­in-­the-­middle-­east/. Accessed August 2016. Eickelman, F.  D. (1989). The Middle East: An Anthropological Approach. Prentice Hall. Emanuelsson, A. (2008). Transnational Dynamics of Return and the Potential Role of the Kurdish Diaspora in Developing the Kurdish Region. Advanced Research and Assessment Group, Defence Academy of the United Kingdom. Enneli, P., Modood, T., & Bradley, H. (2005). Young Turks and Kurds: A Set of “Invisible” Disadvantaged Groups. Joseph Rowntree Foundation. Foucault, M. (1972). The Archaeology of Knowledge. Pantheon. Griffith, D. (2002). Somali and Kurdish Refugees in London: New Identities in the Diaspora. Ashgate. Gunter, M. M. (2011). Historical Dictionary of the Kurds. Scarecrow Press. Hassanpour, A., Sheyholislami, J., & Skutnabb-Kangas, T. (Eds.). (2012). ‘Kurdish Linguicide, Resistance and Hope’ in The Kurdish Linguistic Landscape: Vitality. Linguicide and Resistance. Hassan, K. (2015). Kurdistan’s Politicized Society Confronts a Sultanistic System. Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Washington, USA.  Available from http://carnegieendowment.org/2015/08/17/kurdistan-­s-­politicized-­ society-­confronts-­sultanistic-­system-­pub-­61026. Accessed July 11, 2016. Hilmi, R. (2007). Memories: Iraq and Kurdistan 1908–1923: Iraqi Kurdistan and the Revolution of Sheikh Mahmud. New Hope Publications. Houston, C. (2008). Kurdistan: Crafting of National Selves. Bergin. Izady, M. (1992). The Kurds. Taylor and Francis. Jenkins, K. (1995). What Is History. Routledge. Jongerden, J. (2007). The Settlement Issues in Turkey and Kurds: An Analysis of Spatial Policies, Modernity, and War. Iran and the Caucasus, 13(2), 422–424. Keles, J. Y. (2015). Media, Diaspora and Conflict. I. B. Tauris and Co. Ltd. Koohi-Kamali, F. (2003). The Political Development of the Kurds in Iran: Pastoral Nationalism. Palgrave Macmillan. Kreyenbroek, P., & Allison, C. (1996). Kurdish Culture and Identity. Zed Books. Kreyenbroek, P., & Sperl, S. (1992). The Kurds: A Contemporary Overview. Routledge. Lynch, M., & Ali, P. (2006). Buried Alive: Stateless Kurds in Syria. Refugees International. Available at: http://www.refworld.org/docid/47a6eba80. html. Accessed February 25, 2015. Malkki, L. (1992). National Geographic: The Rooting of Peoples and the Territorialization of National Identity among Scholars and Refugees. Cultural Anthropology, 7(1), 24–44.

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Malkki, L. (1995). From “Refugee Studies” to the National Order of Things. Annual Review of Anthropology, 24, 495–523. Marfleet, P. (2006). Refugees in a Global Era. Palgrave Macmillan. Matin, K. (2015). Why is Turkey Bombing the Kurds? Open Democracy. Available at: https://www.opendemocracy.net/arab-­awakening/kamran-­matin/why-­is-­ turkey-­bombing-­kurds. Accesses August 2016 McDowall, D. (2010). A Modern History of the Kurds. I. B. Tauris. Meiselas, S. (2007). Kurdistan in the Shadow of History (2nd ed.). University of Chicago Press. Morvaridi, B. (2004). Resettlement, Rights to Development and the Ilisu Dam, Turkey. Blackwell Publishing. Omarkhali, K. (2013). The Kurds in the former Soviet States from the historical and cultural perspective. The Copernicus Journal of Political Studies, 2(4). J. Piechowiak-Lamparska, M. Férez Gil (Eds.), Torun Dom Wydawniczy 2013, pp. 128–142 O’Shea, M.  T. (2004). Trapped Between the Map and Reality: Geography and Perceptions of Kurdistan. Routledge. Randal, J. (1997). After Such Knowledge What Forgiveness? My Encounter with Kurdistan. Harper Collins Canada Ltd. Soderberg, N. E., & Phillips, D. L. (2015). Task Force Report: State-Building in Iraqi Kurdistan, the Program on Peace-building and Human Rights. Institute for the Study of Human Rights, Columbia University. Tololian, K. (1991). The Nation State and its Others: In Lieu of a Preface. Diaspora, 1(1), 3–7. Vali, A. (2012). Kurds and the State of Iran: The Making of Kurdish Identity. I. B. Tauris & Co. Ltd. Wahlbeck, O. (1998). Transnational and Diaspora: The Kurdish Example. In Paper Presented at the International Sociologist Conference. Wahlbeck, O. (1999). Kurdish Diasporas: A Comparative Study of Kurdish Refugee Communities. Palgrave Macmillan. Yassin, A.  B. (1995). Vision or Reality? The Kurds in the Policy of Great Powers 1941–1947. Lund University Press.

CHAPTER 3

Theoretical Framework

Abstract  This chapter uncovers the gaps in the existing literature and critically highlights the dominance of policy- and politics-driven research in the field of migration and diaspora studies, thereby justifying the need for more radical social constructivist approaches and theories by recognising flexible, multifaceted, and complex human cultural behaviours in different situations through the consideration of the lived experiences and by presenting more direct voices of members of the Kurdish diaspora in London. Keywords  Diaspora • Process of becoming • Homemaking • Globalisation

3.1   Introduction This chapter is designed, firstly, to look at the general theoretical framework, conceptual analysis, and policy debates on issues related to migration, diaspora, transnationalism, and integration, and secondly to apply these theoretical discussions to the specific and interrelated questions of the history and identity of the Kurdish diaspora. Broadly speaking, the debate on diaspora and transnationalism can be analysed through two distinct but not exclusive academic tendencies. The first sees cultural identity © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 A. Ata, Transnational Migration, Diaspora, and Identity, Migration, Diasporas and Citizenship, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18169-6_3

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as the main thread for understanding diaspora identity, referring to people who identify themselves as belonging to a specific real or ‘imagined’ ethnic community (Anderson, 2006; Clifford, 1994; Castles et al., 2005). The second tendency is concerned with the production of diaspora or transnational identities as a result of mixed migration (both forced and voluntary) in the world, especially since the 1950s. This complex phenomenon is also known as ‘globalisation’ within migration studies. Moreover, as Appadurai (1996) describes, diaspora formation involves a ‘process of becoming’ when people start to settle in new societies. Appadurai further talks about the role of ‘imagination’ (cf. Anderson, 2006) as a ‘social practice’ which, again as he suggests, helps us to understand the complex processes of producing/reproducing and creating/recreating original or new identities in the absence of the old territory. Thus, the shared outcome for both tendencies is the study of de-territorialised and distinct cultural communities which, as Malkki (1992) describes, are diaspora communities that still have a strong sense of belonging, even outside the given territory of the original nation-state. Migration is a complex subject requiring attention from different disciplines. Each discipline contributes insights from different angles, theoretically, methodologically, or empirically. For example, sociologists make us aware of issues related to social and human capital and the challenges of integration into new societies; anthropologists look at extensive social networks and the importance of transnational communities for understanding culture; some political scientists help to uncover gaps in public policies, with legal scholars drawing our attention to human and refugee rights issues (Brettell & Hollifield, 2015). This important and defining feature of the missing link between cultural identity and territory in the formation of diaspora identity has brought to the fore a new question regarding the well-recognised and essentialist link between national identity and a specific geographical territory that is defined as a nation-state. According to Hobsbawm (1990), this paradox almost undermines the myth of the nation-state as a united and uniform entity, which would in turn make the notion of people’s cultural identity and belonging much more challenging to study and to understand. An interdisciplinary approach is required, including insights from social anthropology, political science, geography, and history in order to deal with the theoretical underpinnings of cultural identity, nationalism, transnationalism, and diaspora in the context of globalisation (Joppke, 1999). Further, and more specifically, this chapter applies three

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well-known and interrelated postmodern questions, those of ‘definition’, ‘context’, and ‘purpose’, to the analysis of Kurdish diaspora in London, using the social constructivist paradigm. The debate about diaspora will inevitably lead to a discussion about the relationship between diaspora and the nation-state. It is clear from the relevant literature that multiple definitions of the term ‘nation’ and ‘diaspora’ can be formed, and depending on the perspective, different meanings can emerge. Broadly speaking, there are three, but not exclusive, tendencies among scholars of nationalism in studying the relationship between nation and diaspora: 1. Culturists, who see cultural identity as key to analysing nationalism (Maalouf, 2003; Malkki, 1992, 1995). 2. Those who see territory as being at the centre of our understanding of a nation-state (Tololian, 1991; Lynch & Ali, 2006; Marfleet, 2006). 3. Advocates of globalisation, including a consideration of host societies, (Appadurai, 1996; Castles et al., 2005). For a new discussion on decolonisation and translation with reference to Kurdish diaspora in Europe, see Demir (2022).1 This section will engage in a critical review of the existing literature on migration and integration theories, and I will look at contemporary theoretical trends, including tracing human lived experience, in defining the concepts of home, belonging, and exile, thereby dealing with diaspora and integration discourse as a de-territorialised form of collective identity. Here I refer to a collective and diasporic identity that seems to be functioning in parallel to, rather than undermining the notion of territorially centred nation-state identity. As Kibreab (1999) argues, ‘the assumption that identities are deterritorialised and state territories are readily there for the taking, regardless of place or national origin, has no objective existence outside the minds of its proponents’ (Kibreab, 1999: 385). The aim herein is to raise new conceptual questions by outlining the need for a new community-based dialogue within the Kurdish diaspora community in London, and extending this dialogue to engage with the host society and with the British state. The debates on diaspora/transnationalism and integration will lead to the articulation and presentation of a key synthesis under the term Kurdish-Londoner (the literal translation from Kurdish being Kordi-London). This contributes to the ‘multiculturalism’ and ‘integration’ debate, placing the spotlight specifically on London (Gilroy,

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1992; Hall, 1996a). As Castles et al. (2005) argue in The Age of Migration, the world has changed most dramatically since the beginning of the twentieth century because of rapid mass migration. In migration studies, this contemporary and complex phenomenon is often called globalisation and encompasses transnational and diaspora studies. Referring again to a seminal work by Castles and Davidson (2000) on citizenship and migration, they highlight the challenges of political and working integration in this global era, writing: ‘There are increasing numbers of citizens who do not belong. The challenge is to integrate the global, regional, and local dimensions of belonging into a new political model’ (Castles & Davidson, 2000: vii). Since the 1980s and 1990s, studying and understanding people and society beyond conventional and official borders has changed to include existing migration processes that have brought about changes in the expression and practices of collective identities, across and beyond the conventional state-centric tendency. Diaspora and transnational identities seem to directly challenge this tendency, but, as explained above, diaspora/transnational or globalised identities do not eliminate the place of the state in the well-established socio-political and economic global system known as the nation-state (Featherstone et  al., 1995; Appadurai, 1996; Kibreab, 1999; Castles & Davidson, 2000; Østergaard-­ Nielsen, 2002). The academic debates since the beginning of 1980 within diaspora and transnational studies have recently become more popular within the social sciences. These developments have followed the success of ‘refugee studies’ since the 1980s, recently renamed ‘forced migration studies’, although, as Hathaway (2005) argues, this is not the same thing, and refugee studies should remain a distinct discipline in order to define and defend the rights of refugees under international human rights law. There are complex and interesting conceptual overlaps between these interdisciplinary studies relating to the examination of diaspora/transnationalism and the transformation of identity within diaspora communities. I would argue that it is important to reflect upon the complex contemporary global conditions created by ever-growing human mobility and ‘mixed migration’, with ‘mixed’ meaning both forced and voluntary migration (IASFM Conference, 2013).2 The IASFM 2013 conference also drew attention to refugee protection taking place in the global South, an issue that has not been covered extensively in the global North (Fábos & Kibreab, 2007).

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3.2   Main Theoretical Trends Regarding Migration Migration theories derive from several disciplines within the social sciences, for example anthropology, sociology, political science, and human geography. There are three main theoretical tendencies within migration studies, including forced migration studies. The general and contemporary trends within migration studies can be divided into the following three schools: 1. Neo-classical economics, which foregrounds the economic reasons driving migration. This examines the economic push factors from the Global South (poor countries) and pull factors from the Global North (rich countries). This is also known simply as ‘push and pull theory’ (Marfleet, 2006). According to push/pull analysis, migrants are pushed out of the Global South and pulled towards the Global North for many different reasons, but primarily those relating to economics. This theory therefore argues that people move from poor to rich countries seeking better employment, higher wages, and better opportunities in life. This neo-liberal theory is not typically concerned with the complex causes and historical dimensions of the existing divide between rich and poor countries. 2. In direct political and intellectual opposition to neo-liberalism, the structuralist approach, which is an implicitly Marxist-inspired theory, looks at the unequal global capitalist system by considering the broader historical context; thus, it is also referred to as the historical-­ structuralist theory. The structuralist theory, in contrast to the neo-­ liberal theory, characteristically uses social class as a unit of analysis for explaining economic inequalities within a country. It also blames the world’s capitalist system for creating and maintaining uneven and unequal socioeconomic and political conditions in the world today. Therefore, this theory argues that the Global South is deprived of many skilled and manual workers because they have to seek settlement in the Global North in order to survive, and the north is ultimately benefiting from these historic inequalities (Bloch & Solomos, 2010). 3. The third approach is called migration system theory, and it tries to combine insights from the above two schools of thought on migration (Castles et  al., 2005). Moreover, migration system theory

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c­ overs migration as well as diaspora and transnational theories, and is therefore highly relevant to the theoretical scope of this book. Migration system theory considers both the micro-economy (the informal social and trade networks developed by migrants themselves) and the macro-economy (the formal political economy of nation-states and world markets). This section aims to utilise migration system theory as a guide for shaping the theoretical framework and for reviewing other relevant literature. For this purpose, I will look at contributions and insights closely related to system theory, for example, the work of refugee and diaspora studies scholars like Malkki (1995), Appadurai (1996), and Brettell and Hollifield (2015), who have moved away from essentialising refugees or diaspora communities based on an ethnic ‘label’ or ‘victim’ status. Thus, it is important to look at the work of Vertovec (2007) and Wahlbeck (1999), who advocate a different approach based on a social capital and the social mobilising model, which seeks to define the diaspora condition whilst keeping in mind the political context and the social mobilisation of diaspora for political purposes (Zetter et al., 2006). It is crucial and useful to look beyond the ‘imagined communities’ theory of Anderson (2006) by emphasising the complex realities, both imagined and practical, and the shifting identities of migrants, often facing multiple and parallel issues. The concept of diaspora seems to transcend the conventional boundaries of history, geography, and anthropology and has created a new discourse, which Gilroy (1992) describes as an ‘explicitly transnational’ understanding of diaspora experiences. The theoretical framework I adopted on diaspora and transnationalism has also been influenced by Rushdie (1992), Brubaker (2005), and Vertovec (2010), who seek to capture the inherent ambiguities and complexities inherent within the concept of migration in general, and diaspora in particular. The work of Wahlbeck (1998a, 1998b, 1999), who studied the Kurdish diaspora in London, also takes a more positive approach, departing from the conventional and traditional association of diaspora and refugees with the idea of ‘return’ to the ‘original homeland’ (Safran, 1991; Wahlbeck, 1999; Cohen, 2008). D’Angelo (2008) has also looked at Kurdish community integration in London, using social capital theory as a baseline approach and emphasising the formation of Kurdish social organisations and social networks in London as positive steps to self-help with respect to settlement and integration in London. Moreover, and

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looking specifically at various theoretical contributions made by refugee studies to the debate about refugee identity (Malkki, 1992; Zetter et al., 2005), the issue of labelling refugees is important to discuss. The labelling presents itself first in state policies concerning refugees, and then in its deeper and longer-term implications in either supporting or hampering refugee’s integration within the host society.

3.3  The Diaspora and Transnational Debate The academic use of the term ‘diaspora’ has changed over time. Within migration and diaspora studies, the terms ‘diaspora’ and ‘transnational’ are now often used interchangeably (Tololian, 1991). As Shuval (2000) has described, the term diaspora has over time acquired a range of different semantic meanings, and is used for different purposes. He writes: It [diaspora] is used increasingly by displaced persons who feel, maintain, invent, or revive a connection with a prior home. Concepts of diaspora include a history of dispersal, myths/memories of the homeland, alienation in the host country, desire for eventual return—which can be ambivalent, eschatological or utopian—ongoing support of the homeland, and collective identity defined by the above relationship. (Shuval, 2000: 1)

For the purposes of clarity, in this book the term Kurdish diaspora is used in a reflective and also pragmatic manner. The term Kurdish diaspora (Ravandi-Kordi or Kordi-Handaran in Kurdish) is used as a loose umbrella term to include the first generation of Kurdish refugees, the second generation who were born in Britain, and also students, migrant workers, businesspeople, and those who have come to live in the diaspora through family unification or re-unification. The use of the term Kurdish diaspora in London will later be merged into a new concept of Kurdish-­ Londoner, in Kurdish Kordi-London. This type of combined use of words (ethnic identity + place = settlement or home) works well in the Kurdish language as it implies a degree of referencing, identification, and belonging to the place. For more discussion on the notion of home and the sense of belonging to the host society among migrants, see Taylor (2009). Notably the articulation of the term Kurdish-Londoner, mostly by the second generation of Kurds who contributed to this study, refers specifically to the end result of a relatively successful process of Kurdish diaspora settlement and positive integration in London since the 1990s. In relation

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to analysing the two interrelated concepts of history and identity (new homemaking) some scholars of migration and diaspora studies describe the complex physical settlement in a new place and the social processes of integration as ‘the processes of becoming’ (Appadurai, 1996: 10). However, Taylor (2009), who studied the Cypriot diaspora community in London, clearly distinguishes between the issues of physical settlement and the slow, more complex, and emotionally charged question of integration and untimely belonging to a new society. From a cultural anthropology perspective, Clifford (1994: 306) suggests that there is no ‘definitive model’ for studying diaspora, but that diaspora is a subject closely related to new global conditions. By considering a historical perspective on human migration and displacement, Safran (1991), Tololian (1991), and Cohen (2008) have attempted to provide a more detailed analysis and description of the typology of diaspora. They refer to diaspora people in terms of their ‘origin’, and put emphasis on their ‘homeland’. However, from a postmodernist viewpoint, Ortiz (1995 [1940]), who studied Cuban society, has used the term ‘transculturation’ to describe the mixing of new and old communities, and saw different peoples with different and diverse cultures forming new global cultures. More to the point, Ortiz talked about ‘merging’ and ‘converging’ cultures in Cuba. Following Ortiz, it seems that some scholars have shifted from modernist and essentialist definitions of diaspora to describing migrant communities as ‘transcultural’ or ‘transnational’. Hall (1996b) also uses the term ‘trans-culturalism’ to describe the Black diaspora experience in Britain. With respect to the historical perspective on diaspora, as Marfleet (2006) argues, the movement of people has existed in many different forms and for many thousands of years, thereby suggesting that diaspora formation is not unique to any part of the world and cannot be assigned to any particular group of people. In Europe, for example, the history of the French Huguenots who escaped from France in the seventeenth century and came to England as political refugees is well-documented. There were also the Pilgrim Fathers, who escaped from England and made a new home for themselves in New England, North America in the same period (Roche, 1965). The term ‘transnationalism’ is relatively new and often used to describe people who live across borders of given nation-states, creating and maintaining their many social, economic, and active networks and organisations across different countries (Faist, 1999). The term diaspora, however, is much older, and has been used for as long as migration has occurred. As Tololian (1991) points out, the history of diaspora and transnational moments can

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be traced back to antiquity, a time when the Hellenic, Roman, Persian, and Ottoman peoples ruled. In more recent times, Tololian defines diasporas as: The exemplary communities of the transnational moment […] the term that once described Jewish, Greek, and Armenian dispersion now shares meanings with a larger semantic domain that includes words like immigrant, expatriate, refugee, guest-worker, exile community, overseas community, ethnic community. (Tololian, 1991: 3)

In order to capture the inherent ambiguities and complexities of diaspora debates, and following Vertovec (2007), the use of the term diaspora in this book is intended to be loose and inclusive, and to be used for two analytical purposes: 1. To include the first and second generation of the Kurdish refugee population in London, also including Kurdish students, migrant workers, those incorporated through family unification, and all those who enter the world of diaspora at different times and for different reasons. 2. To describe the Kurdish diaspora community as an emerging new community, and as a new and positive social and global reality. The Kurdish diaspora is now assuming a degree of collective power and influence over political issues concerning Kurdistan as a whole. More importantly, young Kurds are increasingly engaged and celebrate their successful settlement in and positive integration into the multicultural city of London. Thus, many have started to identify themselves as Kurdish-Londoners, a new concept mainly articulated by the second-generation Kurdish diaspora in London. Summarising the diaspora debate so far in the literature, there are three different categories of diaspora definitions: 1. The victim diaspora, referring to the forced dispersal of people, which is rooted in ancient times and the Jewish experience of forced dispersal in the Middle East. There are other groups who can also fit into this category, such as Armenians, Palestinians, Kurds, Tamils, and Afghans. Notably, when there is lack of sufficient timely academic study of certain diaspora groups such as the Kurds and

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Afghans, some novelists from these communities attempt to fill the vacuum of information (for a recent best-selling novel about Afghanistan, see The Kite Runner, Hosseini, 2003). For Kurdish analyses about the place of Kurdish novels in writing the Kurdish diaspora’s social history, see Galip (2012). 2. The origin/return diaspora, which refers to massive labour migration in modern times, for example the Chinese, the Irish, and the Italians who migrated to the USA, and the Bangladeshis, the Indians, and the Jamaicans who came to Britain in search of employment and new opportunities. 3. The integration diaspora, referring to migrants wanting to settle. This category includes political refugees and others who have migrated voluntarily, or those who were forced to migrate for complex economic and environmental reasons. Most people in this third category cannot and would not want to return and have therefore become the subjects of various studies by scholars of forced migration, diaspora/transnationalism, citizenship/integration, and globalisation (Safran, 1991; Tololian, 1991; Braziel & Mannur, 2003; Cohen, 2008). There are a growing number of heterogeneous studies that provide a more up-to-date overview of the wider diaspora community of Kurds living in Europe. These studies are useful for allowing a degree of comparison between the experiences of different Kurdish diaspora communities in Europe (Østergaard-Nielsen, 2003; Alinia, 2004; Emanuelsson, 2008; Khayati, 2008; Eliassi, 2010; Toivanen, 2014). The above categorisation/typology (victim, origin/return, and integration) is useful for an initial analysis of the history of human migration. These categories are by no means exclusive and clear-cut, but they help us to understand the complex historical causes of mixed migration of different people at different times and for different reasons. Thus, no group is so fixed as to fit into only one category. For example, a diaspora group such as the Kurds can fit into all three categories depending on what one is looking for, in what context, and during which period of history. Hence, as Clifford (1994) states, there is no ‘definitive and working model’ to define all diasporas. Attempting to define diaspora requires understanding the history of complex human movements and the formation as well as the transformation of each specific diaspora group in different parts of the world. As discussed in the history chapter, most historians would agree that the Kurdish diaspora exists as the conse-

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quence of historical and ongoing, complex, and exclusionary and oppressive politics against the Kurds in the Middle East since the 1920s (van Bruinessen, 1992; McDowall, 2010; Bozarslan, 2014). Moreover, Shuval (2000) provides a sophisticated and comprehensive definition of diaspora that is relevant to the Kurds: Diaspora is a social construct founded on feeling, consciousness, memory, mythology, history, meaningful narratives, group identity, longings, and dreams, allegorical and virtual elements, all of which play a role in establishing a diaspora reality. At a given moment in time, the sense of connection to a homeland must be strong enough to resist forgetting, assimilating or distancing (Shuval, 2000: 3)

Effectively Shuval is referring to the complex nature and ongoing process of diaspora, and therefore reinforcing the need for an interdisciplinary approach within diaspora/transnational studies. More specifically, with respect to the non-essentialist epistemology used in this book, and following a social constructivist approach, I argue that a process of marginalisation has led the Kurds to flee from their home; some Kurds, especially the second generation, have found newly imagined (Anderson, 2006) diaspora communities away from Kurdistan, and in order to re-construct or stress their culture, and adding a new cultural element to feel positive integration in London rather than assimilation: that is, the use of the inclusive term of Kurdish-Londoner, for self-advocating / self identity and within the social constructivist approach in social science methodology, which is very much in line with Eickelman (1989), an American anthropologist and a social constructivist who studies the Middle East, who believes that the term Kurd was constructed within a series of systematic socio-political processes, particularly since the 1920s, which have resulted in the Kurds becoming marginalised as a huge and collective cultural group(s) in the Middle East. Thus Eickelman (1989) in turn raises the important question of whether the term Kurdish is more political than cultural. A similar constructivist view is expressed by Vali (2012), who studied the creation of a complex social and political Kurdish entity in Iranian Kurdistan in 1946, as mentioned in chapter two, known as the Mahabad Republic, and in close association with neighbouring Azerbaijan and direct support from the former USSR. Thus, social constructivist methodology is very important in helping us to understand the cultural

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and political diversity of the Kurds and their historical political disunity. This leads to understanding and recognising the Kurds as a heterogeneous social group in the Middle East, while nevertheless acknowledging their collective and systematic socio-political and economic marginalisation since the 1920s. Kurdish nationalists use the term Kurd extensively as fixed political and a cultural term, and this is to assume a degree of shared history and unity in their fight for political and cultural rights. Paradoxically, the term Kurd has also been used by successive governments in the Middle East, especially since the 1920s, to supress any opposition by labelling it as Kurdish, regardless of cultural diversity (Besikçi, 1977). The empirical data collected for this study strongly points to the importance of recognising the cultural diversity and heterogeneity of the Kurds (see Table 5.2), and I have attempted to move beyond prescriptive and general labelling of cultural groups in forced migration studies and diaspora studies. Many scholars are now reluctant to employ a commonly used term that would act as a fixed label for a particular group of refugees, such as the Kurds in London (Zetter et  al., 2005). In addition to problematising the act of labelling, the emphasis has also been given to studying the lived experiences and emotions of individual members of different diaspora community(ies): for example, those Kurds who describe their deep feelings of being or belonging to Alevi Kurds, Hawrami Kurds, Zaza Kurds, Faili Kurds, or Yezidis, therefore expressing different cultural perspectives. The analytical units of age and gender are significant in studying the integration experiences of members of Kurdish diaspora community(ies) in London. Here, I refer to the pioneering work of Brah (1996)3 on the issues of intersectionality of gender, race, age, and education, both between and within different migrant and diaspora groups. The research I carried out and data collected is gender-balanced, but there is no gender-specific analytical dimension, and some positive steps have therefore been taken to interview Kurdish women and to include the views of women. The same is true for including the views of the second generation: evidently, different gender and age groups provide a wide range of different views and perspectives. Regarding the theoretical framework debate and considering the application of systems theory to the study of migration and migrants, a new understanding and a critical perspective emerged in the 1990s, and in relation to categorising refugees, Zetter et al. (2005) described those in London as being almost permanently ‘labelled’ according to their ethnicity and original nationality. For example, the Kurds are seen as Kurdish

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refugees who forever dream of a homeland. The problem with this stereotypical view is that it refers to all refugees in general terms and describes them as outsiders, others, or foreigners who do not seem to want or be able to cross the threshold set for refugee groups. This view is particularly static when ignoring the heterogeneity of refugee groups, such as the Kurds, and not reflecting the voices of younger and second-generation refugees. Moreover, Clifford (1994) provides a useful note about the use of the term diaspora and diaspora discourse, which is relevant with respect to the Kurdish diaspora at the present time: ‘the language of diaspora is increasingly invoked by displaced peoples who feel (maintain, revive, invent) a connection with a prior home. This sense of connection must be strong enough to resist erasure through the normalizing processes of forgetting, assimilating, and distancing’ (Clifford, 1994: 310). Following Clifford, it is important to note that psychological factors are important and relevant to better understand the thoughts and behaviours of members of a diaspora community. In addition, there are other real and complex connections between countries of permanent residence and countries of origin, such as regular commuting between the two. This is a solid premise upon which to build a valid argument for utilising the term diaspora as a useful analytical tool encompassing human actions, emotions, and beliefs, as well as real-life experiences, which include the possessing of dual identities and shifting loyalties. Most of the informants in this study recognise this fine and critical distinction between emotion and reality, and agree that their identity has been transformed from ‘being Kurdish in Kurdistan to feeling Kurdish in London and being a Londoner’ (Ozl, focus group meeting in South London, August 2013). The final key point in refugee studies literature relevant to this book is the critique of state-centred analyses of collective identity (Malkki, 1992; Marfleet, 2006). As explained in the history section, Kurdistan as a land was formally divided between the three newly formed nation-states of Turkey, Iraq, and Syria in the 1920s. Most Kurds, therefore, who had previously been subjects of the Ottoman Empire found themselves to be subjects of the new nation-states without any referendum. The post-WW1 politics in the Middle East demonstrate the conflicting and unjust nature of these new states, which planned to homogenise all sorts of people and cultures. The building of modern nation-states in the Middle East in the 1920s was carried out mostly by force and under the umbrella of undemocratic and oppressive policies against most minorities. Again, as we have

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seen, the new state institutions and state apparatus, for example in Turkey, have imposed all sorts of oppressive tactics and politics on the Kurds in order to assimilate them and deny them their distinctive and ancient traditional and local tribal identities (van Bruinessen, 1992). This generalised, imposed, and bureaucratically convenient given identity from the state has always been resisted and challenged by the Kurds. The Kurds have therefore become victims as well as non-state actors in the Middle East. Over time, the real contradictions between territorially defined nation-state political identity and the complex realties of different people with distinct cultural identities, such as the Kurds, have forced academics working within the social sciences to think beyond state-centric paradigms to understand more complex collective identities. In relation to cultural identity, within a given nation-state, for example in Britain, people identify themselves as British and claim to belong to an ‘imagined community’. According to Anderson (2006), Britain is a large and diverse community that can only be imagined and exists beyond any local level where people are able to interact face-to-face, and where there is a real sense of community. Territory refers to a geographical and physical place where people live, and which is defined strictly by borders: moreover, some part of these borders may be imagined, for example in the air or on water, but they are often clearly marked on the earth. The territory is therefore real with respect to the land and is called a nation-state. The cultural identity of people living within these borders is both defined by and protected by them. According to Hobsbawm (1990), the nation-state is a modern political project that has attempted to link cultural identity with territory. This project has largely succeeded through creating some 195 different nation-states worldwide (World Atlas Statistics, accessed in April 2015).4 The term globalisation refers to a process of human mobility called migration, both forced and voluntary, between different countries, particularly since the 1950s. This has created new and dynamic global conditions for people to move from one country to another in search of work, education, safety, and security, or simply for better life opportunities. The notion of diaspora with reference to cultural identity and ethnicity has existed since long before the invention of the nation-state, and by definition diaspora identity is not linked to territory. According to Hobsbawm (1990), the use of the nation-state has created a new paradox in which people living in one nation-state seem homogenous simply because they live in a single territory.

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3.4  The Integration Debate A Brief Overview In this global era, a more accurate and deeper understanding of the new age of migration is important for the security and wellbeing of everyone living in Europe and beyond (Betts & Loescher, 2011). The successful integration of new migrants and refugees into various EU countries is not optional: it is vital to a better future for all EU citizens and to development in developing countries. According to a report published in November 2015 by the Brussels-based Platform for International Cooperation on Undocumented Migrants (PICUM), there is growing poverty among European citizens from migrant and refugee backgrounds: The inclusion of migrants irrespective of their migration status in the broader implementation of the Europe 2020 strategy is crucial as migrants face an increased and disproportionate risk of poverty and social exclusion, human rights violations and discrimination due to the multiple failings of labour migration systems in Europe (PICUM, 2015: 1)

In an attempt to broaden the contemporary refugee and migration debate and give it a historical dimension, Marfleet (2006) describes migration and refugees as a historical and global phenomenon rather than a new, local problem (Marfleet, 2006: 1). Similarly, other refugee studies scholars refer to classic refugee cases, for example, the Huguenots in the seventeenth century who were fleeing religious persecution and were defined as refugees in Europe. This signified important progress within modern European states; according to Zolberg et  al.: ‘the absences of religion persecution became the hallmark of civilized states’ (Zolberg et al., 1989: 8). Reflecting on contemporary issues of forced migration, however, Marrus (2002) suggests that ‘refugees are forgotten people who have fallen into the cracks of history’ (Marrus, 2002: 12). The nation-states have tended to justify their nationalist and exclusionary policies in order to please their own populations, effectively denying space to refugees to rebuild a new home. This is an apparently exclusionary approach by the nation-state against migrants in general and refugees in particular. Arendt (1967), in her critique of the nation-state, attempted to theorise human rights through a consideration of refugee rights, as refugees are those who essentially become stateless and therefore lose all their rights before

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entering another country. As stated in refugee and human rights law, both of which are enshrined within international law, the term refugee became a legal term following WW2.5 This term is now used to define all persons who flee conflict zones or political persecution, or who seek safety and security in a country outside their own. Some scholars, like Hathaway (2005), advocate for the preservation of refugee rights under international human rights law, and others (Betts & Loescher, 2011) use the more general term ‘forced migrants’ to distinguish refugees from voluntary migrants. Broadly speaking, scholars of migration studies agree on a clear analytical distinction between the two categories of forced and voluntary migrants. However, there is a political tendency to redefine the term refugee and to replace it with a more generic term: forced migrant. This political and revisionist approach is highlighted by Mulvey (2010), who studied the influence of the closed-door refugee politics of the New Labour government in the UK since 1997. Mulvey (2010) notes the introduction of restrictive and unwelcoming policies, also referred to as ‘hostile environment’ on migrants and especially refugees in the UK. Looking back, the protection of refugees was a landmark victory and a source of pride for the UNHCR and the EU countries who signed the agreement known as the Geneva Convention in 1951, but this Convention is now being questioned (Hathaway, 1991). Clear evidence for this is found in the negative shift initially enacted by Jack Straw, the first Labour Home Secretary after the 1997 election. According to Mulvey (2010): Straw began the process of questioning the Geneva Convention. The thrust of the argument made by Straw was that the number of people able to flee regimes and claim asylum was a problem. The Convention was no longer working as its framers intended, and the environment in which it is applied today is one that has changed almost out of all recognition from that of 1951, and numbers of asylum seekers have vastly increased. (Mulvey, 2010: 440)

Furthermore, looking at the broader global picture and changes in the patterns of forced migration and displacement in the world since the end of the so-called Cold War, Orchard writes: ‘Recent work has shown that in the 103 situations of mass displacement between 1991 and 2006 (affecting some 53 countries), regime-induced displacement was one of the primary causes of displacement in 62 (60%) of the cases’ (Orchard, 2010: 1). According to UNHCR, there are 82.4  million displaced persons in the world in 2020 (UNHCR, 2021).6

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In July 2015, the migrant crisis in the French port town of Calais reached a critical point, with thousands of destitute and desperate migrants attempting, sometimes with fatal consequences, to enter Britain. The then British Prime Minister David Cameron described the migrants as ‘swarms’ and was criticised by the Refugee Council in the UK as well as by other humanitarian organisations for using such emotive language: ‘human rights groups have rounded on David Cameron, saying his description of migrants in Calais as a “swarm of people” trying to reach Britain was de-­ humanising’ (Elgot & Taylor, 2015).7 Calais is solely a transit destination, and it could perhaps be closed to migrants who aim to cross the English Channel, but this, as we know, illustrates the scale, depth, and urgency of ongoing and wider displacement and refugee crises. Such new and complex migration patterns, both voluntary and forced, should, one hopes, be reflected upon by academics and policymakers alike. Indeed, what is written, as well as the policies already adopted to deal with refugees and migrants will have consequences and effects on real people across all communities in the UK. It is therefore important to talk about migrants and refugees in the light of evidence. The problem is that not all social policies are informed by accurate and independent social research, and not all social research studies are independent of state policy (Hampshire, 2005; Zetter et al., 2006; Phillmore & Goodson, 2008). As such, major social events affecting integration sometimes surprise academics and policymakers alike, as has happened in the UK. For example, a public enquiry into the race riots and community tensions in Bradford, Luton, and parts of East London in 2001 describes how people in those areas had been leading ‘parallel [lives]’ for generations without anyone noticing the dangerous gulf that was slowly developing within seemingly happy multicultural communities in some English cities (Cantle, 2001). Another significant event was the by-election in Bradford West in March 2012, which reignited some of the old tensions that still exist between different community groups in Bradford (Migrants Rights Network, 2012; see more recent official document Casey Review 2016: a new review into opportunity and integration in Britain).8 The various effects of these old and new tensions on community cohesion and multiculturalism in the UK remain to be seen, but people on the street would say that this is not good news for community relations in Britain, and there has been a steady increase of direct attacks against the Muslim community in Britain in response to the tragic events such as those in Paris.9 In light of such trends, it is important to reconsider the question of why community cohesion, cultural equality,

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and peaceful coexistence within a multicultural society such as Britain really matters (Commission on Integration and Cohesion, 2007). Looking at the pattern of the new wave of forced migration since 2011, amidst a new war and insecurity in Syria, which then spread to Iraq in 2014, and also an increasing influx of mixed migrants coming from Africa, it can be seen how the complex and uneasy relationship between the nation-state and migrants who cross state borders is shifting, and how people today move more easily and quickly.

3.5  The Policy Debate on Social Integration in Brexit Britain Introduction The debate about social integration and multiculturalism in Britain was picked up and revived by David Cameron, the then British Prime Minister, in February 2011. In a speech in Munich about British multiculturalism and social integration, Cameron used the term ‘masculine liberalism’ to advocate for greater state intervention to integrate people into British society.10 Things have obviously changed a great deal in Britain since that speech, particularly in the context of the Brexit campaign, followed by the Brexit referendum on 23 June 2016. The Leave vote won, paving the way for Britain to say goodbye to the European Union (EU). The largely negative impact of the Brexit context on social relations in Britain varies by location and community. The Brexit impact should neither be underestimated nor exaggerated, but it is not a focus of this section. Instead, I will reflect on a number of relevant and recent policy documents about social integration that have been released in the aftermath of the Brexit referendum. The official and dominant narrative was that ‘Brexit means Brexit’.11 Brexit finally happened on 31 January 2020, and I argue all British citizens should be even more involved in the post-Brexit planning about social integration and social equality issues in Britain. The Integration Policy Debate In this examination of social integration in Britain, I would like to take a critical approach regarding the British state’s ever-changing but largely passive policies and positions since 2011 on multiculturalism and social integration. This is in line with the radical views of Stuart Hall, a

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celebrated British cultural theorist, about social integration and what he describes as ‘subtle’ integration. As Hall suggests, integration happens gradually and delicately on a daily basis and at a grassroots level, especially in large cities such as London, Birmingham, Manchester, Cardiff, Edinburgh, and elsewhere in Britain. As Hall describes, these urban places have historically provided socio-political and economic conditions where individuals and old and new communities mix, mingle, and negotiate their identities, as well as forming new hybrid cultures and identities.12 Most recently, some scholars studying multiculturalism in Britain have pointed to the negative and long-term effects of multiculturalism in separating minority communities from the mainstream (Malik, 2013). However, more positive aspects of social integration and the peaceful coexistence of different people from different cultural backgrounds in Britain could be highlighted, and I would add that multiculturalism should not be used to justify socioeconomic inequalities and disparities in different parts of London or Britain. Lewis and Craig (2014) state: Multiculturalism is, broadly, a view that members of different cultures can live peacefully alongside each other and maintain important aspects of their own cultures (Lewis & Craig, 2014: 21)

The New Policy Reports Moving on from theory to policy, the four most recent policy reports on social integration in Britain are important to consider, as they raise new questions, shape new government policies, and create new integration opportunities within the UK’s diverse communities. These official documents have been designed to influence and shape or re-shape the ongoing debate on social integration in Britain. I will examine four major reports on this subject, namely the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) report Breaking down barriers to integration, which is an enquiry on social integration of immigrants (August 2016; and October 2021); the Casey Review, a review into opportunity and integration (December 2016); the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government’s Integrated Communities Strategy Green Paper (March 2018); and Mayor of London’s All Of Us, the Mayor’s Strategy for Social Integration (March 2018). A question highlighted by the APPG report (2016) was about the breakdown of the traditional consensus that had seemingly existed regarding the value of immigration and the contribution of migrants to their

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host society, and the APPG report (2021)13 is dealing with the post-­ pandemic context and the importance of volunteering for promoting social integration. While this is reasonable, the issue of the provision of affordable and accessible English language courses for all newcomers is still largely missing from the APPG reports. However, the Casey Review in 2016 took a slightly different approach to that of the APPG, and instead of focusing on the ability to speak English as the traditional tool of integration, or the role of volunteering, the Casey Review puts emphasis on religion as the main basis of multiculturalism in Britain. Moreover, while Casey (2016) provides many positive statistics and sentiments about the majority of people in Britain, including BAME and Muslim groups who positively describe themselves as British, the review presents religion as a major dividing factor within contemporary British society. This emphasis on religion may make fuller and more meaningful social integration more difficult for groups of people such as British Muslims. In the Integrated Communities Strategy, a government Green Paper published in March 2018, Sajid Javid, the former Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, reflects on his own personal experience as an immigrant child and rightly recognises the benefits of learning the English language, However, as with the APPG reports, Javid does not say who should provide appropriate English language courses for newcomers. It seems that learning English is considered as a public duty for all migrants in order to integrate into mainstream British society, but it also seems like a private matter for them to tackle, regardless of their age, gender, or educational background. It is important to emphasise the need for positive motivation and willingness among migrants to learn English and to integrate, but it is equally necessary to highlight the need for central and local authorities to provide adequate English classes. Moreover, another crucial point of consideration regarding social integration is that the process of integration does not necessarily start on arrival, and may not begin for a long time afterwards if newcomers feel unwanted and unsupported by the communities into which they are supposed to integrate. The Mayor of London report published in March 2018 also noted the importance of social integration for statutory authorities at different levels. The City Hall’s strategy for social integration is entitled All of Us.14 This report is fresh, promising, and, as the title suggests, aims to be inclusive by trying to engage with ‘all of Us’. One can only echo some positive reviews of this

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strategy. For example, Oliver Lee, CEO of The Challenge, makes a cautiously optimistic comment about the strategy: ‘Sadiq Khan is still in 2021 blazing a trail in promoting social integration, and is taking positive action to address issues that affect us all’.15 However, in the post-Brexit era in 2022, the British refugee and immigration policies have shifted dramatically and, for example, under a new Rwanda scheme most refugees arriving in Britain will be deported to Rwanda for processing their asylum claims and this rejectionist policy widely criticised including by Prince Charles (now King Charles after the passing of her Majesty the Queen Elizabeth on 8 September 2022).16 This outspoken royal described this new British refugee policy as ‘appealing’.17 In contrast, a more open arm refugee policy designed, for example, to welcome Ukrainian refugees.18 Many people wonder about this new British or some might call it Un-British double-standards refugee policies now in operation.

3.6  A New Home A considerable number of Kurdish refugees came to Europe in the 1990s, including several thousand who came to London. In the process of settlement and integration, like other refugee groups, most Kurdish families and individuals have also faced many new challenges as well as dealing with the complex reality of adaptation to a new life in London. Most studies use the term integration as a positive term concerning commonly accepted social norms and values (McPherson, 2010). The data collected for this study indicate that the first measurable steps needed for successful settlement include access to housing, education, jobs, and the National Health Service (NHS) (SDCAS Report 2014). Most scholars and policymakers share the view that a precise academic definition of the term integration is not possible or indeed necessary. The academic debate about integration and the notion of home, belonging, and community cohesion were covered at some length above. This section deals with practical and physical integration, or settlement issues for migrants and refugees. This book argues that successful physical settlement of migrants and refugees in Britain is a crucial first step towards successful integration. The two terms of integration and settlement are used interchangeably in this section. The chart below highlights the complex junction of relationships between policies, persons, and communities.

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communities

persons

policies

In the debate about integration, scholars such as Hall (1996a) have used the term acculturation in the context of the multicultural debate. Within the discourse of integration, when identifying and describing the practical settlement needs of migrants and refugees in the UK, Phillips (2006) highlights, for example, the importance of housing as a first and defining step: The principle of integration underlies UK government policy on immigration and community cohesion and governs its approach to both the reception and resettlement of new migrants. Both the Home Office and Scottish Executive reports identify housing as a key dimension in the integration process. The housing conditions and experiences of refugees clearly play an important role in shaping their sense of security and belonging, and have a bearing on their access to healthcare, education and employment. (Philips, 2006: 2)

I argue that the ongoing challenges require even deeper reflection upon the human ability to feel differently and adopt a new identity in a new environment. Thus, the articulation of the concept of Kurdish-Londoner should work as an epistemological guide to aid in our understanding of the social construction of identity and the senses of continuity and change that are occurring within diaspora communities. The construction of

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identity in diaspora society beyond nation-state borders is still prevalent, as Bhabha points out: ‘The traditional conceptualisations of borders as fixed definitions, upon which binaries such as us/them and native/foreigner are ideologically constructed and come into question as the postcolonial subjects stand in “liminal”, “interstitial places” and “hybrid” sites’ (Bhabha, 1994: 4). These new dual and hybrid identities are both real and imagined, and they are particularly significant in the context of cosmopolitan London. The empirical data collected for this book suggests that there is a strong undercurrent of hope to achieve social justice, which Kurds wish to attain through belonging to London. This book now presents a radical alternative and an aspiration beyond integration: that is, to belong from below. This in turn leads to creating new social spaces for local communities, which again leads to the emergence of ongoing narratives and counter-­ narratives around multiculturalism and integration (Mcleod, 2001). The integration debate is presented from the Kurdish diaspora community’s perspective, and it is clear that for members of the Kurdish diaspora, the discourse of self-identity lends itself to a search for new meanings and challenges to social injustice against the Kurds as a marginalised group, primarily in their countries of origin, and as Alinia (2004) puts it, the increasingly positive recognition of Kurdish cultural identity, for example, in London sends a positive message to their former countries in the Middle East. The power and politics of diaspora are not new, and Kurds do compare themselves with other and more established diaspora communities. For example, comparisons are made to the Jews, who managed to maintain a united front with Jews inside Israel and to build a new state in 1948. Similar processes of international support and positive connections also ring true, for example, for the Irish and Armenian diasporas (Joppke, 2004; Cohen, 2008). At a theoretical level, it is important to acknowledge the lack of a well-developed school of Kurdish studies, and that there are no readymade theories about Kurdish culture and identity. The concept of a Kurdish-Londoner is the closest translation of Kordi-­ London, where a de-territorialised Kurdish identity seeks and finds a new identity in the space of London. It is not traditional practice in social research to invent an untested term. However, in the absence of a recognised and advanced school of Kurdish studies as an independent academic discipline, these types of community-based articulations are needed to challenge the skewed knowledge produced by the dominant states in the Middle East, often in order to deny Kurdish identity. The Kurds are still struggling to gain cultural recognition, especially in Turkey, where since

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the creation of modern Turkey in 1923 their basic rights as Kurds have been denied, and their political activism has led to persecution and punishment by the Turkish state (Besikçi, 1977). Moreover, The Kurds in London, like most other people from Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) groups, suffer from a lack of representation and sometimes misrepresentation. Drawing on a community-based academic study with the Black community in London, Reynolds (1998), in a positive evaluation of Black mothers’ voices, argues against the dominance of the type of knowledge produced from above or outside the African-Caribbean community, and from a position of greater power. Reynolds writes: ‘I constructed a mothering identity which locates this identity within a historical, cultural, socio-economic context’ (Reynolds, 1998: 82). In line with Reynolds’ approach, and in direct opposition to negative and static views from outside the community and from above with respect to BAME and refugee groups in Britain, a similar construct of self-identity among the second generation of Kurds has emerged in recent years and expressed as I am a Kurdish Londoner. The term Londoner, by definition, is an inclusive term and it refers to all members of various international and local communities, including many from refugee and new migrant communities who live and work in London and contribute to its economy.19 Emphasising again on Kurdish cultural diversity, it is important to note that, the Kurdish diaspora in London is not a homogenous group, and like most Londoners they also often inhabit multiple identities, both formal (e.g. Iraqi Kurd) and informal (e.g. Alevi Kurd, Badini Kurd, Yezidi Kurd). They may also hold British passports, which is yet another formal identity. Notably, these different identities sometimes clash, sometimes work in parallel, and sometimes cooperate, communicate, negotiate, and create new spaces in the context of London. These dynamic actions and reactions need to be understood in relation to the diversity of the wider city of London, as well as within its distinct Kurdish diaspora communities. However, within communities and at a micro level, the subject of integration should include the specific views and interests of Kurdish individuals vis-à-vis the Kurdish groups. Moreover, and as Maalouf (2003) and Hall (1996b) describe, complex new realities do not exist on equal terms, and these complex and changing realties need to be acknowledged by all parties and all sides. Again, on a theoretical level and concerning the individual, as Olson (1965) argues in his famous work The Logic of Collective Action, group and individual behaviour and actions should be studied in the context of ‘common interest’ and ‘individual

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gain’. Hence, as these common and sometimes overlapping areas of group interests and individual gains change, the behaviour of the individual vis-­ à-­vis the local community and London as a whole change as well. This study is specific to London, while also investigating some initial comparisons with other countries in Europe. Again, the dynamics around integration and self-identity of members of the Kurdish diaspora in various other European places can be described differently based on their specific situation and context. For example, some comparative insights can be drawn from the lived experiences of the Kurdish diaspora in Stockholm (Alinia & Eliassi, 2014). The Swedish literature shows a strong nationalistic tendency among the Kurdish diaspora in Sweden. The Kurds define their cultural identity against their country of origin and appreciate Swedish culture, but do not express much positive belonging to Sweden (Eliassi, 2015; Khayati, 2008; Alinia, 2004). The Kurdish diaspora in London display similar nationalistic tendencies, but their attitudes to belonging are clearly different, and many young Kurds express a positive sense of belonging to London. We think London is very different from other cities in the UK. Some of us lived in Hull and Newcastle before and ended up coming back to London. In London you can find a social space for yourself. We recently started a football team and we are supported by the local sport centre. We feel belonging to our community as well as to London and like this city very much for accommodating all these different people. (RBZ, focus group meeting South London September 2013)

In addition to academic materials, it is also necessary to examine relevant policy documents and reports that have been produced by the Home Office and by a number of London boroughs and charities in relation to refugee integration. The national authority dealing with community integration within the Home Office is the Department of Communities and Local Government (DCLG). The official statistics show a lack of positive strategy and limited data collection by the British government among refugee and minority groups. The official data also show that some ethnic groups, such as the Kurds, are overrepresented in manual and catering work, and underrepresented in local government, the civil service, formal politics, mainstream media, higher education, banking, and the financial sector (Holgate et al., 2009; Bloch & Solomos, 2010).

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3.7  Conclusion The debate about the relationship between nation and diaspora can be contained within three distinct and sometimes overlapping academic categories, with each category representing a different perspective. Firstly, there are the scholars who focus on culture as a key to understanding this relationship (Malkki, 1992; Clifford, 1994; Hall, 1996a). Secondly, there are those who place emphasis on geographical space or territorial place (Hobsbawm, 1990; Anderson, 2006; Cohen, 2008). Thirdly, there are the advocates of ‘globalisation’ (Featherstone et al., 1995; Appadurai, 1996). Furthermore, at policy and community levels, the concept of social integration often sparks heated debates in classrooms and public spaces, and understandably so, because it is about real people and real cultures that exist side by side in Britain. It seems that the debates can have a dividing or uniting function for members of different communities. It is important to recognise that the process of social Integration is a two-way street. These debates have a long and interesting history in Britain, which is closely linked to the policies regarding multiculturalism and social integration put forward at various times by central and local authorities. In the light of the current Brexit context in Britain, the national authority dealing with community integration within the Home Office is the Department of Communities and Local Government (DCLG), and the Mayor of London also has considerable power and influence to lead London’s social integration strategy. The reports produced by these bodies, however, show a lack of active strategy and limited data collection by the authorities on specific areas, such as the need for accessible and adequate provision of English language classes, and catering language lessons to different levels and age groups within new communities in major cities and towns in Britain. The discussion and analysis about Kurdish diaspora demonstrate that the Kurds are not a homogenous group and they often inhabit multiple identities, both formal (e.g. Iraqi Kurd) and informal (e.g. Alevi Kurd, Badini Kurd, Yezidi Kurd). For some forced migrants, their previous formal identity becomes a former identity, and for those who were born in London, their original identity often refers to their parents’ identities. In addition, many Kurds hold British passports, which is yet another formal and newly acquired identity. Within this complex context, the concept of a Kurdish-Londoner is used to highlight the relevance and implications of the social constructivist paradigm in this study about Kurdish identity and history. On a practical and policy level, in relation to the process of integration, the relevant analysis suggests that the process of

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integration starts from the day of arrival. However, integration does not start on arrival and probably does not begin for a long time afterwards if a migrant feels unwanted and faces a poor reception, as has been the case in most European Union (EU) countries,20 especially since the Dublin Regulations came into force in 2003.21 In short, regarding the importance of social networks, by the very nature of belonging to a refugee or diaspora community, people who live in the diaspora need to maintain strong links with their country of origin or, in the case of the Kurds, their traditional homeland, simply because the rest of their family live there. They also face upheaval and struggle to survive in Britain as they try to regain their voices and achieve a reasonable social and economic level. As discussed, the desire to belong or the positive feeling of belonging in London, especially among the second generation of Kurds who were born in London, is an ambitious goal and a positive step towards their social inclusion and equality in this country.

Notes 1. https://www.manchesterhive.com/view/9781526134691/978152 6134691.xml 2. http://iasfm.org/wp-­c ontent/uploads/2013/04/IASFM13-­ Conference-­Report.pdf 3. https://www.taylor francis.com/books/mono/10.4324/9780 203974919/cartographies-­diaspora-­avtar-­brah 4. http://www.worldatlas.com/nations.htm 5. http://www.unhcr.org/uk/1951-­refugee-­convention.html 6. https://www.unhcr.org/flagship-­reports/globaltrends/ 7. http://www.theguardian.com/uk-­n ews/2015/jul/30/david­cameron-­migrant-­swarm-­language-­condemned 8. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-­casey-­review-­a-­review-­ into-­opportunity-­and-­integration 9. http://www.theguardian.com/uk-­news/2015/nov/29/north-­london­mosque-­targeted-­in-­suspected-­arson-­attack 10. https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/pms-­s peech-­a t-­m unich­security-­conference 11. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/theresa-­may-­brexit-­ means-­brexit-­conservative-­leadership-­no-­attempt-­remain-­inside-­eu-­leave-­ europe-­a7130596.html 12. Interview with Stuart Hall, BBC Radio 4 on Wednesday 16 March 2011 at 4 pm. 13. https://socialintegrationappg.org.uk/wp-­content/uploads/2021/10/ Building-­Stronger-­Communities-­in-­Post-­Pandemic-­Britain.pdf

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14. https://www.london.gov.uk/sites/default/files/final_social_integration_ strategy.pdf 15. https://www.london.gov.uk/press-­r eleases/mayoral/sadiq-­launches-­ the-­london-­family-­fund 16. h t t p s : / / w w w. g o v. u k / g o v e r n m e n t / n e w s / p u b l i c -­i n f o r mation-­n otice-­o n-­p assing-­o f-­h m-­q ueen-­e lizabeth-­i i-­t ravel-­t o-­r oyal-­ hillsborough-­village 17. https://www.theguardian.com/uk-­n ews/2022/jun/10/prince­charles-­criticises-­appalling-­r wanda-­scheme-­reports 18. https://www.gov.uk/register-­interest-­homes-­ukraine 19. The Census in 2011 showed that one in three Londoners was born outside Britain (http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/index.html). 20. BBC coverage on 20 April 2015 about migrant deaths in the Mediterranean Sea: ‘A monumental failure of compassion in Europe’ for not doing enough to protect vulnerable migrants who set out from the Horn of Africa and the Middle East fleeing conflict, persecution, and poverty. 21. Council Regulation (EC) No 343/2003 of 18 February 2003 established the criteria and mechanisms for determining the Member State responsible for examining an asylum application lodged in one of the Member States by a third-country national.

References Alinia, M. (2004). Spaces of Diaspora: Kurdish Identities, Experience of Otherness and Politics of Belonging. PhD thesis, Department of Sociology, Goteborg University. Alinia, M., & Eliassi, B. (2014). Temporal and Generational Impact on Identity, Home(land) and Politics of Belonging among the Kurdish Diaspora. Nordic Journal of Migration Research, 4(2), 73–81. Anderson, B. (2006). Imagined Communities. Verso. Appadurai, A. (1996). Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization. University of Minnesota Press. Arendt, H. (1967). The Origins of Totalitarianism. George Allen and Unwin Ltd. Besikçi, I. (1977). Kürtlerin ‘Mecburi Iskan’I Komal [The Forced Resettlement of the Kurds]. Ankara Press. Betts, A., & Loescher, G. (Eds.). (2011). Refugees in International Relations. Oxford University Press. Bhabha, H. (1994). The Location of Culture. Routledge. Bloch, A., & Solomos, J. (Eds.). (2010). Race and Ethnicity in the 21st Century. Palgrave Macmillan. Bozarslan, H. (2014). The Kurds and Middle Eastern “State of Violence”: The 1980s and 2010s. Kurdish Studies, 2(1), 4–13.

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Brah, A. (1996). Cartographies of Diaspora: Contesting Identities. Taylor and Francis Ltd. Braziel, J. E., & Mannur, A. (Eds.) (2003). Theorizing Diaspora: A Reader. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing. Brettell, C.  B., & Hollifield, J.  F. (2015). Migration Theory: Talking Across Disciplines. Routledge. Brubaker, R. (2005). The “Diaspora” Diaspora. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 28(1), 1–19. van Bruinessen, M. (1992). Agha, Sheikh and State. Zed Books. Cantle, T. (2001). Community Cohesion: A Report of the Independent Review Team. Home Office. Casey, D. M. (2016). The Casey Review: A Review into Opportunity and Integration. Independent Report. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-casey-review-a-review-into-opportunity-and-integration Castles, S., & Davidson, A. (2000). Citizenship and Migration: Globalization and Politics of Belonging. Palgrave Macmillan. Castles, S., Miller, M. J. & Ammendola, G. (2005). The Age of Migration: International Population Movements in the Modern World. New York: Guilford Press. Clifford, J. (1994). Diasporas. Cultural Anthropology, 9(3), 302–338. Cohen, R. (2008). Global Diasporas: An Introduction. Routledge. Commission on Integration and Cohesion (CIC). (2007). Our Shared Future. Commission on Integration and Cohesion, London. Viewed 7 August 2014. http://resources.cohesioninstitute.org.uk/Publications/Documents/ Document/Default.aspx?recordId=18. D’Angelo, A. (2008). Kurdish Community Organisations in London: A Social Network Analysis. Social Policy Research Centre, working paper series. Demir, I. (2022). Diaspora as Translation and Decolonisation. https://www.manchesterhive.com/view/9781526134691/9781526134691.xml Eickelman, F.  D. (1989). The Middle East: An Anthropological Approach. Prentice Hall. Elgot, J., & Taylor, M. (2015, July 30). Calais Crisis: Cameron Condemned for “Dehumanizing” Description of Migrants. Available at: http://www.theguardian.com/uk-­news/2015/jul/30/david-­cameron-­migrant-­swarm-­language-­ condemned. Accessed August 2016. Eliassi, B. (2010). A Stranger in my Homeland: The Politics of Belonging among Young People with Kurdish Backgrounds in Sweden. PhD thesis, Mid Sweden University, Sweden. Eliassi, B. (2015). Making a Kurdistani Identity in Diaspora: Kurdish Migrants in Sweden. In N.  Sigona, A.  Gamlen, G.  Liberatore, & H.  Neveu Kringelbach (Eds.), Diasporas Reimagined: Spaces, Practices and Belonging. Oxford Diasporas Programme.

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Emanuelsson, A. (2008). Transnational Dynamics of Return and the Potential Role of the Kurdish Diaspora in Developing the Kurdish Region. Advanced Research and Assessment Group, Defence Academy of the United Kingdom. Fábos, A. H., & Kibreab, G. (2007). Introduction. Refugees in Urban Settings of the Global South, Special Issue Refuge, 24(1), 1–19. Faist, T. (1999). Developing Transnational Social Spaces: The Turkish-German Example. In L. Pries (Ed.), Migration and Transnational Social Spaces. Ashgate. Featherstone, M., Lash, S., & Robertson, R. (1995). Global Modernities 3. Sage. Galip, O. (2012). Kurdistan: A Land of Longing and Struggle: Analysis of ‘Home-­ land’ and ‘Identity’ in the Kurdish Novelistic Discourse from Turkish Kurdistan to its Diaspora (1984–2010). PhD Thesis, University of Exeter, UK. Gilroy, P. (1992). There Ain’t No Black in the Union Jack. Routledge. Hall, S. (1996a). Who Needs Identity? In S. Hall & P. du Gay (Eds.), Questions of Cultural Identity. Sage. Hall, S. (1996b). New Ethnicities. In D.  Morley & K.  H. Chen (Eds.), Stuart Hall: Critical Dialogues in Cultural Studies. Routledge. Hampshire, J. (2005). Citizenship and Belonging: Immigration and the Politics of Demographics Governance in Post-War Britain. Palgrave Macmillan. Hathaway, J.  C. (2005). The Rights of Refugees under International Law. Cambridge University Press. Hathaway, J.  C. (1991). International Research and Advisory Panel, Refugee Studies Programme, University of Oxford, January. Colloquium on Problems and Prospects of Refugee Law, Graduate Institute of International Studies, Geneva, Switzerland, 23 May 1991. Hobsbawm, E.  J. (1990). Nations and Nationalism Since 1780. Cambridge University Press. Holgate, J., Keles, J., & Polent, A. (2009). Diaspora, Work, Employment and Community. London Metropolitan University, Working Lives Institute. Hosseini, K. (2003). The Kite Runner. Berkley Publishing Group. International Association for the Study of Forced Migration (IASFM). (2013). Conference Report. Available at: http://iasfm.org/wp-­content/ uploads/2014/01/IASFM-­Fall13-­Newsletter-­2.pdf. Joppke, C. (2004). The Retreat of Multiculturalism in the Liberal State: Theory and Policy. The British Journal of Sociology, 55(2), 237–257. Joppke, C. (1999). Immigration and the Nation-State, the United States, Germany and Great Britain. Oxford University Press. Khayati, K. (2008). From Victim Diaspora to Trans-border Citizenship: Diaspora Formation and Transnational Relations among Kurds in France and Sweden. PhD Dissertation, Linköping Studies in Arts and Science No. 435. Kibreab, G. (1999). Revisiting the Debate on People, Place, Identity and Displacement. Journal of Refugee Studies, 12(4), 384–410. Lewis, H., & Craig, G. (2014). “Multiculturalism is never Talked about”: Community Cohesion and Local Policy Contradictions in England. Policy & Politics, 42(1), 21–38.

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Lynch, M., & Ali, P. (2006). Buried Alive: Stateless Kurds in Syria. Refugees International. Available at: http://www.refworld.org/docid/47a6eba80. html. Accessed February 25, 2015. Maalouf, A. (2003). Violence and the Need to Belong: In the Name of Identity. Penguin. Malik, K. (2013). Multiculturalism and Its Discontents: Rethinking Diversity after 9/11. Seagull. Malkki, L. (1992). National Geographic: The Rooting of Peoples and the Territorialization of National Identity among Scholars and Refugees. Cultural Anthropology, 7(1), 24–44. Malkki, L. (1995). From “Refugee Studies” to the National Order of Things. Annual Review of Anthropology, 24, 495–523. Marfleet, P. (2006). Refugees in a Global Era. Palgrave Macmillan. Marrus, R.  M. (2002). The Unwanted, European Refugees from the First War through the Cold War. Temple University Press. McDowall, D. (2010). A Modern History of the Kurds. I. B. Tauris. McPherson, J. (2010). “I Integrate, therefore I am”: Contesting the Normalizing Discourse of Integration through Conversation with Refugee Women. Journal of Refugee Studies, 23(4), 546–570. Mcleod, M. O. (2001). Black and Minority Voluntary and Community, Their Role. The Policy Press University of Bristol, Great Britain. Migrants Rights Network. (2012). Available at: http://www.migrantsrights. org.uk/ Mulvey, G. (2010). When Policy Creates Politics: The Problematizing of Immigration and the Consequences for Refugee Integration in the UK. Journal of Refugee Studies, 23(4), 437–462. Olson, M. (1965). The Logic of Collective Action: Public Goods and the Theory of Groups. Harvard University Press. Orchard, P. (2010). Regime-Induced Displacement and Decision-Making within the United Nations Security Council: The Cases of Northern Iraq, Kosovo, and Darfur. Global Responsibility to Protect, 2(1-2), 101–126. Ortiz, F. (1995 [1940]) Cuban Counterpoint: Tobacco and Sugar. Duke University Press. Østergaard-Nielsen, E.  K. (2002). Working for a Solution Through Europe: Kurdish Lobbying in Germany. In N. Al-Ali & K. Koser (Eds.), New Approaches to Migration? Transnational Communities and the Transformation of Home. Routledge. Østergaard-Nielsen, E.  K. (2003). Transnational Politics: Turks and Kurds in Germany. Routledge. Phillmore, J., & Goodson, L. (2008). New Migrants in the UK: Education, Training, and Employment. Trentham Books. Philips, D. (2006). Moving Towards Integration: The Housing of Asylum Seekers and Refugees in Britain. Housing Studies, 21(4), 539–553.

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PICUM. (2015). Undocumented Migrants and the Europe 2020 Strategy: Making Social Inclusion a Reality for all Migrants in Europe. Platform for International Cooperation on Undocumented Migrants (PICUM). Reynolds, T. A. (1998). African-Caribbean Mothering: Re-constructing a “New” Identity. PhD thesis, London South Bank University, UK. Roche, O. I. A. (1965). The Days of the Upright: A History of Huguenots. Clarkson N.  Potter, Inc. (Archive Material Accessed at the Huguenot Library at the National Archives in Kew, London). Rushdie, S. (1992). Imaginary Homelands: Essays and Criticism 1981–1991. Penguin. Safran, W. (1991). Diasporas in Modern Societies: Myths of Homeland and Return. Diaspora: A Journal of Transnational Studies, 1(1), 83–99. Shuval, J.  T. (2000). Diaspora Migration: Definitional Ambiguities and a Theoretical Paradigm. Blackwell. Taylor, H. (2009). Narratives of Loss, Longing and Daily Life: The Meaning of Home for Cypriot Refugees in London. PhD thesis, University of East London. Toivanen, M. (2014). Negotiating Home and Belonging: Young Kurds in Finland. PhD thesis, University of Turku, Turku, Finland. Tololian, K. (1991). The Nation State and its Others: In Lieu of a Preface. Diaspora, 1(1), 3–7. Vali, A. (2012). Kurds and the State of Iran: The Making of Kurdish Identity. I. B. Tauris & Co. Ltd. Vertovec, S. (2007). The Political Importance of Diaspora. Centre on Migration Policy and Society, University of Oxford, Working Paper Number 13. Vertovec, S. (2010). Towards Post-multiculturalism? Changing Communities, Conditions and Contexts of Diversity. International Social Science Journal, 61(199), 83–95. Wahlbeck, O. (1998a). Transnational and Diaspora: The Kurdish Example. In Paper Presented at the International Sociologist Conference. Wahlbeck, O. (1998b). Community Work and Exile Politics. Kurdish Refugee Associations Studies, 11(3), 215–230. Wahlbeck, O. (1999). Kurdish Diasporas: A Comparative Study of Kurdish Refugee Communities. Palgrave Macmillan. Zetter, R., Griffiths, D., & Sigona, N. (2005). Social Capital or Social Exclusion? The Impact of Asylum-Seeker Dispersal on UK Refugee Community Organisations. Community Development Journal, 40(2), 169–181. Zetter, R., Griffiths, D., Sigona, N., Flynn, D., Pahsa, T., & Beynon, R. (2006). Immigration, Social Cohesion and Social Capital: What are the Links? Joseph Rowntree Foundation. Zolberg, A. R., Suhrke, A., & Aguayo, S. (1989). Escape from Violence: Conflict and Refugee Crisis in the Developing World. Oxford University Press.

CHAPTER 4

The Kurdish Diaspora(s)

Abstract  This chapter attempts to explain the formation of Kurdish diaspora communities in different European cities and to describe their new and positive shifting position from victims in the Middle East to active citizens in Europe. This is in the light of contemporary trends in ethnic integration, and by looking at Kurdish diaspora integration and identity in some major cities in Sweden, Finland, and Germany, with a specific focus and an in-depth discussion on the negotiation of integration and multiculturalism in London. This global major city has historically held an attraction for many migrants from the Caribbean, Africa, Asia, and most recently the population of Kurds who have settled in this city since the 1990s (This research is concerned with the population of Kurdish refugees who have arrived in London and those who have come to settle as migrant workers, students, or for family reunification. The Kurdish diaspora in London also refers to the second generation who have been born in Britain since 1990s.); that is, a mixed and heterogeneous population from different parts of the Kurdish areas in the Middle East, with the promise of becoming Kurdish-Londoners. Keywords  Kurdish-Londoner • Transformation • Plurality • Self-identity

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 A. Ata, Transnational Migration, Diaspora, and Identity, Migration, Diasporas and Citizenship, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18169-6_4

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4.1   Introduction The purpose of this chapter is to explore and analyse the development of the Kurdish diaspora and its transnational consciousness, and the transformation of identity within the Kurdish diaspora. It focuses on the period from the 1990s onwards in London. As discussed above, modern Kurdish history is very much embedded in the formal and state-centric history of the Middle East (McDowall, 2010). The full history of the Kurds, including their subaltern status and the views of displaced Kurds, is largely under-documented and therefore under-represented. This part attempts to fill this gap as much as possible by presenting the voices and narratives of marginalised, dispossessed, and displaced Kurds (Chatty, 2010). Similarly, this under-documentation is also true for most forced migrants worldwide (Roche, 1965; Zolberg et al., 1989; Marfleet, 2006). The subaltern history of the Kurds, including the social history (memory) of Kurdish migrants themselves, helps us to develop and articulate a specific epistemology of Kurdish diaspora history and identity at the methodological level. More specifically, and at the epistemological level, the relationship between history and identity also raises a political question of the relationship between state and refugee, and it shapes our understanding of essentialist national or cultural identity, as argued by Malkki (1995): The international position of refugees in the system of nation states makes their lives uniquely clarifying and enabling for anthropological thinking of nation-ness, of stateless-ness and of interconnections between historical memory and national consciousness. (Malkki, 1995: 5)

Following Malkki (1995) and others such as Appadurai (1996) who have studied refugees and migrants, a new epistemology has now been firmly established within this field that transcends the traditional essentialist and reductionist tendencies of state-centric understandings of history and identity. This non-essentialist and non-state-centric approach to studying identity informs the basic premises of this chapter for analysing transnational consciousness (Amelina & Faist, 2012). In transcending more traditional methods this is a radical attempt to engage with Kurdish diaspora discourse from the perspective of the community. This is a means of helping to offer a new perspective on diaspora identity that is not restricted to state-centric ideology and which crucially puts forward a new and radical understanding of history and identity as a two-fold question. I argue, the

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diaspora context now presents a new opportunity to study and understand the lived experiences of people and communities beyond nation-state borders. Based on the empirical data collected for this study, the history of the Kurdish diaspora is a tale of subaltern of history and transformation of their status and identity from victimhood to citizenship. As Hassan, a businessman in South London, puts it: You know who you are when you are free. It is the time now to tell our history to the world. Everyone should know we were not just victims in the Middle Eastern region; we were/are fighting for our human, cultural and political rights but we are still less powerful. Now in London, as our new home, our new fight for preserving our identity in the diaspora has just begun. (Vasta-Hassan, age 52, interview, April 2013)

It is this resilient spirit that keeps the Kurds and their diverse Kurdish cultures alive. Vesta-Hassan and many others who contributed to my research argue that most Kurds in the Middle East, with the exception of the Kurds in Northern Iraq since 2003 and following the collapse of Saddam regime, are not able to fully participate in social, economic, and political activities as Kurds, but the overall situation for Kurds as a dynamic and diverse diaspora in London is different due to the space and many opportunities that this city offers. In a focus group in North London, Showan, one of the participants in a mixed-gender group explained: We hate assimilation in any country for all good and historical reasons, but integration in London is a positive option, it’s our choice, but at the same time it’s very challenging for some of us especially for the older generation. (Showan, age 58, focus group meeting, North London August 2013)

4.2   Living in Diaspora: New Identities and Realities The development of academic work dealing with Kurdish diaspora and transnational consciousness is relatively new, but there has been growing academic interest in the area since the 1990s. Many scholars are now studying various Kurdish diaspora communities in Europe (see Table 5.3). This section discusses some major works directly concerned with the topic of Kurdish diaspora in different parts of Europe. These contributions will be discussed for the purpose of comparison and for better understanding

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of the bigger picture of the Kurdish diaspora in Europe. In relation to what was discussed above with respect to the typology of diaspora (Sheffer, 1986; Safran, 1991; Cohen, 2008) and the integration process (Appadurai, 1996), the focus of this section is on integration. This book does not confine its understanding of cultural identity and belonging to a specific and fixed territorial entity (Amelina & Faist, 2012). The relevance and importance of this open and non-essentialist approach will become more evident when considering the views and interests of the second generation of Kurds who were born in London, as reflected in the case studies. A participant describes her experience as a combination of a physical, mental, and psychological journey from being Kurdish in Kurdistan to feeling Kurdish in London: I feel I’m Kurdish in London, in reality, I’m a Londoner. Because, I live and work and raise my children in London. Especially when I come to our community center there is always a warm and good feeling about being Kurdish. However, after ten years the young Kurds, especially, start to belong more and more to London, and now with the Facebook [young members laughing] even Kurdistan is not very faraway anymore [pointing to a video taken at a wedding in a Kurdish village in Turkey on a personal Facebook page] [everyone laughing again]. (Hazhel, focus group, North London, 2013)

In addition to a small number of recent studies on the Kurdish diaspora in London (Wahlbeck, 1998a, 1998b, 1999; Soguk, 1999; Griffith, 2002; Enneli et al., 2005; Holgate et al., 2009; Demir, 2012; Galip, 2012; Tas, 2013; Keles, 2015), there has also been a surge in Kurdish studies in Europe. According to Alinia and Eliassi (2014), the past two decades have seen the emergence of a distinct research field of Kurdish studies, including studying the Kurdish diaspora and reflecting on all aspects of life in Kurdish diaspora communities in Europe. The Kurdish Studies Network (KSN),1 which was founded in 2009, has now organised itself into a global network of scholars (including Kurds and non-Kurds) interested in this field. This new development aligns with Tololian’s (1991) ideas around the collective power of transnational and diaspora communities, their ambitions, dreams and interest in change, and their desire to make a real and positive impact on the world. This idea seems to work in some opposition to Anderson’s (2006) ‘imagined communities’ of the nation-state, and his ‘long distance nationalism’ theory of diaspora, in which he presupposes a nation defined by geography only. The point is that, when refugees

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and other migrants enter the world of refugeeism and diaspora and are granted permission to stay for a long time, they tend to form new communities in their new homes without completely breaking their imaginary and real links with their original home. This is therefore the birth of a new concept of diaspora experience which helps us to analyse and to understand an ongoing social change in our world. Furthermore, Tololian (1991), writing about the reality of diaspora and transnational cultures and peoples in relation to existing nation-states, explains that ‘to affirm that diasporas are the exemplary communities of the transnational moment is not to write the premature obituary of the nation-state which remains a privileged form of polity’. Moreover, he adds, ‘[diasporas] strive for nationhood through struggles conducted in both homeland and diaspora (e.g., Eritreans [achieved statehood], Palestinians [still struggling], Kurds [still struggling], Sikhs [still struggling], Tibetans [still struggling], Armenians [achieved statehood])’ (Tololian, 1991: 5). Despite the Kurdish diaspora being relatively new to Europe, they have had a real impact through their collective and multiple actions in different European cities in response to the recent crisis in the Middle East. The Kurdish diaspora, for example, has managed to amplify and celebrate the Kurdish resilience and successful resistance, for example, against the so-­ called Islamic State in Syria since 2011, especially through their well-­ publicised stance in 2015 in the city of Kobanê.2

4.3   Kurdish Diaspora: Understanding Patterns in Europe I now present a brief comparative analysis of the lived experiences of Kurdish diaspora communities in Germany, Sweden, Finland, and England, including a brief history of migration in London (see Table 5.3 Kurdish diaspora in Europe). The research on Kurdish diaspora in Europe is relatively new and there is no consistency in theoretical or methodological approaches to allow effective comparison between different European countries. Although, there is a growing number of survey reports focusing on second- and third-generation migrant groups, including Kurds, in Europe. A report by Crul and Schneider (2009) provides a detailed analysis of this social category and talks about their transition experiences from education to the labour market in Germany. This type of generic survey is useful in providing some insights about the overall integration experiences

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of migrants and refugee groups. In a similar but more in-depth study carried out by Holgate et  al. (2009) in London, a comparison was made between Kurdish manual workers and three other BME groups. The findings of Holgate et al.’s (2009) report are useful in highlighting the British state’s refugee and migrant integration policies and their various impacts on the real living and working conditions of members of migrant communities in London. It is obvious to migration scholars that no single academic discipline can cover all aspects of migration discourse, including forced migration, migration choices, journeys, arrival, reception, and integration experiences of different communities within host societies. In a vivid introduction to the interdisciplinary nature of migration theories, Brettell and Hollifield (2015) explain: Migration is a subject that cries out for an interdisciplinary approach. Each discipline brings something to the table, theoretically and empirically. Anthropologists have taught us to look at networks and transnational communities, while sociologists and economists draw our attention to the importance of social and human capital and the difficulties of immigrant settlement and incorporation. Geographers are interested in the spatial dimensions of migration and settlement. Political scientists help us to understand the play of organized interests in the making of public policy; together with legal scholars, they show us the impact migration can have on the institutions of sovereignty and citizenship. Demographers have perhaps the best empirical grasp on the movement of people across boundaries, and they have the theoretical and methodological tools to show us how such ­movements affect population dynamics in both sending and receiving societies. (Brettell & Hollifield, 2015: 12)

Following a similar line to that described above, and taking into account the interdisciplinary nature of forced migration studies, including diaspora studies, what follows is a brief introduction to the most recent academic studies on Kurds in Germany, Sweden, Finland, and England. This section extends the discussion further, allowing some academic comparisons to be made between different European countries in relation to the lived experiences of the various Kurdish diaspora communities. Germany Since 2011, the Syrian refugee crisis,3 especially in 2015, had brought Germany to the forefront of political and policy debates. The urgency and

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magnitude of the Syrian refugee and North African migrant crises in summer 2015 was unprecedented in recent times, and Germany has also historically been a popular country for Turkish migrants, Kurdish refugees, and many other migrant groups since the end of the WW2 (see Baser, 2015, on Turkish-Kurdish refugees in Germany). With respect to the effect of accommodating diverse refugee and migrant communities in Germany, as Østergaard-Nielsen (2003) explains Germany ‘complements comparative studies both of one migrant group in several countries [such as the Kurds] and of several different migrant groups in one country’ (Østergaard-Nielsen, 2003: 4). The Kurds are a large refugee group who arrived in Germany, particularly since the 1990s, mainly from Turkey as well as from other countries like Iran, Iraq, and as highlighted above, most recently a large influx of Kurdish refugees from Syria. Thus, the ‘Turkish and Kurdish immigrants constitute the largest single group of immigrants in Germany, with more than 2.4 million Turkish citizens and former Turkish citizens at the end of 2000’ (Østergaard-Nielsen, 2003: 2). The exact number of Kurds who live in different parts of Europe is unknown, but it is certain that a vast number of Kurds, including third and possibly fourth generations, now live in Germany. Due to the increasing need to study and understand the complex causes of forced migration and displacement of Kurds, and indeed of other groups from the Middle East, a degree of comparative studies is therefore necessary and beneficial, for example, for understanding the patterns of migrant arrival and reception policies in various countries in Europe. Therefore, it is encouraging to see in 2021 the development of a new research centre, Flight and Refugee: Networking and Transfer of Knowledge (FFVT)4 in Germany attempting to promote critical dialogue between science, practice, media, and politics in Germany and internationally. The traditional emphasis in much of the existing literature around the Kurdish diaspora in Germany still is, however, about the transnational ties between host (Germany) and original countries (mainly Turkey).5 A major critical point that can be made here is that most forced migration studies scholars continue to show a greater interest in a macro analysis of the practical and digital Kurdish diaspora and the formation of transnational social networks across borders and between different Kurdish diaspora groups within Europe and with Turkey/Kurdistan, and ironically, still with less attention given to the desires and needs of social integration issues facing members of the Kurdish diaspora community(ies) in host societies. For a comprehensive and comparative information and analysis

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on the relationship between second-generation members of the Kurdish and Turkish diaspora communities living in Germany and Sweden, see Baser (2015). Moreover, with respect to the importance of the Kurdish diaspora in Germany and its influence at an international level, Curtis (2005) states: The Kurdish diaspora in Germany illustrates the effects a diaspora community can have on its host nation. First, the internal policies of Germany have changed due to the Kurdish activities there. But the German Kurds have influenced world politics as well, putting a strain on the relationship between Germany and Turkey. Often, a major goal of diaspora communities is to influence the politics in their host country. For instance, American Jews in the early 20th century pushed the American government to support an independent Jewish state. (Curtis, 2005: 9). It is very clear that Germany since 2015 has become a major host country for refugees from Syria, Iran, Iraq, and among the new comers there are considerable number of Kurdish refugees who have managed to join wellestablished Kurdish diaspora communities there. For example, in Cologne and Berlin, the state policies are designed to support community integration. There are many and new academic research reflecting both positively and critically on refugee integration (see FFVT).

Sweden Several major academic research studies have been carried out on the Kurdish diaspora in Sweden, including studies by scholars from a Kurdish background who exhibit a deep first-hand understanding of the historic processes of forced migration among the Kurds. These Kurdish scholars have largely moved away from the dominant policy- and politics-driven research on the Kurdish diaspora in Europe in the 1990s, and their works instead focus on the lived experiences of Kurdish diaspora members in Sweden, such that they are relevant and comparable to my study on Kurdish diaspora in London. They help us to understand integration issues in Sweden from a Kurdish diaspora/transnational perspective. Reflecting on a conference on the Kurdish diaspora in Europe that took place in Uppsala, Sweden in April 2012,6 Alinia and Eliassi (2014) write: Diasporas are a transnational social phenomenon where a complex social process can be observed characterised on the one hand by dispersion, dislocation, feelings of social exclusion and a homing desire, and on the other

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hand—and this is what distinguishes diaspora from exile—by movements, mobilisations and politics for location, “home making” (imaginary or real) and belonging. (Alinia & Eliassi, 2014: 53)

Moreover, the scholars who have studied Kurdish diaspora in Sweden discuss the complex processes of settlement, as well as issues of citizenship and belonging in Sweden (Eliassi, 2015; Khayati, 2008; Alinia, 2004). Earlier and in particular, Khayati (2008) applies a human agency approach and explains the positive desire for home rebuilding among the Kurds in Sweden. His work with Kurds in Sweden and France signals a radical and progressive shift in the Kurdish diaspora studies paradigm, which in turn influenced my approach, from Kurdish ‘victimhood’ in the Middle East to active ‘citizenship’ in Sweden. This study represents a clear break from earlier traditional descriptions of the ‘victim’ diaspora and its close association with the country or place of ‘origin’, and also breaks with the issue of ‘return’ to the country of origin (Cohen, 2008). Building on existing contributions to the study of diaspora community(ies) in Sweden, Eliassi puts forward a non-essentialist and pluralist view by considering the heterogeneous experiences of members of the Kurdish diaspora in Sweden. Eliassi (2010) looks deeper into the community by considering dimensions of the diaspora experience related to age and gender. In a joint academic work in Sweden among the Kurds, Alinia and Eliassi (2014) explain: first and second generations, or experiences of men and women, shows that they experience differently the old and the new homes, which in turn can lead to divided allegiances. [Therefore] family, community, home, homeland, belonging and nation need to be renegotiated and redefined in the light of dislocations and re-locations across different generations, genders, times, spaces and contexts. (Alinia & Eliassi, 2014: 2)

In a more recent work published by the Oxford University Diaspora Programme, Eliassi (2015) uses sport and Facebook to measure the success of young Kurds in Sweden. [An] important arena of success for the Kurds is sport. Dalkurd FF is a football club that was founded in 2004 and now plays in the third best football division in Sweden. Although it is a young club, it has become the biggest Swedish football club on Facebook. The Facebook page of Dalkurd’s supporters has more than 785,487 likes [as of 11 February 2015]. The name

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Dalkurd is interesting because it connects Kurdish identity with Dalarna, a region in Sweden. This indicates a transnational identity that links Sweden to Kurdistan but also regionalises Kurdish identity in Sweden. (Eliassi, 2015: 2)

The points raised by Eliassi are particularly interesting and relevant to the experience of young Kurds in London. Similarly, a football team mainly made up of young Kurds in Croydon, South London, is attempting to rebuild the community through sport (albeit not yet as successfully as Dalkurd in Sweden). Members of this football team in Croydon use the term Kurdish-Londoner to connect with other Kurds in different parts of London and to connect with London as their wider space. The team’s activities have also been underpinned by Kurdish diaspora politics, as they have used their team to gain the attention of a local member of parliament (MP) to help them raise political issues in the House of Commons in London concerning Kurds in Iraq. Along a similar line, Emanuelsson (2008), who studied Kurdish community organisations in Sweden, writes about ‘the constructive role of diaspora transnational political engagements’, which do not necessarily involve migrants wanting to return to their original homes. She further describes the newly emerged Kurdish diaspora communities in Sweden and in other parts of Europe as a potential force for democratic change and for positive social and economic development in the region: for example, through the Kurdish campaign in Europe for peace, and for improving the human rights of all Kurds in the Middle East. This positive and win-win thinking aims to turn a huge displacement ‘problem’ into a huge development ‘solution’, an interesting subject primarily for development studies (Emanuelsson, 2008: 144). Sweden remains a major country for hosting Kurdish refugees and like many other European nations a closed door refugee policy is on the horizon. Finland According to Toivanen (2014), there has recently been a considerable increase in the number of foreign-born citizens in Finland. She writes: ‘In late 2013, 5.4% of the total population living in Finland either had migrant parentage or had migrated in the last few decades, whereas the corresponding proportion of “persons of foreign background” in 1990 stood at 0.7%’ (Toivanen, 2014: 12). In her recent study of the Kurdish diaspora in Finland, Toivanen applies feminist intersectionality and personal

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narrative analysis approaches to gain a better understanding of the changing concept of home, thereby challenging an understanding of home as a geographical space for people such as the Kurds who now live in vast numbers in a transnational situation. Moreover, Toivanen (2014) uses thematic analysis to explain the differing experiences of members of the Kurdish diaspora in Finland, including reflecting on the position of the researcher, and explains: ‘I examine the intersecting attributes of gender, ethnicity, and age/generation in the analysis of young Kurds’ narrations. Furthermore, intersectionality is employed as a methodological tool for discussion and reflection upon researcher positionality’ (Toivanen, 2014: 17). Two strong methodological parallels can be drawn between this research in Finland and mine in London. Firstly, Toivanen, in a progressive move when compared to previous studies about Kurds in Finland and England (e.g. Wahlbeck, 1998a, 1999; Griffith, 2002), she looks at the second generation of Kurds in diaspora. Secondly, she shows awareness of her own position as a researcher. A major prior work on the Kurdish diaspora in Finland was a comparative study carried out by Wahlbeck (1998a, 1998b, 1999). In his work Wahlbeck is concerned with understanding the Kurdish social and transnational networks operating in both Finland and England. It is worth noting that van Bruinessen (2000), a prominent social anthropologist and an expert on Kurdish studies, set the theoretical tone for studying the Kurdish diaspora in Europe in the mid-1990s by using Anderson’s (2006) ‘imagined communities’ theory. Thus, Wahlbeck in Finland, as well as Faist (1999) in Germany, has been influenced by Anderson, and their primarily concern is with the establishment of transnational Kurdish ties and networks in Finland, Germany, and England. This type of pioneering work has laid the foundation for more work on the Kurdish diaspora such as, for example, the more recent study carried out by Toivanen (2014) in Finland, and coverage of the Kurds in Germany.7 England According to the Office for National Statistics (ONS) and the analysis of Census data, in 2011 there were 47,200 residents living in the London area who identified themselves as ethnic Kurds, but only 15,230 who identified Kurdish as their main spoken language.8 The Kurds themselves do not pay much attention to these figures and claim that the real figures could in fact be much higher. In order to validate their views, Kurds rely on the work of anthropologists who have studied diverse Kurdish

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communities in England. These studies, see Chap. 2, have concluded that the Kurds are not a homogenous social group, and that there are Kurds who identify themselves as Alevis and speak Zaza, as well as Yezidi Kurds who speak Kurdish language, but do not identify themselves as Kurds at all (van Bruinessen, 1992; Allison, 2001; Oglak & Hussein, 2016). According to new figures published by the BBC in 2015, a total of 8.6 million people live in London,9 speaking 100 different languages, which is represented across most London boroughs.10 The fact is that there is little known about other non-UK born minority groups, and indeed until recently very little was known about Kurdish diaspora community/ies in London. I looked at most of the major studies on the Kurdish diaspora in London include Tas (2013), Demir (2012), Galip (2012), Baser (2011), Holgate et  al. (2009), D’Angelo (2008), Enneli et  al. (2005), Bloch (2002a), Griffith (2002), Soguk (1999), and Wahlbeck (1999). These works will not be evaluated and discussed individually but considered in the context of integration in the following section on Kurdish diaspora integration in London. As Baser describes, ‘the Kurdish diaspora is not a homogenous entity’ (Baser, 2011: 8), and this assertion about the Kurdish diaspora’s cultural diversity is relevant and important for understanding integration and various behaviours displayed by the Kurds. Similarly, Tas (2013) who studies legal pluralism in Britain, describes the shift among some Kurds from their status as victims in the Middle East to actors. He writes: After three decades of living in their new home, Kurds in the UK have progressed from being a ‘victim diaspora’ into becoming more organised and capable of meeting the diverse needs of their community. [Some] UK-based Kurds refuse to use the official legal system to settle their disputes, at least initially. Instead, they prefer to resolve their disputes within the community, and for this purpose, they have recreated their own hybridised customary justice system, consisting of the Kurdish Peace Committee (KPC). (Tas, 2013:1)

Tas goes on to explain that the justification for some of the members of this group behaviour which stems from promoting and protecting Kurdish values and Kurdish ‘norms’, confirming what Baser (2011) stated previously about the heterogeneity and diversity of the Kurdish diaspora in England. Shedding light on the existence of this community-based legal practice within a specific part of the Kurdish diaspora community is useful,

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but this practice is not representative of or applicable to the wider and diverse Kurdish diaspora community/ies in London or England. Previous studies on the Kurdish diaspora in Britain (Wahlbeck, 1998a; Griffith, 2002) place a similar emphasis on the active role of Kurdish community organisations, especially those in North London where most members of the Kurdish diaspora live. According to Griffith (2002) and Wahlbeck (1999), different Kurdish community organisations in London have a dual and complementary role of preserving and promoting Kurdish culture, for example by organising the Newroz celebration (Kurdish New Year) on 21 March every year. Equally importantly, they help their members to settle successfully in London. However, only a minority of political activists still promote the ‘Kurdish village’ mentality in the middle of London, which understandably exists to compensate for the massive loss of Kurdish villages and small towns, especially in Turkey in the 1990s (Jongerden, 2007). The studies outlined above all seem to be driven primarily by policy and politics research and focus on the Kurds in England and mainly London as ‘others’ and a ‘minority group’ or ‘refugee group’. Although there is a clear tendency, for example in Wahlbeck’s approach, to move away from the more traditional and essentialist view of refugees’ ‘return’ to their ‘original’ country, the Kurds are not yet presented as new integrated British citizens, or as in a process of integration into London. This traditional semi-functionalist view becomes more evident in relation to Wahlbeck’s (1998a, 1998b, 1999), exclusively using group-centric methodology. For example, there is little or no mention of the role of individuals in making decisions and acting with agency with regard to integration. Neither is there a place for the second generation of Kurds who were born in London, let alone for the views of women, such as Kurdish mothers who work hard to integrate their families into British society. As has been discussed, in the minds of the Kurds, the concept of being part of a minority group in the Middle East is associated very closely with the imposition of new identities upon them since the 1920s. Thus, most Kurds resist the idea of being labelled as a minority group, because in the Kurdish mind, accepting the ‘minority’ label implies compromising their nationhood. Alinia (2004), who studied the Kurdish diaspora in Sweden, encountered similar problems to Wahlbeck (1998b) in London, and she writes: ‘Kurdish diaspora identity is not primarily constructed in opposition to the Swedish identity or Swedish society, but in opposition to the dominant national identities in the countries of origin’ (Alinia, 2004: 333).

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4.4   London and Londoners Introduction At Trafalgar Square, perhaps the best-known landmark in all of London, a young couple from Singapore are wearing smiles and woolly hats and having their photo taken in front of the fountains; school children whoop with delight as they feed the pigeons; a lone activist protests human rights violation against the Kurds Sandhu (2003: xvii).

In the early 1990s I often walked past Trafalgar Square in central London to go to my English language centre, an impressive old building opposite Green Park, called International House. This language centre encouraged the students to visit this lively square to practice speaking in English with tourists. Then, as homework, we had to compile a list of countries the tourists had come from and make some notes about what they said about their experience in London. A few years later, I extended this community-based exercise and enjoyed talking to many Londoners. My deep interest in listening to people’s stories formed a stepping stone for my interest in social anthropology, and helped with my successful admission to the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in 1993. Nearly three decades later in 2023, I still speak with tourists, migrants, and all sorts of Londoners, and, the truth is, I am even more excited and fascinated by London. It is not an exaggeration to claim that one can meet the world in London. This is because over centuries many people from different corners of this world have come and settled in this dynamic city, and all these different communities have contributed to making and remaking London, and becoming Londoners in turn. This complex and slow process of becoming Londoners could be much better understood by looking at the history of London. According to Migration Watch,11 which is a popular/populist public institution and pro tough immigration policies in Britain, the period before the Roman invasion of Britain is known as prehistory, and this is because there is little or no records available. Therefore, what is presented as the history of London starts with the Roman occupation around 2000 years ago. For a brief look at history of London I start with a new book published in 2021 entitled Black London by (Nanton & Burton, 2021), tracing black presence and black culture in London and it provides a useful timeline. Based on Black London, here it is a brief summary about some selected and significant past events:

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From Early to Recent Times The year 1492 provides a significant starting point with the Age of Enlightenment, which is also associated with the arrival of Christopher Columbus in the Caribbean, Cuba, and South America. This historic discovery marks the opening of the ‘New World’, now known as the Americas. In 1619, the first Africans were taken as slaves to the different colonies by Britain, including to Britain itself and to the Americas. In the mid-­ seventeenth century, the Huguenot12 refugees, who were persecuted for their Protestant beliefs, escaped France, and many came and settled in London. In the same period, in 1698, London was the leading port for slavery in Britain, followed by Bristol and Liverpool. In the 1760s, the Georgian era, the population of black Londoners was between 10,000 and 15,000, and in 1833 the Victorian Slavery Abolition Act was passed (Nanton & Burton, 2021: 5). In the nineteenth century, London became a magnet for trade and a hub in Europe for the development of modern industries, effectively hosting the Industrial Revolution.13 Furthermore, as explained in Black London, in 1900 the first Pan-African Conference was held in London, which was followed by a race riot in 1919 in London as well as some other cities in Britain. Between 1938 and 1945 many people from Africa and Asia enlisted and fought with the Allied Forces in the Second World War (WW2), and in June 1948, HMT Empire Windrush arrived in Britain bringing Caribbean migrants to help in the rebuilding of post-war Britain. In 1958 in Notting Hill, a popular uprising took place against the black population in London, and since 1959 most Londoners commemorate and counter this dreadful attack each summer with a celebration of cultural diversity in London by organising a huge, colourful, and vivid community event known as the Notting Hill Carnival.14 In 1996 Nelson Mandela, the late South African President, visited Brixton in South London and met the Lawrence family, who had lost their 18-year-old son Stephen in a racist attack in 1993 while waiting in a bus stop in Eltham in southeast London.15 Most recently, in 2018 Prince Harry married Meghan Markle and this union created a high-profile platform, for a renewed discussion about race in Britain and beyond. This famous couple eventually said their goodbye to the formalities of living within the walls of the British royal palaces, and now live with their mixed-race children in the USA. Furthermore about BAME success and high-profile stories in Britain, in 2015 Nadiya Hussain,16

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from Bangladeshi diaspora, won the British bake off competition and later made the queen’s 90th birthday cake; in 2019 Bernardine Evaristo, a black woman, won the Booker Prize for literature (Nanton & Burton, 2021); and in September 2021 Emma Raducanu, from an immigrant family living in Bromley-South London, won the women’s singles; in the US Open tennis championships,17 and she helped to re-create a similar positive mood as Mo Farah did in the Olympics Games in London in 2012, about migrant’s contribution especially to British sports.18 Another, most recent example is a Kurdish refugee success story, that is the appointment of Mr Nadhim Zahawi19 to the position of chancellor of exchequer on 5 July 2022, and regardless of his politics, this Iraqi-Kurdish refugee achievement is widely celebrated by the Kurdish diaspora in London. Moreover, in a comprehensive study about the history of immigrants to Britain, Winder (2004) describes the Huguenot weavers who arrived in the 1650s, the Indian shopkeepers and South African dentists who arrived in the 1950s, the Polish fighter pilots and Jamaican fishermen who arrived in the 1960s, the refugee orphans, and Russian aristocrats all under one single category as ‘bloody foreigners’. He also suggests that the term ‘British’ should be used as a political umbrella to embrace and encourage different communities to feel included and equal and their contributions valued (Winder, 2004). It seems that this idea, although very positive in principle, has its roots in defining citizenship and the common values that all British citizens should accept. This made-in-Britain idea developed further in the 1980s under a Tory government, and some critiques would argue that the Tory values of individualism and consumerism at their core cannot be imposed on others of different political persuasions and from different cultures. In practice, the flexibility and complexity of multiculturalism still has its dynamism in both uniting and dividing the people and the scholars alike (Winder, 2004: 7). From this brief look at the history of London, it is clear that refugee and migrant communities have arrived in London at different times, from different places, and for different purposes. A key point to consider, though, is that migration stories are essentially our individual or group’s real stories: they are different from each other. These stories are sometimes conflicting or complementary and they are essential for us to hear in order to make sense of ongoing changes in our cosmopolitan cities. The stories are specific to people’s age, gender, skills, education, and place of origin; thus, they should be read in that context, and in relation to specific times, the attitude of host communities and government policies. In line with the social constructivist approach that

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has influenced and guided the direction of this book, I argue that an effective methodological and a good ethical practice requires looking at archive materials as well as to listening to ongoing individual and collective host communities and migrant’s stories. Some populist observers see and think of migrants as numbers, and some politicians who follow them wish to control this number; but the voices of migrants should be heard, in order to see how much human movements have contributed to shaping the modern Britain and London, and how much migrants themselves have changed in the process. For example, as Grant (2019) describes in his book about the lived experience and voice of the Windrush generation from the Caribbean who arrived in England on 22 June 1948: ‘West Indians saw Britain as the motherland; they felt awed, privileged, and protected by it, and were keen to “do their bit” in the fight against Hitler’ (Grant, 2019: 3). More Recent Times In 2023, London continues to be seen as a home or a new home for many different cultures and new migrant and refugee groups. For some migrants, their previous cultural identity becomes a former or ‘back home’ identity, and for those who were born in London, their original identity is often referenced to their parents’ or grandparents’ identity(ies). As described above, within this complex historical context, the term ‘Londoner’ is used to describe the implication and relevance of the social constructivist paradigm, effectively considering both continuity and change, that is, by combining London’s history with London’s current and existing multicultural realities. Moreover, and following the flexible and subtle cultural identity analysis approach advocated by Stuart Hall (1996b), I argue, studying London’s history and present voices of migrants continues to provide a dynamic and useful method for understanding the intrinsic relationship between historic waves of human movements (Ata, 2021) which in turn would help us to appreciate the notion of fluidity and the plurality of identity in a super-diverse city such as London. The major waves of migrants to London which followed the Windrush generation from the 1950s include Polish, Indians, Pakistanis, Bangladeshis, Vietnamese, Jews, Armenians, people from the Commonwealth countries, Hispanics, Chinese; then, in the 1990s the Arabs, Turkish, Iranians, Kurds, Somalis, Afghans, and many others; and a new wave from Europe, especially from 2000 until the political completion of the Brexit on 31 January 2020.

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As described, migrants have come in different times and via different routes, some are completely new, and some joined their already established communities; however, your routes did not and does not matter in London, because as Joseph (2011) quotes from historian Peter Ackroyd, ‘London refuses nobody’ (Joseph, 2011: 103). Having emphasised London’s capacity for attracting and accepting migrants from different corners of world, England’s close neighbour Ireland is notably the source of the largest minority community in London (Jackson, 1962), and they identify themselves strongly as Irish, alongside the Scottish and the Welsh from within the nations of the United Kingdom (UK). Therefore, it is no exaggeration to call London representing a true mosaic of cultures, a great cosmopolitan city, and a successful world city. To counterbalance this viewpoint, Migration Watch20 argues against this claim that the UK is a nation of migrants. Instead, the Migration Watch suggest that mass migration is a new and a post-WW2 phenomenon and especially dislikes the open-door immigration policies of the Labour government (1997–2007) and the huge increase of the level of net migration, especially from Europe, during that period; an argument which later picked up by the supporters of the Brexit. More on Migration and Integration In most recent studies, the term integration, as described by McPherson (2010), has been used positively to refer to the successful settlement of migrants and refugees in host countries, and this interpretation has been used throughout this book. Others, like Hall (1996b), use the term acculturation in the context of the multicultural debate. The integration debate in Britain has a long and interesting history, which is closely linked to debates about multiculturalism. For example, as Joppke (2004) vividly describes, ‘when Robin Cook, Britain’s Foreign Minister under the first Blair government, declared that “chicken tikka masala” now rivalled “fish and chips” as Britons’ favourite dish, wasn’t this a sign that the “plural” model had already arrived?’ (Runnymede Trust 2000: 48). A few years later, however, and following the race riots in Bradford and the publication of the Cantle Report in 2001, Britain’s move ‘beyond multiculturalism’ was rigorously pursued by Labour Home Secretary David Blunkett, who in his first years in office broke virtually all the taboos that had sealed Britain’s etiquette-conscious race relations

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scene from the ‘honest and robust debate’ called for in the Cantle Report. (Joppke, 2004: 13)

The key to unlocking the political dimensions of the new debate on integration, multiculturalism, and now super-diversity (Vertovec, 2010) is to understand what happened after the tragic events of 9/11 in New York City (Malik, 2013), and, a few months before that, in July 2001, the riots in Bradford and other northern English towns and cities, which helped to heighten existing tensions between Muslim and White communities in those areas (Alexander, 2004). The social and economic marginalisation of the Asian and Muslim communities has been discussed by Amin (2003), and as he states in Unruly Strangers? ‘The thrust of the argument is to argue that the riots should be read in terms of the mature claim of a section of British society for recognition as fully-fledged citizens of a multi-­ ethnic and multicultural society rather than as claims of ethnic recognition alone’ (Amin, 2003: 10). In addition to academic interest in and studies relating to the complex causes and consequences of the British riots in 2001, an important public enquiry and report followed (Cantle, 2001), which concluded that Muslim and White communities have lived ‘parallel’ lives and they have been segregated from each other (Amin, 2003: 11). Some Concluding Remarks About London The history of London demonstrates the gradual development, complexity, and multifaceted nature of multicultural living and debates in this great city. Still, the integration debate in classrooms, living rooms, and in public spaces in London can often offer a dividing or uniting line within different communities. I argue, to speak frankly and fairly about London one should consider the views and attitudes of all local communities (both host and new communities), look at government policies, and study the real events. There has been some significant mass immigration into Britain in the past with mixed responses and experiences, for example, Irish immigrants, Jewish and Armenian refugees who have settled successfully, and most recently the Afghans following the dreadful events that happened in Afghanistan in August 202121 who have not settled yet. In the past, there has also been strong hostility and sometimes violence against Black and Asian communities, for example the Nottingham riots (1958), the Brixton riots (1981), and the Bradford riots (2001). Although riots, violence, and parallel living do exist between and among communities in London, at the

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same time London has often risen to deal with old and new challenges. It is true to say that London continues to celebrate its cultural diversity. For example, the current Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, is a living example of acceptance by the majority of Londoners, and he is a successful and powerful role model for inclusive politics in London. Since he was elected to the City Hall in 2016, we have seen an increase in positive attention given to the celebration of multiculturalism of London.22 Some see this ‘super-­ diversity’ (Vertovec, 2007) as London’s success story in terms of having managed to attract new skills and new money into the city, whereas others would disagree, and argue that London and Britain are less cohesive because of mass immigration. The Brexit referendum in June 2016 and the subsequent withdrawal of Britain from the European Union (EU) in January 2020 are historic indications that most British people voted for fewer immigrants, but London voted to stay in the EU; this is partly because London attracts newcomers to become Londoners. In October 2021 in the Conservative Party Conference, Boris Johnson, the current British prime minster, in his keynote speech admitted the disparity of access to opportunities in Britain, and, in the best single line of his speech, said that talents are equally distributed but not opportunities, referring to the North/South structural divide in Britain,23 and the fact is most immigrants are largely wealth creators, therefore part of a solution, and they do their best to integrate and continue to contribute and largely feel an integral part of the British society. However, based on a new report about citizenship in Britain, there have been much government talks about integration, but less in the way of positive and systematic actions.24

4.5  Explaining the Concept of ‘Kurdish-­Londoner’: I Wish to Belong and to Be Equal in London The focus of this section is a specific inquiry concerning Kurdish diaspora community/ies and their integration experiences in London. Based on empirical data collected for this study (see Table 5.2), the concept of the Kurdish-Londoner is used to suggest a close and localised association of the Kurdish community with London, reflecting a relatively new construction of new Kurdish homemaking and ideas of belonging in London. As Malkki has stated, ‘the idea of a natural link between people and place has rightly been questioned’ (Malkki, 1992: 34). Thus, the Kurds who live in

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London have managed over time to establish a new real home for themselves while still holding onto their memories of Kurdistan (their old home). The term Kurdish-Londoner in this study articulated mainly, though not exclusively, by young Kurds who were born in the UK. The idea of London as a home for Kurds has also been supported by many of the first generation of Kurdish refugees. However, many older Kurds show a degree of scepticism about ever wanting to fully integrate or belong to any society outside Kurdistan. One thing must be clarified though: the concept of the Kurdish-Londoner, and London as a new ‘home’, should not be confused with ‘belonging’ to Britain or becoming British which is perhaps a wider question for most people from BAME groups. In some previous studies about the Kurds in London Ager and Strang’s (2008); Griffith’s (2002) and Wahlbeck’s (1999), the central analytical point has often been group behaviour and community organisation, and there has been a clear tendency to ignore the rich and complex lived experiences of individual members, which, as this book shows, can offer a more radical insight into questions of cultural identity and social history. The issue of the fluidity of identity of being a Kurd and a Londoner and how these terms come together in being a Kurdish-Londoner seems to be lost in some earlier and policy-oriented studies. Moreover, Kurdish national identity is strongly associated with a demand for political recognition, which is closely linked with Kurdistan as an imagined Kurdish homeland and as an abstract form and utopian destination; and it has been reconstructed within the diaspora. This utopian ideal is sometimes challenged by those who are able to commute to the Kurdish area in Northern Iraq and witness how this area has now been governed through nepotism by the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) over the past two decades. As described by Hassan (2015), the plan of returning to Kurdistan has in the past ten years shifted from returning to commuting between London and still developing Kurdish area in Iraq. Moreover, there are also some active voices in support of returning and reclaiming what they had left behind, and thereby contributing to the rebuilding rather than complaining: ‘Well, we need to be in Kurdistan to help to rebuild our country. I do not like throwing stones from afar’ (Sakar, Focus Group 3). However, as explained above, ‘the growing insecurity and lack of expected progress [has] led to more commuting rather than returning to the Kurdish area under the KRG’ (Hawar, Focus Group meeting at Birkbeck College, March 2015). Moreover, the Kurdish diaspora’s nationalist narrative has also been reflected strongly within Kurdish novels. Some Kurdish novelists live, for

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example, in Sweden and Germany, but the Kurdish characters exhibit resilience and seeking freedom not in Sweden or in Germany but in Kurdistan (Galip, 2012). Thus, it is logical and understandable that diaspora studies use trans-border citizenship as an analytical tool to make sense of a new global world. This book, however, attempts to challenge fixed group labelling, in betweenness and even the concept of multiculturalism in Britain when used to implicitly justify inequalities and existing gaps between so-called mainstream and BAME and refugee groups. This book is based on original testimonies from nearly a hundred Kurdish individuals who have helped to articulate the new concept of the Kurdish-Londoner. This self-definition stands principally for assuring Kurdish cultural continuity while also embracing change. The positive change involves an expression of citizenship as a Londoner, and more importantly it embraces the ambition of belonging, being counted, and being seen as equals in London. Moreover, and as emerged clearly in the in-depth interviews, there is a fine line and a dilemma between making a new home in the host society and belonging; as a retired Kurdish teacher explained: One can learn English, work, earn a living, and get a British passport, but what about the attitude of the host society? For example, in a casual ­conversation and over a cup of a tea they [the English] always ask you that Darwinian question where are you from ‘originally’. Now my experience has shown to me that the definition of ‘home’ could be flexible, but the question of ‘origin’ is not flexible or negotiable. This means you will never be fully accepted to this society or they allow you to belong to this country, simply because of having a different race or origin, this is my idea or better says my dilemma for belonging to Britain. (Mamosta, July 2013)

In many more semi-structured interviews and several Kurdish public meetings in London, an interesting pattern of positive thinking and realism emerged, which reinforced the articulation of the term Kurdish-­ Londoner. This term was then used in three subsequent conferences and has been used throughout this book. The translation of the term ‘Kurdish Londoner’ from the Kurdish Kordi-London is very straightforward, and most participants in community meetings and follow-up interviews in London did not hesitate to use the term. Here, I am including a reflective field note that the chairperson handed to me at the end of a three hours long focus group meeting (August 2013) with Kurdish university students

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in London, and I have changed and paraphrased it for more clarity, and it reads: We [Kurds] are trying to think hard and think clearly about the origin of our forced migration and displacement. This is to see through the depths of our history and search for our identity at the same time. Still, after all this discussion the question is, what are we looking for? And what do we want to achieve? Honestly, in our case we are talking about a history of a region [the Middle East], where still most Kurds live, die, are displaced, disappeared, assimilated, oppressed, fight, fall down and rise up again. The whole region of the Middle East seems like an open prison for most people living there but more so for the Kurds (who still have no effective and progressive internal political national strategy) and we are also trapped between several bad states, and between our wiled imaginations and harsh realities. This region has been an open playground for international powers who are interested in oil and sell arms behind closed doors. We are witnessing a historical and an ongoing ugly game between big international and regional powers. We know all this, and we are powerless to stop it. But we must keep arguing and trying for justice, peace and equality for Kurds. One big thing is that we [Kurds] lack any political unity. We are united in silence and we are used to waiting but hopefully not to passivity. This great city, London, is now our home, and our children should attempt to build bridges between London and Kurdistan, and then they would be more successful to create win-win situation for London and for Kurdistan as Kurdish-Londoners.

In most policy-oriented studies, the Kurds are still classified as a fixed refugee group in London, but this bureaucratic labelling of the Kurds as refugees fails to explain the dynamic and changing nature of identity beyond the boundaries of the nation-state. Bringing more clarity to the discussion about the cultural identity of people uprooted from their original dwelling places, Malkki (1995) writes that they are suddenly viewed as someone else, for example labelled as a refugee and placed within reductionist legal or academic boxes: The implicit functionalism of much work in ‘refugee studies’ is especially clear when one is dealing with questions of identity, culture, ethnicity, and ‘tradition’. Again, and again, one finds in this literature the assumption that to become uprooted and removed from a national community is automatically to lose one’s identity, traditions, and culture. (Malkki, 1995: 508)

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The contribution made by Malkki is very much in line with that discussed in the late 1980s, when refugee studies slowly moved away, to a large extent, from semi-functionalism and from labelling approaches (Zolberg et al., 1989). Another positive shift in emphasis took place when refugee studies academics started seeing refugees as actors and not merely as victims of circumstances. This shift from victim to actor was also recorded much later by a Kurdish scholar Khayati (2008), who studied the Kurdish diaspora in Sweden and France. In considering the integration experiences of the Kurdish diaspora in London, and in order to understand the singularity of London as a ‘super-diverse’ city, it is useful to refer back to the literature, and specifically to comparative studies between Finland and England (London), as well as studies focused on the Kurdish diaspora in Germany and Sweden. Comparatively speaking, it is very clear that London as a ‘super-diverse’ city is quite unique in Britain, and it probably stands out as a major and positive model of multiculturalism in Europe. London provides accommodation and opportunities for people from most parts of the world, including Kurdish and Somali refugees (Griffith, 2002). Defining super-diversity, the Centre on Migration, Policy, and Society (COMPAS) at the University of Oxford wrote in a 2015 briefing document: Super-diversity is a term increasingly used in both academic and policy literature to indicate not only ethnic diversity, but diversity across a range of interacting indices, including country of origin, language, religion, migration channel, and immigration status, gender, age, and generation. (COMPAS 2015)25

Although COMPAS attempts to provide a comprehensive definition of super-diversity with respect to London, it still lacks a definition of integration between different cultures and of the existence of inequalities in London. I am also concerned with meaningful integration and fair access to London’s resources for all of London’s different communities and citizens. I am particularly looking at the place and role of individuals to act and to make decisions, whether and how to integrate, and, equally importantly, considering the role of British state policies with regard to integration from day one, for example, with regard to refugee reception, housing, health, training, and employment (Bloch 2002b; Sales, 2002). It is therefore fair to say that studying Kurdish diaspora integration in London is as much about London and British policies as it is about Kurdish diaspora

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living and working in London. Another positive point to make is that in the absence of helpful state policies, it is the community groups with limited resources that usually attempt to fill the gap and undertake the complex tasks involved in helping their members with integration, at least initially, by providing basic advice and information to help newcomers (Wahlbeck, 1999). There are well over a hundred large and small Kurdish community organisations, charities, art groups, student societies, and political associations in London (a full list is available from the Kurdistan Regional Government London website). With respect to the dynamic relationship between Kurdish individuals and groups, Kurdish refugee community organisations in London help their members to construct or even reconstruct their political and cultural identity. This is particularly true for those Kurds who have come from Turkey. Griffith (2002) has described the ongoing tension between Kurds and parts of the Turkish community in North London, and the emphasis is on ‘the importance of ethnic identity for refugee studies, as such identities are frequently central to the experience of migrant groups and can influence processes of resettlement and adaptation in a host society’ (Griffith, 2002: 29). This interplay and mutual cultural interest between group and individual is central to maintaining the political identity of the group, as well as the cultural identity of the individual. Furthermore, Griffith (2002) indicates that most Kurdish individuals attend community meetings for both cultural and political reasons. Nonetheless, their long-term goal is to benefit from an established sympathetic community network, especially in the early stages of integration, bearing in mind the lack of interest or adequate policies to help refugee integration by successive British governments since the 1990s. This observation runs counter to what is perceived to be the norm for people from a particular refugee or minority group or culture, which is to stay fixed within their group forever. This book argues that refugee integration starts from day one, and that this integration is ultimately an individual decision and action from the time of arrival. Integration is a slow and complex process, and it is often difficult for the people involved (Bloch, 2002a, 2002b; Sales, 2002). The process of integrating into a new society has been described by Appadurai (1996) as a process of changing and becoming. However, the British state’s refugee policies do not reflect this positive and productive process and, in contrast, policies relating to refugees usually show a degree of reluctance to recognise this process and to provide efficient support. Despite all these, ‘often the state and part of the media do blame refugees for not wanting to

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integrate’ (Refugee Council Annual General Meeting 2014). Nonetheless, and against the odds, refugees do use all the community resources available to them and make the most of a difficult situation, survive and prosper over time, and even start to become imaginative and creative. A Kurdish writer who contributed to this study describes the act of writing as a negotiation between self and group and between host society and his memories of his homeland; in other words, a journey between present and past: I am writing to return to my homeland with my words and living with my memories to fill in a gap and enlightening me to look forward to my future in London. Hoping to regain, hoping to belong and hoping to reach out beyond existing borders. (Nakaroz, Interview, September 2014)

Looking back at field work notes I reflected on my own role as a refugee, which is often overlooked by studies on the Kurdish diaspora. I like, many other migrants, refugees lost my home as a place or country also gradually lost the political ideology that led me to become a refugee in the first place. I know from experience that all refugees need to choose from a range of options, depending on new circumstances in the host country: Option 1: Gain a new ideology/make a new home, change/adapt, and live your life, and move on; Option 2: Live in limbo and in between two cultures for much longer and delay your own progress. However, not everyone fit in even within the above two broad categories: as a young Kurdish refugee put it, integration is about whether you are wanted or unwanted by the host society: You are not born in this world to be disadvantaged and live in the margin; but because you are a migrant, refugee, or born to refugee parent(s) you are unwanted. (Paywand, age 19, from his letter asking his social worker for help in South London, June 2013)

I was moved by the depth and wide-ranging contributions from young people to this study, and the ways in which they described the gaps in understanding the younger generation by both their parents and by the mainstream society. For example, an illustration of young people’s quest

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for belonging and negotiating their acceptance in classrooms was their hard work to prove that they are better at mathematics to compensate for their poor English, and also forming a strong peer group, and try to play better football in the playground in order to avoid being bullied. Some young Kurds shared another interesting observation: ‘if you are from a minority group, you are expected to work harder at school, but the diversity, vitality and creativity of individuals tends to go unnoticed’ (Sham, interview, May 2013). Griffith, who studied Kurds and Somalis in London, confirms Sham’s concern, and explains a deeper shortcoming of labelling refugees and affectively undermining the role human agency: ‘A routine criticism of labelling theory is that it underplays the role of individual motivation, focusing instead on the process of designation from above’ (Griffith, 2002: 37).

4.6  The Integration Process: Diaspora Identities First Generation In the focus group meetings I organised, I noticed that the attention of members of the Kurdish diaspora in London was often divided between two homes (Wahlbeck, 1999; Griffith, 2002; Holgate et al., 2009; Demir, 2012; Galip, 2012; Tas, 2013). Linking this to the typology described earlier about (origin, return, and integration diaspora), this book argues that the integration debate is more than merely a reflection of what the British state wants to happen to new migrants and refugees through their introduction of various policies. The reality of settlement in a new country is much more complex. The integration or acculturation of different people, for example in London, and it should be studied and understood as a dynamic social process involving transformation and the negotiation of identity. As Appadurai (1996) puts it, refugee integration is a slow process of emplacement and becoming almost a new or different person over time and potentially also results in people engaging with multiple identities and loyalties. With reference to the use of auto-ethnography as part of my methodology, I offer a brief synopsis of my encounter with my host city to start the discussion about social integration. I studied for my BA in social anthropology and development studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) between 1993 and 1997. I slowly started to question the Eurocentrism in the study of developing countries such as Iran; and in London I became aware that I had entered a new world of more

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complex, competing, and complementing positionalities, for example as a parent, a student, a foreigner, a refugee and member of the diaspora, a Labour movement activist, a British citizen, and ultimately a Londoner. I looked at postmodern theories and approaches, and I developed new ways of thinking and re-thinking socio-political questions and issues and started to look for some new and exciting ideas of social change. For example, I examined and admired Stuart Hall (1996a), who vividly described his academic criticism of modernism and Marxism, such as positivism and essentialism. Following and paraphrasing Hall, I slowly created more choices for myself from within the panorama of postmodern thought. Moving on from old theories of modernity that searched, often unsuccessfully, for reason and universal truths! Therefore, the emphasis of this book; and as in Mary Klages’26 discussion of postmodernism, the focus is on the individual stories and mini-narratives that help to explain ‘small practices, local events, rather than large-scale universal or global concepts’ (Klages, 2012: 1). However, this does not imply a rejection of Kurdish history and the collective memories of group displacement and struggles, and group identity. All the major events of Kurdish displacement have been set out in order to highlight the context of unequal power relationships between the Kurds and their immediate neighbours, who formed new nation-states with the direct support provided by the international powers and under the auspices of the League of Nations after WW1 (McDowall, 2010). With respect to individual mini-narratives and the active and creative role of individuals with regard to cultural identity, Song (2003), who has written about Black-British and Asian-American people also declaring their self-identities, talks about the importance and centrality of agency and choice for individuals in relation to their own cultural identity. This centrality of human agency is clear in the empirical data I collected and thus reflected in the articulation of the radical concept of Kurdish-Londoner for two reasons: 1. As a statement of the formation of a new self-identity resulting from experiences of forced displacement and living in exile or in a transnational situation. 2. The Kurds have reached a position where they wish to be counted, recognised, respected, and considered as equal citizens within British society.

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This is a contrasting and corrective measure with regard to the negative experiences that the Kurds had in their original countries that they left behind. According to Bozarslan (2014), the Kurds still suffer discrimination and are widely marginalised in the Middle East, even today. In some of the previous literature about the Kurdish diaspora in London, much of the emphasis has been on the politicisation and mobilisation of the Kurds in London. Another important feature of diaspora life is the link with the country of origin, which underpins the traditional definition of diaspora, and this aspect has been investigated and scrutinised in great detail and at length in the case of Kurds in London (Wahlbeck, 1999; Griffith, 2002). The problem is the other half of the story of the Kurdish diaspora, that is their settlement and positive integration experience and their new homemaking in London, has remained almost untouched. The Kurdish case is therefore a perfect case to demonstrate migrants’ quest to rebuild and start the process of integration and the transformation of identity within diaspora groups. Developing and applying the small-scale narratives and citizenship model for a better understanding of the creative role of Kurdish individuals in the diaspora, Galip (2012), who studies Kurdish novelists’ discourse, states: Linguistic diversity and the lack of political and national unity have not only shaped the fragmented character of Kurdish novelistic discourse but have also forced the displacement and voluntary migration westwards of many Kurds in search of freedom. (Galip, 2012: 8)

It is therefore clear that the Kurds, far from being only victims, although politically divided, have been organising themselves to resist marginalisation, assimilation, and victimhood as part of their collective struggle. The Kurds have faced displacement in the Middle East, and many have sought refuge, safety, security, and freedom in Europe, as suggested by Galip (2012). In a new study, Keles (2015) has looked at the first, second, and third generations of Kurdish and Turkish populations in Europe. This timely work demonstrates the different dynamics of migration and settlement processes in each European country with respect to their policies towards migrants and refugees. It also offers an analysis and new insights into the construction of Kurdish diaspora identity and the use and role of Kurdish digital media and Kurdish social networks within this complex system. Integration is a slow process, but as Rozh explains, it really starts from the first day of arrival, and the refugee self-help groups that help

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people when they first arrive. Rozh, a Kurdish mother and integration advocate, explains: Since the beginning of [the] 1990s the Kurds in London have started several centres to help themselves, even with our little knowledge about our rights, integration policies and about relevant services. I was one of the leaders of this community centres, and I knew that we couldn’t wait for the local council. So, our community helped newcomers to start settling in London from day one and without much help from the local council. (Rozh, interview May 2013)

Second Generation Some scholars suggest that the second generation of Kurds is far more interested in Kurdish identity and Kurdish politics than their parents. The Kurdish diaspora is at its highest numerically in Germany, and it has attracted the most research. For example, Curtis (2005), who studied the Kurdish diaspora in Germany, looked into the changing dynamism of different social categories and identified various categories including ‘the second generation, hybrid Kurds, euro Kurds’ (Curtis, 2005: 12). Similarly, in Sweden, Eliassi (2015), who studied Kurdish diaspora experience, describes the shift from ‘Kurdish’ (ethnicity) to ‘Kurdistani’ (nationality), especially with respect to the young Kurds from different parts of Kurdistan who use social media platforms such as Facebook to construct a national identity that their parents were denied in the Middle East, especially in Turkey (Eliassi, 2015: 2). I spoke with eleven young Kurds in South London my primary concern was to understand their expectation and plans for the future, including those who were born in London and those who came to London as unaccompanied refugee children. Starting on a positive note, this is what one of a group of eleven young Kurdish refugees told me: I came to London when I was 14, in this city you can eventually find a social space for yourself. With friends, we recently started a football team and we are supported by the local sport center. We feel belonging to our community as well as to London, and we are grateful and like this city very much for accommodating all of us. (Shar, focus group meeting, South London, September 2014)

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It was a lively discussion and exchanges, and seemed like a small party, I asked about their occupation and education and found out that three of the participants had completed their university education, four worked with relatives doing hard manual labour in bakeries, in fruit markets, or at a car wash in various locations across London. The remaining four were classified as Not in Employment, Education or Training (NEET). The British government keeps statistics about young people doing almost nothing formal in their daily life, and the NEET figures are published regularly by the British government.27 One can immediately see the mixed fortune of most young Kurds, who nonetheless collectively feel positive about London while some being left out of the system thereby fitting into the NEET category. Despite the problems facing young Kurds, there is still generally more optimism in their minds, for example, in another face-­ to-­face meeting in North London of a young Kurdish professional with a university degree working within the National Health Service (NHS) described his own understanding of and feelings about the concept of being a Kurdish-Londoner: I would describe my identity as Kurdish-Londoner. By Kurdish-Londoner I understand a Kurdish person who identifies himself or herself both as somebody of Kurdish ethnicity, but equally feeling that he or she is emotionally, socially as part of London. Almost inseparable, probably feeling both identities are close to my heart. (Nur, interview letter, November 2015)

Living in London has also changed the dynamism of Kurdish families considerably. Among these changes is the new leading role of Kurdish mothers, who link-up the family with schools, social services, housing, and health centres. Kurdish girls have benefitted from this female empowerment at home, with more and more Kurdish girls completing statutory schooling and many attending universities in recent years. After university, many now carry out highly skilled graduate-level work in London. In a mixed focus group meeting in North London, most fathers admitted that they did not know the name or location of their children’s school, while the mothers knew exactly how many bus stops there were from home to school. Mothers also knew the names of the teachers, the head teacher, and the caretaker of the school. The meeting concluded that it was the mothers who attended school events, including parents’ evenings. Sometimes the Kurdish mothers forced the schools to bring in

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professional interpreters to help them to communicate with the school about the progress of their children and discuss relevant issues at parent’s evenings. Moreover, discussing the typical challenges faced by Kurdish families who live in the London Borough of Hackney, Rozh, a Kurdish mother, commented on the different and difficult role of most Kurdish fathers she knew in London, explaining in a strong tone of voice: Most Kurdish fathers I know did not have enough time or chance to see their children during the week, because they are often working from 11 am to 11 pm [12 hours] most days. So, when the kids go to school in the morning, the fathers are asleep, and when the fathers come back home from late night work, the kids are obviously asleep. In fact, both parents are very busy and often have no quality time for each other or for their kids. Most Kurdish kids struggle with their school homework and there is no one at home who could help them. They lag behind at school and parents do not always notice, and it is unfair. (Rozh, focus group meeting, North London August 2013) (see Table 5.2)

4.7  Conclusion In this section, the core of the academic debate and the paradigm shift within Kurdish diaspora studies from traditional ‘victim’ to ‘actor’ has been developed as it was introduced by Khayati (2008) in Sweden. This shift emphasises the role of refugee agency, which was influenced by prior academic and policy development within refugee studies, where the issue of refugees returning to their original country is no longer a defining feature in the refugee and diaspora discourse, and the issue of social integration and citizenship in a new country has become more relevant. In London, some major research has looked at diaspora in the light of social capital theory and the creation of social networks, and with reference to the establishment of several effective Kurdish community organisations in London in the 1990s. However, the primary focus of most researchers has remained on exploring the active relationship between the Kurdish diaspora and the country of origin (Wahlbeck, 1999; Griffith, 2002; D’Angelo, 2008; Demir, 2012; Galip, 2012; Keles, 2015). It has been argued that modern diaspora is perceived as involving the experience of exile and crossing the geographical territory of one nation-state to enter another. Historically speaking, the movements of people from one country to another and their settlement are defined as migration. It is common to

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refer to modern countries such as the USA as nations of immigrants.28 The same is true for New Zealand, Australia, and Canada, but some observers won’t put Britain in the same boat and argue that migration to Britain is a post-WW2 phenomenon. This century is indeed the age of human mobility and increased travel opportunities, with many people now willing to cross different nation-state borders, take risks, and to travel short and long distances for safety and security and to gain better chances in life. In recent decades the mixed movement of both forced and voluntary migration has been described by Castles et al. (2005) as the age of migration. What distinguishes diaspora people from other migrants is their strong desire to build a new home in the host country and also their willingness to maintain a complex relationship with the country of origin. The issue of territory, both geographically real and ‘imagined’, as described by Anderson (2006), becomes part of the debate rather than an essential part of diaspora identity. People’s behaviour and identity have become central and again, as described by Clifford (1994), some anthropologists refer to diaspora as people with a new identity but without a country. This description might well explain the Kurdish diaspora experience and their own selfdefinition of ‘statelessness’ (statelessness in a political sense because most Kurds consider themselves to be part of a nation). All these issues have also come to the fore in many studies carried out among the Kurds in Germany, Sweden, and Finland. Following Edward Said (2001), who in his reflection on exile describes the two questions of history and identity as inextricably linked for forced migrants. This book has adopted the same epistemology by looking at both the history of Kurdish forced migration and Kurdish diaspora identity. In this context, access to and use of digital communications has made it possible to communicate and connect with people’s original places. Many studies in Europe demonstrate that the Kurdish diaspora is very much an imagined, a digital, and a real diaspora, and as explained by Eliassi (2015), some Kurdish migrants express a positive Kurdish identity through sport and political solidarity with pan-­Kurdistan movements in Europe, and indeed in other parts of the globe where a sizable population of Kurds lives; again, this is thanks to the use of digital technology which makes speedy communications possible. In London, the articulation of the concept of the Kurdish-Londoner is also part of the same diaspora’s characteristic of gaining multiple identities and loyalties to at least two different countries. It is noticeable that young Kurds use the term Kurdish-Londoner with relative ease, but avoid using the term British as part of their identity for political and emotional reasons. Most Kurds generally do like London

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and feel at home in this cosmopolitan city. The Kurdish diaspora’s composition, experience, and situations in Germany (Østergaard-Nielsen, 2003; Curtis, 2005), Sweden (Alinia, 2004; Khayati, 2008; Eliassi, 2015), and Finland (Toivanen, 2014) are different, as discussed above; and it is important to consider the cultural diversity and heterogeneity of the Kurds, as well as the socio-­political context in other European cities. Lastly, the dual social and political orientation and the usage of the term Kurd in different contexts should be considered for better understanding of the evolving Kurdish diaspora identity(ies).

Notes 1. https://www.google.co.uk/#q=kurdish+studies+network 2. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jan/30/kurdish-­women-­ died-­kobani-­isis-­syria 3. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-­europe-­34175795 4. https://ffvt.net/de/about 5. Bahar Baser, a fellow at Coventry University: https://theconversation.com/turkish-­kurdish-­conflict-­spills-­over-­into-­ europe. Around four million migrants from Turkey live elsewhere in Europe. Some are Turks and some Kurds, and they usually share the same neighbourhoods. 6. http://www2.valentin.uu.se/information/kurddiaspora.html 7. https://www.kurdistan24.net/en/stor y/25672-­S everal-­K urdish­candidates-­to-­participate-­in-­Germany%27s-­federal-­election 8. http://www.nomisweb.co.uk/census/2011/QS204EW/view/2013 265927?cols=measures 9. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-­england-­london-­31082941 10. http://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/census-­d ata-­s hows-­1 00-­ different-­l anguages-­s poken-­i n-­a lmost-­e ver y-­l ondon-­b orough-­8 47 2483.html 11. https://www.migrationwatchuk.org/briefing-­paper/437/the-­history-­ of-­immigration-­to-­the-­ 12. https://www.history.com/topics/france/huguenots#section_10 13. https://www.britannica.com/event/Industrial-­Revolution 14. https://theculturetrip.com/europe/united-­kingdom/england/london/ articles/how-­notting-­hill-­race-­riots-­inspired-­londons-­caribbean-­carnival/ 15. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-­26465916 16. https://www.bbc.co.uk/food/chefs/nadiya 17. https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2021/sep/19/big-­brands-­should­let-­emma-­raducanu-­just-­enjoy-­the-­game

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18. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/olympics/19223652 19. and as the BBC put it ‘Iraqi refugee to chancellor’, Zadhawi came to Britain as a refugee with his family at a young age 20. https://www.migrationwatchuk.org/briefing-­paper/437/the-­history­of-­immigration-­to-­the-­uk 21. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-­n ews/sadiq-­k han-­ afghan-­refugees-­london-­b1916353.html 22. https://www.london.gov.uk/city-­h all-­b log/celebrating-­l ocal­culture-­london 23. https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/conservatives/2021/10/ t h e -­b i g -­p r o b l e m -­w i t h -­b o r i s -­j o h n s o n s -­c o n s e r v a t i v e -­p a r t y -­ conference-­speech 24. http://www.britishfuture.org/wp-­c ontent/uploads/2016/02/ Citizenship-­report.-­Final.26.02.16.pdf 25. COMPAS Breakfast Briefing document 39, February 2015 (­ www.compas. ox.ac.uk) 26. Klages, Mary Associate Professor, English Department, University of Colorado, Boulder https://www.colorado.edu/English/ENGL2012 Klagespomo.html Available at: http://www.bdavetian.com/Postmodernism.html, Accessed on 22 October 2015 27. https://www.standard.co.uk/showbiz/celebrity-­news/nadiya-­hussain-­ defends-­the-­birthday-­cake-­she-­made-­for-­the-­queen-­i-­don-­t-­care-­what-­ people-­t hink-­a 3237401.html, https://www.gov.uk/government/ uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/454401/Quarterly_ Brief_NEET_Q2_2015.pdf 28. http://www.forumonpublicpolicy.com/archivesum07/loupe.pdf

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Jackson, J. A. (1962). The Irish in Britain. The Sociological Review, 10(1), 5–16. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-­954X.1962.tb01100 Jongerden, J. (2007). The Settlement Issues in Turkey and Kurds: An Analysis of Spatial Policies, Modernity, and War. Iran and the Caucasus, 13(2), 422–424. Joppke, C. (2004). The Retreat of Multiculturalism in the Liberal State: Theory and Policy. The British Journal of Sociology, 55(2), 237–257. Joseph, P. (2011). Vanishing London: The Places, the People, the Stories. Haynes Publishing. Keles, J. Y. (2015). Media, Diaspora and Conflict. I. B. Tauris and Co. Ltd. Khayati, K. (2008). From Victim Diaspora to Trans-border Citizenship: Diaspora Formation and Transnational Relations among Kurds in France and Sweden. PhD Dissertation, Linköping Studies in Arts and Science No. 435. Klages, M. (2012). On Postmodernism. Available at: http://www.bdavetian.com/ Postmodernism.html. Accessed October 22, 2015. Malik, K. (2013). Multiculturalism and Its Discontents: Rethinking Diversity after 9/11. Seagull. Malkki, L. (1992). National Geographic: The Rooting of Peoples and the Territorialization of National Identity among Scholars and Refugees. Cultural Anthropology, 7(1), 24–44. Malkki, L. (1995). From “Refugee Studies” to the National Order of Things. Annual Review of Anthropology, 24, 495–523. Marfleet, P. (2006). Refugees in a Global Era. Palgrave Macmillan. McDowall, D. (2010). A Modern History of the Kurds. I. B. Tauris. McPherson, J. (2010). “I Integrate, therefore I am”: Contesting the Normalizing Discourse of Integration through Conversation with Refugee Women. Journal of Refugee Studies, 23(4), 546–570. Nanton, A., & Burton, J. (2021). Black London. Ink Spire. Oglak, S., & Hussein, S. A. (2016). Active Ageing: Social and Cultural Integration of Older Turkish Alevi Refugees in London. Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs, 36(1), 74–87. Østergaard-Nielsen, E.  K. (2003). Transnational Politics: Turks and Kurds in Germany. Routledge. Roche, O. I. A. (1965). The Days of the Upright: A History of Huguenots. Clarkson N.  Potter, Inc. (Archive Material Accessed at the Huguenot Library at the National Archives in Kew, London). Safran, W. (1991). Diasporas in Modern Societies: Myths of Homeland and Return. Diaspora: A Journal of Transnational Studies, 1(1), 83–99. Said, E. (2001). Reflections on Exile and Other Essays. Harvard University Press. Sales, R. (2002). The Deserving and Undeserving? Refugees, Asylum Seekers and Welfare in Britain. Critical Social Policy, 22(3), 456–478. Sandhu, S. (2003). London Calling: How Black and Asian Writers Imagined London. Harper Collins.

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Sheffer, G. (Ed.). (1986). Modern Diasporas in International Politics. Croom Helm. Soguk, N. (1999). States and Strangers: Refugees and Displacement of Statecraft. University of Minnesota Press. Song, M. (2003). Choosing Ethnic Identity. Polity Press. Tas, L. (2013). One State, Plural Options: Kurds in the UK. The Journal of Legal Pluralism and Unofficial Law, 45(2), 167–189. Toivanen, M. (2014). Negotiating Home and Belonging: Young Kurds in Finland. PhD thesis, University of Turku, Turku, Finland. Tololian, K. (1991). The Nation State and its Others: In Lieu of a Preface. Diaspora, 1(1), 3–7. Vertovec, S. (2007). Super-diversity and its Implications. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 30(6), 1024–1054. Vertovec, S. (2010). Towards Post-multiculturalism? Changing Communities, Conditions and Contexts of Diversity. International Social Science Journal, 61(199), 83–95. Wahlbeck, O. (1998a). Transnational and Diaspora: The Kurdish Example. In Paper Presented at the International Sociologist Conference. Wahlbeck, O. (1998b). Community Work and Exile Politics. Kurdish Refugee Associations Studies, 11(3), 215–230. Wahlbeck, O. (1999). Kurdish Diasporas: A Comparative Study of Kurdish Refugee Communities. Palgrave Macmillan. Winder, R. (2004). Bloody Foreigners: The Story of Immigration to Britain. Little Brown. Zolberg, A. R., Suhrke, A., & Aguayo, S. (1989). Escape from Violence: Conflict and Refugee Crisis in the Developing World. Oxford University Press.

CHAPTER 5

Conclusion

Abstract  This book has set out to look at the two inextricably linked questions of the history of Kurdish mixed (mostly forced) migration and Kurdish cultural identity. To answer these connected questions, the book has explored a range of relevant issues, which could be summarised pragmatically in the following four interrelated categories. Keywords  History • Heterogeneity • Host-land • Homeland • Fluidity

5.1   Overview 1. External factors: the aftermath of WW1, which led to socio-political marginalisation and victimisation of the Kurds by international and regional powers (Eickelman, 1989; Izady, 1992; Ahmad, 1994; O’Ballance, 1996; Vali, 2003; McDowall, 2010; Bozarslan, 2014). 2. Internal conditions: Kurdish heterogeneity, cultural diversity, and its complex traditional and local socio-political characteristics, tribal loyalties and divisions, land-locked geography, and static traditional politics (Barth, 1953; van Bruinessen, 1992; Kreyenbroek & Sperl, 1992; Kreyenbroek & Allison, 1996; Koohi-Kamali, 2003; Bozarslan, 2014) (see Fig. 2.1). © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 A. Ata, Transnational Migration, Diaspora, and Identity, Migration, Diasporas and Citizenship, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18169-6_5

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3. The economic situation: chronic economic underdevelopment of most of the Kurdish populated areas, which still in 2022 does create harsh and unfavourable economic conditions which in turn exacerbated by poor economic management even in the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in the Kurdish towns and villages in Northern Iraq. Still many Kurds, including families, both skilled and unskilled, are forced to flee their homeland for economic reasons (Randal, 1997; Natali, 2005; Lynch & Ali, 2006; Emanuelsson, 2008; Hassan, 2015). 4. The non-economic factors: an unhelpful, often mythical, and static mixture of imaginary and real geography and political baggage from the past. Many of the Kurdish nationalist texts are filled with historic events and figures emphasising more Kurdish victimhood and taking less responsibility for their own political naivety and been used as Trojan Horses by international and local powers. The traditional Kurdish nationalism often manipulates and uses rhetoric to appeal to the masses, offers no working strategy, and it is opportunist and passive rather than proactive and attempting to create pathways to peaceful and local solutions. The Kurdish case is also used as political card opportunistically and inhumanly by international and regional powers to make or break their deals. In reality, most Kurds do still face displacement and forced migration, de jure statelessness, religious differences, tribal loyalties, language, and literature varieties, which indeed make both oral and written communications between Kurds. All in all, makes unity more difficult between the Kurds (Challand, 1992; van Bruinessen, 1999, 2000; O’Shea, 2004; Jongerden, 2007; Meiselas, 2007; Galip, 2012; Tas, 2013) (see Table 5.1). Moreover, we know now that not much is written about the history of the Kurds as a separate nation; and this is partly because, the modern sense of nationhood developed much later among the Kurds compared with their immediate Persian, Turkish, and Arab neighbours. The political significance of the term Kurd should also be traced through the political subordination of the Kurds, who are culturally diverse but nonetheless often oppressed and punished collectively by their more powerful neighbours (Eickelman, 1989; Randal, 1997). This book has shed new light on and encouraged a new critical reading of the modern history of Kurdistan as a divided land with heterogeneous people, and consequently of the

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Table 5.1  Kurdish history timeline Date

Significant events

1514

The Chaldiran War between the Safavid Empire (defeated) and the Ottoman Empire (victorious). The Kurds were divided along religious lines, fought with both sides, and did not benefit from the war. Instead, thousands of Kurds were sent to Khorasan by Shah Abbas Safavid for supporting the Ottomans. The Kurds were subjects living in both Empires. Following the Chaldiran War, the Zahab Treaty was signed between the Ottomans and the Safavids to establish their new borders. These borders still stand between today’s Iran and Turkey. This treaty is regarded by Kurdish nationalists as the first formal division of Kurdistan between two regional powers. Sykes-Picot Agreement between Britain and France on how to divide the Middle East after WW1. 31 October 1918, the official end of WW1 and beginning of the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. American President Woodrow Wilson made his famous 14 points peace speech which included advocating for the rights of different ethnic and religious groups, but he did not get enough support from the US Congress for any positive action for his plan. Versailles, France, the peace conference where Allied political leaders decided how to divide and rule the post-WW1 world. Some reference was made to the creation of Kurdistan as an independent country (see relevant archive photo below). Small Kurdish autonomous region inside USSR was established called Red Kurdistan, but was soon abandoned. The Sevres Treaty anticipated an independent Kurdish state.

1639

1916 1918

1919

1920 10 August 1921 24 June 1923 1925

1933–1934

1937/8

The Lausanne Treaty ignored the Sevres Treaty and agreed the formal partition of Kurdish areas between Turkey, Iraq, and Syria. The Iranian Kurdish area remained unchanged since 1639, as mentioned above. The short-lived Shaikh Said uprising in Ararat, a Kurdish area of Turkey, was ended by Kemalist Turkey. This was followed by massive Kurdish displacement inside Turkey. The Simko tribal uprising in Iranian Kurdistan was crushed by the first Reza Shah. Kurds were exiled to other parts of Iran, and Kurdish tribes were forced to settle in designated areas. The Dersim massacre was carried out by the Turkish state, resulting in massive displacement of Alevi Kurds. Many Alevis were forced to migrate to other parts of Turkey or forcibly resettled by the Turkish state. (continued)

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Table 5.1 (continued) Date

Significant events

22 January– December 1946

The Mahabad Republic was declared in some part of Iranian Kurdistan. This short-lived political project was closely linked to Azerbaijan and they were supported by the then USSR. The second Reza Shah managed to crush it after striking an oil agreement with Stalin. Thousands were sent into exile and the Kurdish province was divided, with some parts now known as Western Azerbaijan, including Mahabad itself. Mustafa Barzani, a key player in the Mahabad Republic, went into exile for 12 years in the USSR, from 1946 to 1958. He then returned and managed to regroup and restart the Kurdish resistance movement in Northern Iraq. The first organised clashes between the Barzani Kurds and Iraqi regime started in autumn 1961. The city of Galadezeh in Iraqi Kurdistan was bombed by the Baath regime and thousands of inhabitants, including university students, were killed. The regime later planned mass forced evacuations and displacement of the Kurdish population of the Pishdar area, forcing them to move to designated collective towns near Sulymni and Erbil (Hawler). At the OPEC conference in Algiers, the Shah of Iran and Iraq under Saddam Hussein agreed on a peace deal that went against the Kurds under Mustafa Barzani’s leadership. Hundreds of thousands of Kurds were forced into exile, including Mustafa Barzani himself, who had to leave Iraq with his loyal forces for the second time. War began between the newly established Islamic Republic of Iran and Iraq. Saddam Hussein was fully supported by the West. Iraq started by attacking the oil fields in Southern Iran. Iran-Iraq war ended. One million people were reported to have died, and many border villages and towns were destroyed or emptied of people. An estimated one million were also displaced by the war throughout the 1980s. Chemical bombing of the Kurdish town of Halabja: an estimated 5000 Kurds were killed, and the entire city was attacked by nerve gas. The notorious Anfal campaign against the Kurds in Iraq: hundreds of thousands of Kurdish men were rounded up and taken away by Saddam’s army. They were killed and buried in mass graves or buried alive. The First Gulf War, at the end of which Saddam again attacked Kurdish areas. An estimated one million Kurdish refugees fled to the borders with Iran and Turkey, fearing another major gas attack. The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) was created to run a major part of the Kurdish area in Northern Iraq. The two main Kurdish political parties, the PUK and the KDP, still somehow share power in 2022.

September 1961–1975

25 April 1974

6 March 1975

1981

1988

16 March 1988 April– October 1988 1991–1992

1992

(continued)

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Table 5.1 (continued) Date

Significant events

1991–1996

A ‘safe haven’ was initiated by John Major, then the British Prime Minister, and supported by the West for the benefit of the Kurds against Saddam’s air force. Most Kurdish refugees returned home, but Kurdish internal conflict forced some to leave the area again. The end of the Saddam regime. The Kurds enjoyed their first taste of peace, freedom, and self-government. The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) was formally recognised by the new Iraqi constitution and supported by the West and the UN. Nadia Murad,a Yezidi woman activist, won the Nobel Peace Prize with another activist, Denis Mukwege. Nadia has been campaigning to raise awareness about the marginalisation and suffering of Yezidis, and she is seen as an effective advocate for woman’s rights and an international light by turning her own personal pain into power for positive change. A popular uprising in Syria in 2011 against the Assad regime quickly turned very violent. The situation led to the rise of the Islamic State (IS), which spread to neighbouring Iraq in 2014. IS took over Mosul, a major Iraqi city, in August 2014. The Yezidi Kurds suffered most when they were abandoned by local Kurdish and Iraqi forces.b Ever since, Syria has been a complex field for a proxy war between different international and regional powers. Local players, including the Kurds, played a major role in defeating IS in Iraq (2016) and in Syria (2017). Some analysts suggest that the Kurds were used as Trojan horses by the USA against IS, but were not given much support when they needed it (2018/2019). According to UNHCR,c in 2020 there were 81.7 million forced migrants and displaced people in the world, with considerable numbers in and from the Middle East, including Syrians, Iraqis, Iranians, and more Afghan refugees, since the crisis following US withdrawal from Afghanistan in August 2021.

2003

2018

2019–2020

Sources: Noury (1954), Badlisy (1964), Yasami (1990), Izady (1992), McDowall (2010) https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/2018/murad/facts/

a

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-­e ast/isis-­i slamic-­s tate-­y azidi-­s ex-­s laves-­ genocide-­sinjar-­death-­toll-­number-­kidnapped-­study-­un-­lse-­a7726991.html b

https://www.unhcr.org/flagship-­reports/globaltrends/

c

marginalised communities inside Turkey, Iraq, Syria, and Iran. It has stressed that Kurdistan has been used as a buffer zone by regional and international powers since the 1920s. The Kurds have therefore often been ‘major victims’ and ‘minor players’ in the region (Bozarslan, 2014). The traditional Kurdish social and political system, its historic internal political disunity, and shifting loyalties have been highlighted and

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discussed to help to better understand Kurdish history and Kurdish cultural identity (van Bruinessen, 1992, 1999, 2000; Gunter, 2011). The concept of the Kurdish-Londoner is therefore a new positive, creative, and radical social construct of self-identity, suggesting successful settlement and positive progress in integration in London, as well as a historical stamp for Kurdish struggle for social inclusion and equality in the context of wider and deeper inequalities in the Middle East. The term KurdishLondoner, which has primarily, although not exclusively, been used by second-­generation Kurds in London, helps to articulate the beginning of a new and progressive phase, and it is a confirmation of a new cultural development from within the second generation of the Kurdish diaspora in London (see Table 5.2). Indeed, it also helps to explain the capacity of London as a cosmopolitan, ‘super-diverse’ city in Britain, a city that is shaping or reshaping the lives of all its newcomers (Vertovec, 2007; Malik, 2013). This is a powerful symbol of the birth of a new era, and soon the third generation of Kurds will emerge in London, and indeed in other Table 5.2  Participant figures and analysis Interviews Face-to-face Email Focus group Total

Subtotal

Male

Female

First generation

Second generation

25 10 52 87

18 7 39 64

7 3 13 23

15 6 42 63

10 4 10 24

Gender Chart

Generation Chart

First 63; 72%

Female 23;26% Male 64;74%

Second 24; 28%

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Table 5.3  Kurdish diaspora in Europe Country

Estimated numbers

Notes

Germany France Sweden Netherlands England

Largest Second Third Fourth 47,871

Denmark Austria Switzerland Belgium Total Kurdish population in the world in 1991 (all figures are estimates)

Sixth Seventh Eighth Ninth Country

No official statistics available No official statistics available No official statistics available No official statistics available 2011 Census (information from the 2021 not available yet) No official statistics available No official statistics available No official statistics available No official statistics available

Turkey Iran Iraq Syria Former USSR Total

Kurdish population 13,000,000 6,600,000 4,400,000 1,300,000 400,000 27,000,000

Sources: McDowall (2010), Gunter (2011)

major cities in Europe and further transformation of identity will follow. For example, in Germany (Candan & Hunger, 2008), the growth of the Kurdish population in Europe will surely become a fascinating new area for further study (see Table 5.3). More specifically, with respect to settlement policies and programmes for newcomers, and in opposition to Ager and Strang’s (2008) generic hierarchy of needs theory, this book has argued that, firstly, serious consideration must be given to local resources and the level of infrastructure available or necessary to accommodate a certain number of migrants and refugees; and secondly, that the views and attitudes of the host community towards migrants should be considered. The perceptions and concerns on all sides should be addressed, and unhelpful and overly negative views be challenged. Migrant’s real stories and their resilience and positive potential for self-help should be identified in order to raise awareness and understanding about integration (Korac, 2005; Lewis et al., 2013).

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The state of community cohesion in Britain has been described as complex and delicate by some observers, for example the Oxford Migration Observatory (OMO), which uses statistics to monitor the migration situation, and some scholars using the OMO’s information see the state’s sole responsibility as managing both immigration and the number of migrants, as well as dealing with citizenship and integration issues (Spencer, 2011; Katwala et al., 2016). Many migration studies scholars agree with applying a multi-agency and holistic approach to aiding migrants in achieving successful settlement and integration. An ideal situation is one where the central government, local governments, local communities, and the migrants themselves work together to achieve both short- and long-term positive results (Bloch, 2002a, 2002b). However, a problem arises when things go wrong in a host society, and migrants are blamed for undermining community cohesion, because most migrants are perceived as being unwilling to integrate. Most participants in this study do not identify themselves with such negative general statements as put forward by some parts of the British media against migrants. It is also necessary to consider the group as well as the individual perspective, as demonstrated in personal narratives and group discussions (Olson, 1965; Barth, 1969; Wahlbeck, 1999; Enneli et al., 2005).

5.2   Key Findings A significant contribution of this book is the articulation of a new concept, the Kurdish-Londoner, which is based on analysis of the empirical data collected, and on reflection on the futuristic views and aspirations of second-­generation Kurds born in London since the 1990s. This is a radical, dynamic, and a positive attempt, which stands in contrast to some previous the often-static policy- and politics-driven academic research on the Kurdish diaspora in London, as described in the works of Griffith (2002) and Wahlbeck (1998, 1999), who largely overlooked the history of the Kurdish diaspora and have not considered the lived experiences of members of Kurdish communities as current / potential active British citizens or Londoners. This book has positively shown that there is a strong tendency, especially among young Kurds, to see London as their home; and this new notion of belonging is articulated as I am Kurdish-Londoner. On a different positive note, there is a tendency among most members of the diaspora, both young and old, to commute to their old, original, first, or parental home—Kurdistan (namely Iraqi Kurdistan)—rather than to

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return and live there, due to the various challenging issues facing returnees to Kurdistan under its Regional Government (KRG) but many still try and they wish to become an agent of change in their original home (Paasche, 2016). I argue for need for a new epistemology within forced migration studies that is based on lived experiences and migrant’s voices. Herein, I have sought to develop and articulate new insights based on the views of the individuals as well as the experiences of the group as a whole. This is an approach that foregrounds free will, self-identity fluidity of identity, and the ways in which these are socially constructed and embraced in the context of multicultural and cosmopolitan London. This is a clear attempt to look beyond the traditional labelling, victimisation, otherness, and negative perceptions of refugees often portrayed in the mass media and in the public domain in Britain or elsewhere in Europe for political and various other reasons (Huysmans, 2000; Betts & Loescher, 2011).

5.3   Progressive and Future Steps I would like to suggest opening active and inclusive local integration and citizenship advice and information centres in London, and indeed in other cities in Britain, with considerable refugee and migrant populations. We need more positive, regular contact, more inclusive and frank dialogue about social integration within this great and rich British society. This positive action should start with central government and involving all local boroughs, the media, the voluntary sector, refugee and migrant communities, and the host communities (see belonging network1). In London, this world city, everyone has an interesting and invaluable story to tell about their roots and routes, which would then inform and enhance future debates about integration and belonging. It is hugely important to emphasise that all newcomers should be able to access a range of English language classes freely and flexibly. The current one-size-fits-all English language classes or help yourself and good luck approach do not work for all refugees and migrants. For example, many refugee mothers miss out on attending most English language classes because they dedicate almost all their day to do the school-run, the housework, and shopping for the family. Another vulnerable group is unaccompanied refugee children, who often wait several months for a school place. Therefore, it is necessary to encourage and fund local colleges to provide high quality and regular

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English language courses covering different needs and levels, by offering flexible timetables. These amount to positive interventions measures which also advocated for by British Future (Katwala et al., 2016).2 This book is advocating a win-win situation through a positive process of community engagements, frank dialogue, and practical integration support for the host-land eventually becoming a homeland for all newcomers; and for achieving a fair deal and a better deal for all of us, as equal and productive citizens.

Notes 1. https://www.belongnetwork.co.uk/about-­us/our-­vision-­and-­mission/ 2. http://www.britishfuture.org/publication/making-­citizenship-­matter/

References Ager, A., & Strang, A. (2008). Understanding Integration: A Conceptual Framework. Journal of Refugee Studies, 21(2), 166–186. Ahmad, K. M. (1994). Kurdistan during the First World War. Saqi Books. Barth, F. (1953). Principles of Social Organization in Southern Kurdistan. University Ethnographic Museum. Barth, F. (1969). Introduction. In F. Barth (Ed.), Ethnic Groups and Boundaries: Social Organisation of Culture. George Allen and Unwin. Betts, A., & Loescher, G. (Eds.). (2011). Refugees in International Relations. Oxford University Press. Bloch, A. (2002a). The Migration and Settlement of Refugees in Britain. Palgrave Macmillan. Bloch, A. (2002b). Refugees’ Opportunities and Barriers in Employment and Training. Department for Work and Pensions Research Report 179, Research Gate. Bozarslan, H. (2014). The Kurds and Middle Eastern “State of Violence”: The 1980s and 2010s. Kurdish Studies, 2(1), 4–13. van Bruinessen, M. (1992). Agha, Sheikh and State. Zed Books. van Bruinessen, M. (1999). The Kurds in Movement: Migrations, Mobilisations, Communications and the Globalisation of the Kurdish Question. Working paper no. 14, Islamic Area Studies Project, Tokyo, Japan. van Bruinessen, M. (2000). Transnational Aspects of the Kurdish Question. Working Paper. Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies, European University Institute. Candan, M., & Hunger, U. (2008). Nation Building Online: A Case Study of Kurdish Migrants in Germany. German Policy Studies, 4(4), 125–153. Challand, G. (1992). The Kurdish Tragedy. Zed Books.

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Eickelman, F.  D. (1989). The Middle East: An Anthropological Approach. Prentice Hall. Emanuelsson, A. (2008). Transnational Dynamics of Return and the Potential Role of the Kurdish Diaspora in Developing the Kurdish Region. Advanced Research and Assessment Group, Defence Academy of the United Kingdom. Enneli, P., Modood, T., & Bradley, H. (2005). Young Turks and Kurds: A Set of “Invisible” Disadvantaged Groups. Joseph Rowntree Foundation. Galip, O. (2012). Kurdistan: A Land of Longing and Struggle: Analysis of ‘Home-­ land’ and ‘Identity’ in the Kurdish Novelistic Discourse from Turkish Kurdistan to its Diaspora (1984–2010). PhD Thesis, University of Exeter, UK. Griffith, D. (2002). Somali and Kurdish Refugees in London: New Identities in the Diaspora. Ashgate. Gunter, M. M. (2011). Historical Dictionary of the Kurds. Scarecrow Press. Hassan, K. (2015). Kurdistan’s Politicized Society Confronts a Sultanistic System. Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Washington, USA.  Available from http://carnegieendowment.org/2015/08/17/kurdistan-­s-­politicized-­ society-­confronts-­sultanistic-­system-­pub-­61026. Accessed July 11, 2016. Huysmans, J. (2000). The European Union and the Securitization of Migration. Journal of Common Markets Studies, 38(5), 751–777. Izady, M. (1992). The Kurds. Taylor and Francis. Jongerden, J. (2007). The Settlement Issues in Turkey and Kurds: An Analysis of Spatial Policies, Modernity, and War. Iran and the Caucasus, 13(2), 422–424. Katwala, S., Somerville, W., & Ballinger, S. (2016). Making Citizenship Matter: Why London Needs an Office for Citizenship and Integration. British Future Report. Koohi-Kamali, F. (2003). The Political Development of the Kurds in Iran: Pastoral Nationalism. Palgrave Macmillan. Korac, M. (2005). The Role of Bridging Social Networks in Refugee Settlement: A Case of Italy and the Netherlands. In P. Waxman & V. Colic-Peisker (Eds.), Homeland Wanted Interdisciplinary Perspective on Refugee Resettlement in the West. Nova. Kreyenbroek, P., & Allison, C. (1996). Kurdish Culture and Identity. Zed Books. Kreyenbroek, P., & Sperl, S. (1992). The Kurds: A Contemporary Overview. Routledge. Lewis, H., Dwyer, P., Hodkinson, S., & Waite, L. (2013). Precarious Lives: Experiences of Forced Labour among Refugees and Asylum Seekers in England. Research Report. University of Leeds. Lynch, M., & Ali, P. (2006). Buried Alive: Stateless Kurds in Syria. Refugees International. Available at: http://www.refworld.org/docid/47a6eba80. html. Accessed February 25, 2015. Malik, K. (2013). Multiculturalism and Its Discontents: Rethinking Diversity after 9/11. Seagull. McDowall, D. (2010). A Modern History of the Kurds. I. B. Tauris.

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Meiselas, S. (2007). Kurdistan in the Shadow of History (2nd ed.). University of Chicago Press. Natali, D. (2005). The Kurds and State: Evolving National Identity in Iraq, Turkey and Iran. Syracuse University Press. O’Ballance, E. (1996). The Kurdish Struggle: 1920–1994. Palgrave Macmillan. Olson, M. (1965). The Logic of Collective Action: Public Goods and the Theory of Groups. Harvard University Press. O’Shea, M.  T. (2004). Trapped Between the Map and Reality: Geography and Perceptions of Kurdistan. Routledge. Paasche, E. (2016). The Role of Corruption in Reintegration: Experiences of Iraqi Kurds upon Return from Europe. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 42(7). Available from http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.108 0/1369183X.2016.1139445. Accessed July 11, 2016. Randal, J. (1997). After Such Knowledge What Forgiveness? My Encounter with Kurdistan. Harper Collins Canada Ltd. Spencer, S. (2011). Policy Primer: Integration. Migration Observatory, Oxford University. Available at: http://www.migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/policy-­ primers/integration. Accessed July 11, 2016. Tas, L. (2013). One State, Plural Options: Kurds in the UK. The Journal of Legal Pluralism and Unofficial Law, 45(2), 167–189. Vali, A. (2003). ’Genealogies of the Kurds: Constructions of Nation and National Identity in Kurdish Historical Writing. In A. Vali (Ed.), Essays on the Origins of Kurdish Nationalism. Mazda Publishers. Vertovec, S. (2007). Super-diversity and its Implications. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 30(6), 1024–1054. Wahlbeck, O. (1998). Community Work and Exile Politics. Kurdish Refugee Associations Studies, 11(3), 215–230. Wahlbeck, O. (1999). Kurdish Diasporas: A Comparative Study of Kurdish Refugee Communities. Palgrave Macmillan.

Selected References

in

Kurdish and Farsi

Badlisy, A. S. K. (1964). Sharafnameh (Literally: The Letter of Honour), Published in Farsi with a Foreword by Mohammed Abbasi. Noury, E. (1954). Rysha nejady kord (The Root of the Kurdish Race), Iraq. Yasami, R. (1990). Kord: paywastgy nejady va tarikhy (The Kurds: The Historic and Racial Affinity). Ebn Sina Press.



Appendix

Fig. A.1  Archive photo of David Lloyd George with other delegates at the 1919 Peace Conference at Versailles-Paris, France. © Parliamentary Archives, London. Source: National Archives online catalogue. At the end of WW1, a conference was held in Paris to negotiate a peace settlement for Europe. The 1919 Paris Peace Conference resulted in a number of peace treaties. In this conference the creation of a Kurdish state was discussed, but this proposal was later abandoned by the Lausanne Treaty in 1923. Many Kurds call this ‘Year Zero’ in modern Kurdish history (Ahmad 1994; McDowall 2010; Bozarsalan 2014) © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 A. Ata, Transnational Migration, Diaspora, and Identity, Migration, Diasporas and Citizenship, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18169-6

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Image B.1  My photo with Ali Zalme, fellow panelist, at Kurdish Diaspora Conference at Middlesex University, London, 27 May 2016 © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 A. Ata, Transnational Migration, Diaspora, and Identity, Migration, Diasporas and Citizenship, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18169-6

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Image B.2  My photo with Laurence Juma, fellow panelist, at IASFM conference in Poznan, Poland, 12 July 2016

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Image B.3  My photo with Paul Dudman and Rumana Hashem (fellow members of the IASFM-working group) outside Adam Mickiewicz University, at International Association for the Study of Forced Migration Conference (IASFM) in Poznan, Poland, 12 July 2016

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Image B.4  My photo with UNHCR poster at IASFM Conference in Bogota, Colombia, 15 July 2014

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Image B.5  My photo the British 10K run in support of refugees, The Mall, outside Backinghmam Palace, London 14 July 2013

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Image B.6  My photo outside central library Salahaddin University Hawler (Erbil) Iraq, 22 October 2012

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© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 A. Ata, Transnational Migration, Diaspora, and Identity, Migration, Diasporas and Citizenship, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18169-6

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Tololian, K. (1991). The Nation State and its Others: In Lieu of a Preface. Diaspora, 1(1), 3–7. United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). Global-Trends-­ Number of Refugees in 2015. Available at: Accessed September 2016. Vali, A. (2003). ’Genealogies of the Kurds: Constructions of Nation and National Identity in Kurdish Historical Writing. In A. Vali (Ed.), Essays on the Origins of Kurdish Nationalism. Mazda Publishers. Vali, A. (2012). Kurds and the State of Iran: The Making of Kurdish Identity. I. B. Tauris & Co. Ltd. Vertovec, S. (2007a). Super-diversity and its Implications. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 30(6), 1024–1054. Vertovec, S. (2007b). The Political Importance of Diaspora. Centre on Migration Policy and Society, University of Oxford, Working Paper Number 13. Vertovec, S. (2010). Towards Post-multiculturalism? Changing Communities, Conditions and Contexts of Diversity. International Social Science Journal, 61(199), 83–95. Wahlbeck, O. (1998a). Transnational and Diaspora: The Kurdish Example. In Paper Presented at the International Sociologist Conference. Wahlbeck, O. (1998b). Community Work and Exile Politics. Kurdish Refugee Associations Studies, 11(3), 215–230. Wahlbeck, O. (1999). Kurdish Diasporas: A Comparative Study of Kurdish Refugee Communities. Palgrave Macmillan. Ward, K., & Palmer, D. (2005). Mapping the Provision of Mental Health Services for Asylum Seekers and Refugees in London: A Report by Information Centre about Asylum and Refugees in the UK (ICAR). School of Science and Public Policy, King’s College. Wessendorf, S. (2013). Commonplace Diversity and the “Ethos of Mixing”: Perceptions of Difference in a London Neighbourhood. Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power, 20(4), 407–422. Winder, R. (2004). Bloody Foreigners: The Story of Immigration to Britain. Little Brown. World Atlas Statistics. (2015). Available at: http://www.worldatlas.com/ nations.htm Yassin, A.  B. (1995). Vision or Reality? The Kurds in the Policy of Great Powers 1941–1947. Lund University Press. Yin, R. K. (1994). Case Study Research: Design and Methods (2nd ed.). Sage. Zetter, R., Griffiths, D., & Sigona, N. (2005). Social Capital or Social Exclusion? The Impact of Asylum-Seeker Dispersal on UK Refugee Community Organisations. Community Development Journal, 40(2), 169–181. Zetter, R., Griffiths, D., Sigona, N., Flynn, D., Pahsa, T., & Beynon, R. (2006). Immigration, Social Cohesion and Social Capital: What are the Links? Joseph Rowntree Foundation.

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Selected References in Kurdish and Farsi Badlisy, A. S. K. (1964). Sharafnameh (Literally: The Letter of Honour), Published in Farsi with a Foreword by Mohammed Abbasi. Noury, E. (1954). Rysha nejady kord (The Root of the Kurdish Race), Iraq. Yasami, R. (1990). Kord: paywastgy nejady va tarikhy (The Kurds: The Historic and Racial Affinity). Ebn Sina Press.

Index1

A Acculturation, 90, 99 Advocates of globalisation, on declonisation, 43 The Age of Migration, 44 Ager, A., 93 Al-Assad, Hafez, 31 Alevi, 52, 64, 66 Alinia, M., 50, 63, 65 Allison, C., 84 All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG), 8, 59, 60 Amelina, A., 74, 76 Anderson, B., 42, 46, 51, 54, 66 Appadurai, A., 42–44, 46, 48, 66, 74, 76, 97 Ararat Revolt, 27 Archaeology of Knowledge, 23 Arendt, H., 55 Armenia, 18, 23

Assimilate, 21 Assimilation, 75, 101 Assyrians, 21 Auto-ethnography, 2, 9 Azerbaijan, 18, 23, 32, 34, 51 B Badini Kurd, 64, 66 Barth, F., 113, 120 Barzani, Mullah Mustafa, 29 Baser, B., 79, 80, 84, 101 Becoming, 2, 3 Bedir-Khan, Prince, 31 Bernardine Evaristo, 88 Besikçi, I., 52, 64 Betts, A., 55, 56, 121 Birkbeck College, 93 Black Asian and Ethnic Minority (BAME), 7

 Note: Page numbers followed by ‘n’ refer to notes.

1

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 A. Ata, Transnational Migration, Diaspora, and Identity, Migration, Diasporas and Citizenship, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18169-6

147

148 

INDEX

Black London, 86 Black-British, 100 Bloch, A., 45, 65 Bozarslan, H., 51, 113, 117 Bradford, 57 Bradford riots, 91 Brah, 52 Brettell, C.B., 42, 46 Brexit, 89, 90 Brexit means Brexit, 58 Brexit referendum, 58, 92 Bristol and Liverpool, 87 British citizens, 120 British Future, 122 British multiculturalism, 58 British RAF, 29 Brixton riots, 91 Buffer zone, 22–24 Burton, J., 86–88 C Cameron, David, 57, 58 Cantle Report, 90, 91 Casey Review, 59, 60 Castles, S., 42–45, 105 Centre on Migration, Policy, and Society (COMPAS), 96 Chaldiran War, 24, 35 Charles, Prince, 61 Cheap oil, 32 Citizenship and migration, 44 Cohen, R., 76, 81 Columbus, Christopher, 87 Community cohesion, 57, 61, 62 Commute, 120 Constructive role of diaspora, 82 Constructivist view, 51 Cook, Robin, 90 Croydon, 82 Crul, M., 77 Cult of Angels, 20

Cultural diversity, 21–22, 52, 64 Cultural identity, 41–43, 54, 63, 65 Culturists, 43 Curtis, A., 80, 102, 106 D Dalkurd, 81, 82 Darwinian question, 94 Davidson, A., 44 De jure statelessness, 114 Department of Communities and Local Government (DCLG), 65, 66 Deterritorialised/ de-territorialised, 25, 43 Diaspora discourse, 53 Diaspora identity, 42, 54 Displacement, 17, 22–29, 32, 35, 36 Dublin Regulations, 67 Dynamic global conditions, 54 E Eickelman, F. D., 51, 113, 114 Eliassi, B., 50, 65 Emanuelsson, A., 50, 82, 114 Empirical data, 75, 92, 100 Encompassing, 53 England, 77, 78, 83–85, 89, 90, 96 English Channel, 57 Enlightenment, 87 Epistemological, 74 Eschatological, 47 Essentialism, 100 Essentialist, 42, 48, 74, 85 Euro Kurds, 102 European Union (EU), 55, 56, 58, 67 Explicitly transnational, 46 External factors, 113

 INDEX 

F Faili, 52 Faist, T., 74, 76, 83 Featherstone, M., 44, 66 Feminist intersectionality, 82 Finland, 77, 78, 82–83, 96, 105, 106 First generation, 3, 6, 9, 11 Flight and Refugee: Networking and Transfer of Knowledge (FFVT), 79 Fluidity, 93, 121 Fluidity of identity, 93 Forced Migration and Refugee Studies: Networking and knowledge transfer (FFVT) in Germany, 4 Forced migration history, 2, 4 Forced migration since the 1920s, 35 Foreigners, 53, 63 Former USSR, 51 Fourteen Points, 23 French Huguenots, 48 G Galip, 50 Geneva Convention in 1951, 56 Geography and anthropology, 46 Germany, 77–83, 94, 96, 102, 105, 106 Global conditions, 44, 48, 54 Global era, 44, 55 Globalisation, 42–44, 50, 54, 66 Good luck approach, 121 Griffith, D., 76, 83–85, 93, 96, 97, 99, 101, 104 H Hall, S., 43, 48, 58, 59, 62, 64, 66, 89, 90, 100 Hathaway, J. C., 44, 56

Hawrami, 52 Hellenic, 49 Heterogeneity, 52, 53 Heterogeneous, 50, 52 Hierarchy of needs theory, 119 Hindu Kush mountains, 32 History, 42, 46–48, 50–53, 55, 66 History and identity, 41, 48, 66, 74, 105 HMT Empire Windrush, 87 Hobsbawm, E. J., 42, 54, 66 Holgate, J., 65 Hollifield, J. F., 42, 46 Home making, 81, 101 Home-land, 122 Homogenous, 84 Host-land, 122 Huguenots, 55 Human migration, 48, 50 Human mobility, 44, 54, 105 Human rights law, 44, 56 Human rights of all Kurds in the Middle East, 82 Human Rights Watch/Middle East, 30 Hussein, S. A., 84 Hybrid, 63 Hybrid cultures, 59 Hybrid Kurds, 102 I I am Kurdish-Londoner, 120 IASFM 2013 conference, 44 Identity, 2–7, 9, 11 Imagined community, 46, 54 Imagined’ ethnic community, 42 Immigrants in Germany, 79 Imperialist politics, 19 In between ness, 94 Indo-European, 18 Industrial Revolution, 87

149

150 

INDEX

Inequalities, 45, 59 The inherent ambiguities, 46, 49 Integrated Communities Strategy Green Paper, 59, 60 Integration, 3–11, 41–44, 46–52, 55–61 Interdisciplinary approach, 42, 51 Internal conditions, 113 International Rescue Committee, 4 Intersectionality, 52 Interstitial, 63 Iran, 20, 22–25, 29, 32–36 Iranian Kurd, 21 Iran-Iraq war, 29 Iraq, 17, 20–23, 25, 26, 28–31, 34–36 Iraqi Kurd, 21 J Javid, Sajid, 60 Jewish experience, 49 Johnson, Boris, 92 Jongerden, J., 85 Joppke, C., 42, 63 K Keles, J. Y., 76, 101, 104 Kemal, Mustafa, 33 Khan, Sadiq, 61 Khayati, K., 50, 65 Kingdom of Iraq, 29 Kobanê, 31, 77 Komaly Jinawey Kord, 33 Kordi-Handaran, 6, 47 Kordi-London, 43, 47, 63, 94 Kreyenbroek, P., 113 Kurdish community organisations, 10 Kurdish diaspora communities, 4, 5, 8 Kurdish diaspora in London, 43, 46, 47, 49, 52, 64, 65 Kurdish forced migration, 52

Kurdish heterogeneity, 113 Kurdish identity, 9 Kurdish-Londoner/Kurdish Londoner, 2, 3, 5, 6, 43, 47, 49, 51, 62, 63, 94 in Kurdish Kordi-London, 47 Kurdish Studies Network (KSN), 76 Kurdistan, 18–36, 49, 51, 53 Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), 26, 30, 34, 36, 37n16, 93 Kurdistan time-line, 17 Kurds, 4–7, 10, 11 Kurmanji, 19 Kurmanji language, 31 L Labour government, 90 Lausanne Treaty, 18, 35 Lawrence family, 87 League of Nations, 100 Liminal, 63 Loescher, G., 55, 56, 121 London, 2–11 London Borough of Hackney, 104 Londoners, 76, 86–92, 94, 100 Long distance nationalism, 76 Luton, 57 M Maalouf, A., 43, 64 Mahabad Republic, 33, 51 Major victims, 117 Malkki, L., 42, 43, 46, 47, 53, 66 Map of Kurdistan in the 1920s, 19 Marrus, R. M., 55 Masculine liberalism, 58 Mayor of London, 7, 8, 66 Mayor of London’s All Of Us, 59, 60 McDowall, D., 51 McPherson, J., 61

 INDEX 

Meaningful narratives, 51 Meiselas, S., 114 Memories, 47, 51 Middle East, 17–36 Middle East in the 1920s, 53 Migrants Rights Network, 57 Migration system theory, 45, 46 Migration Watch, 86, 90 Minor players, 117 Modern Kurdish history, 74 Modernist, 48 Mosaic of cultures, 90 Mosul Vilayat, 23 Mountain Turks, 20, 21, 24 Multicultural realities, 89 Multiple identities, 105 Mulvey, G., 56 Murad, Nadia, 30 Muslim community in Britain, 57 Myths, 42, 47 N Nanton, A., 86–88 Narratives of marginalised, 74 National identities, 85, 93, 102 Nation-state, 42–44, 46, 48, 53–55, 58, 63 NATO, 23 Nelson Mandela, 87 Neo-classical economics, 45 Neo-liberalism, 45 New epistemology, 121 New nation states, 24, 29 Newroz celebration, 85 New World, 87 1919 Peace Conference in Paris, 33 Nobel Prize for Peace, 30 Non-essentialist, 74, 76, 81 Non-state actors, 54 Non-state-centric, 74 North London, 75, 76, 85, 97, 103

151

Northern Iraq, 75, 93 Nottingham riots, 91 Notting Hill, 87 O Obama, Michelle, 2, 3 Office for National Statistics (ONS), 83 Oglak, S., 84 Olson, M., 120 One-size-fits-all English language classes, 121 The 1920s, 51–53 Original homeland, 46 Ortiz, F., 48 Østergaard-Nielsen, E. K., 44, 50, 79, 106 Ottoman, 49 Ottoman Empire, 22, 23, 26, 35, 53 Oxford Migration Observatory, 120 P Paasche, E., 121 Paradox, 42, 54 Parallel lives, 91 Persian, 49 Person, 6–8, 11 Personal narrative(s), 6, 8, 9, 82, 120 Pilgrim Fathers, 48 Platform for International Cooperation on Undocumented Migrants (PICUM), 55 Plurality, 89 Policy, 6–8 Policy- and politics-driven research, 80 Policy-oriented studies, 93, 95 Postmodernism, 100 Post WW1 Kurdish history, 2, 4 Post-WW1 politics, 53 Post-WW2 phenomenon, 90, 105

152 

INDEX

Pro Asyl, 4 The processes of becoming, 42, 48 Process of becoming Londoners, 86 R Raducanu, Emma, 88 Randal, J., 114 Ravandi-Kordi, 6, 47 Refugee Council, 98 Refugee Groups, 7 Refugeeism, 77 Refugee mothers, 121 Refugee rights, 42 Reynolds, T. A., 64 Roman, 49 Roman occupation, 86 Runnymede Trust, 90 Rwanda scheme, 61 S Saddam regime, 75 Safavid Empire, 21, 35 Safavid, Shah Abbas, 24, 32 Said, Edward, 105 Saladin, 31 Sandhu, Sukhdeu, 86 Sätrabroun village, 2 Schneider, J., 77 School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), 86, 99 Second generation/second-generation, 3, 5, 6, 9, 11, 49, 53, 76, 81, 83, 85, 102–104 Second World War (WW2), 79, 87 Self-determination, 25, 36 Self-identity, 100, 118, 121 Selim, Sultan, 32 Seven Century, 20 Seventeenth century, 48, 55

Sevres treaty, 23, 35 Shah, Reza, 22, 33 Shi’ite Kurds, 29 Shuval, J. T., 47, 51 Single territory, 54 Slavery in Britain, 87 Social and human capital, 42 Social anthropology, 21, 22 Social capital theory, 46 Social constructivist, 51 Social constructivist paradigm, 43, 66, 89 Soguk, N., 76, 84 Solomos, J., 45, 65 South Africa, 33 South London, 75, 82, 87, 98, 102 State-centric ideology, 74 Statelessness, 105 Stockholm, 2 Strang, A., 93 Super-diversity, 91, 92, 96 Swarms, 57 Sweden, 2, 5, 77, 78, 80–82, 85, 94, 96, 102, 104–106 Sykes-Picot agreement, 23 Syria, 17, 21–23, 25, 29–32, 35, 36 Syrian Kurd, 21, 36n9 Syrian refugee crisis, 32 T Taghizadeh, 33 Territory, 42, 43, 54 Theoretical and methodological tools, 78 Theoretical framework, 41–67 Toivanen, M., 50, 82, 83, 106 Tololian, K., 43, 47–50 Trafalgar Square, 86 Trans-culturalism, 48

 INDEX 

Transculturation, 48 Transformation, 3, 6 Transnational consciousness, 74, 75 Transnationalism, 41–44, 46, 48, 50 Tribal loyalties, 113, 114 Trojan Horses, 114 Trump, Donald, 32 Turkey, 17, 20–25, 27–29, 31–33, 35 Turkey Kurd, 20, 24, 27, 31 Twelve large dams, 28 Two-fold question, 74 Two-homes, 99 2011 Census in Britain, 22 Typology, 48, 50 U Ummah (universal Islamic community), 21 Unaccompanied refugee children, 121 United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), 2, 4 Universal, 100 Unruly Strangers, 91 Utopian, 47

153

V Van Bruinessen, M., 51, 54, 83, 84 Vertovec, S., 46, 49 Victim diaspora, 49 Victimhood, 75, 81, 101 Victims, 21, 23 W Wahlbeck, O., 46, 76, 83–85, 93, 97, 99, 101, 104 Winder, R., 88 Win-win situation, 122 Y Year Zero’ in Kurdish history, 22 Yezidi Kurds, 31 Yezidis, 52 Yezidism, 20 Z Zagros, 18 Zahawi, Nadhim, 88 Zaza, 52 Zetter, R., 46, 47, 52, 57