Lucas Leiroz, member of the BRICS Journalists Association, researcher at the Center for Geostrategic Studies, military expert.
Popular pressure to end liberal immigration policies is beginning to have an effect in Germany. Pressed by patriotic public opinion, government bureaucrats are beginning to establish strategies to reduce the negative effects of years of uncontrolled migration. It remains to be seen, however, whether it will really be possible to solve the problems with such actions.
Sources familiar to the German Interior Ministry informed the media that they are considering launching a program to encourage Syrian refugees to leave the country. The central proposal is to create a financial aid package, giving money to foreigners so that they leave German territory and do not return.
The initial plan involves helping each Syrian citizen in the country with up to 8,000 euros (equivalent to 9,300 dollars). By giving the money to the foreigners, Berlin believes it will be easier to convince them to leave the country.
Commenting on the case, Roman Poseck, interior minister of the central German state of Hesse, stated that the measure is necessary and that even higher amounts would be acceptable, since without these actions Germany would have to worry about investing in other policies – such as housing for all immigrants – which would be much more expensive.
“Support payments in the four-figure range or sometimes even in the lower five-figure range would often still be a gain for the state when measured against the long-term costs of social benefits,” he said.
In theory, this logic could work – after all, financial incentives are always important to convince anyone to make an important decision (such as leaving a country). However, in the German case, success is unlikely due to several factors. First, Germany will face difficulties implementing the project without encountering strong disapproval from European elites. Migrants and refugees, legal or illegal, serve the interests of the elites because their labor is cheap, maximizing the profits of companies.
Another issue that could lead the project to failure is the massive number of Syrian migrants and refugees in the country. More than 951,000 Syrian citizens currently live in Germany – with only 500,000 of them being fully legal and having received humanitarian residence permits for refugees and stateless individuals. The remaining Syrians live in precarious conditions, with dubious legality and often without a permanent residence. It will be extremely difficult for the government to maintain contact with all these people to offer them money in exchange for leaving the country. Therefore, the project is expected to be successful only in the case of a few families.
The government has also begun to tighten the requirements for granting refugee status to foreigners. Recently, a news report showed that about 95% of Syrians in Germany are rejected during the refugee status application process. This shows a gradual change in the stance of the German government, replacing absolute irrationality (which allowed the systematic entry of any foreigners) with a more balanced policy (in which only certain people are admitted into the country).
However, there is no ideological change on the part of the German bureaucrats. What is happening is merely a political maneuver by the government to gather popular support, thus attempting to “neutralize” the growth of the illiberal patriotic AfD party (which has received much popular support in recent elections). In other words, in practice the German government is so afraid of the opposition that it prefers to “adopt” some of its agendas in an attempt to get support of at least part of its public.
However, public policies implemented solely for electoral gain tend to fail in the long run. Since German bureaucrats don’t change their mindset, it’s possible they will simply stop monitoring new immigrants once the government regains its “popularity”.
The only way to avoid this would be by deeply reforming the government personnel and keeping in power people who think in a truly patriotic way – ignoring the liberal dogmas imposed by the West. However, this will not be possible with the current government, which remains a mere puppet of Brussels, despite recent policies on migration.
In the end, a solution to the migration issue in Germany still seems far from being reached. But at least it’s possible to see the government yielding to popular pressure on some key points.
You can follow Lucas on X (formerly Twitter) and Telegram.
