Racism 4

Integration inevitably implies significant assimilation to dominant German culture and its core values.

Die ZEIT, 09.05.2017.

Theo Sommer (born 1930) is a German journalist who has been editor in chief and publisher of the weekly newspaper Die ZEIT.  

The term 'Leitkultur' was first used in 1998 by Bassam Tibi, a professor of International Relations. In 2000, Theo Sommer, publisher of Die ZEIT newspaper, took it up, calling on people with a migration background, people of colour, Black people and Jews to assimilate and follow dominant German culture, which was left vaguely defined. Leitkultur has been used over and again during election campaigns to stir up a certain climate, most recently in 2000 by Friedrich Merz, the current chairman of the CDU. Above all, these kinds of statement reinforce a feeling of superiority among some white Germans, portraying people marked Muslim as backward, violent and misogynist. The term Leitkultur jumbles together various racist ideologies. These include the AfD's formulation of a counter-concept to the idea of multiculturalism in its party programme.

*Ayse Tecmen (2020): Debates on German Leitkultur and Multiculturalism.

1998