Spain's Growing Pains
It is a common scene to those living on the forsaken fringes of America's metropolises, where an air of physical threat emanates from every corner: Restless tattooed boys and bejeweled girls congregate in city parks and squares, pacing with nervous energy, almost like tigers in a cage. They display colorful bandanas that are emblems of a secret brotherhood. Moving in a swagger of braggadocio in oversized jerseys, they return your gaze without even a glimmer of recognition of shared humanity.
This is certainly not the image that comes to mind when one thinks of Spain. But things are slowly changing in the land of tapas and flamenco. Although Central America and pockets of certain U.S. cities remain the epicenters for dangerous gangs, gangs are establishing a foothold in Spanish metropolises. Until recently, Spain boasted the old continent's lowest violent crime rates. But media coverage linking South Americans to a disproportionate number of violent crimes have left Spaniards concerned, while highlighting the country's deeply troubled relationship with immigration.
So how did this balmy Mediterranean nation often touted as tolerant of immigrants become a hub for gangs? Santiago Botello and ¡ngel Moya, the authors of Reyes Latinos, point out that the upsurge in gangs coincided with the high tide of immigration from former Spanish colonies during an economic boom in the 1990s in Spain's industrial engines ñ Madrid and Barcelona. Spain's liberal immigration policies allowed immigrant women to bring over their jÛvenesñ who, in most cases, had preexisting gang ties among Hispanic populations in North and South America.
Indeed, according to government statistics, Spain's immigrant population has more than tripled since 2000, whereas the population of Latin American youth has quadrupled between 1999 and 2004. According to Madrid city statistics, one out of every six of its 3 million inhabitants is now foreign-born and non-natives currently account for 9.9 per cent of the country's 45 million people, up from 2.3 per cent in 2000, according to the National Statistics Institute. "Imported into Spain, they have played upon widespread unemployment, alienation and social problems amid the massed arrivals from former colonies in the past few years ñ the first major wave of immigration experienced by Spain ñ to recruit hundreds of teenagers," writes Jason Burke in the British popular daily The Guardian.
In just one short decade the Spanish gang culture has moved from essentially being a nonfactor to an issue of public concern. Madrid is now home to 1500 gang members, who operate in almost the same manner as their U.S. counterparts. Conversely, about four or five factions of gangs exist in Barcelona and "have evolved in the past five years as immigration from Latin America, and Ecuador in particular, has soared," Christine Spolar explains in the Chicago Tribune. Some gang members are as young as 14, and others as old as 25, according to Spanish police reports. The vast majority are of Hispanic origin, from politically perilous and impoverished nations such as Ecuador, Puerto Rico, Colombia and Dominican Republic, as well as members from Spaniards' closer brethrens Morocco and CataluÒa, according to a report in Barcelona Living.
Gangs might have tumultuously and violently barged their way into the Spanish sociological landscape but the concept is hardly a novelty. The ëgansta' phenomenon dates as far back as 1800s in the United States, with the surge of Irish immigration to the East Coast. Indeed, by the late 1800s the U.S. witnessed the proliferation of different gangs from a range of ethnic and religious backgrounds: Jewish, Polish, African-American, all of whom felt marginalized and discriminated against in an Anglo-dominated socio-economic world.
Gangs of Hispanic origin are no exception. Latin Kings, Queen Nation, and Mara Salvatrucha rose from the shadows of the barrios of American metropolises, demanding dignity and equal access to burgeoning American wealth. By the 1940s, gangs made up of young Mexican men embittered by their second-class treatment had already formed and crystallized in various cities from Los Angeles and New York to Chicago.
Many of these gangs have cloned themselves in Spain. Although not as violent as their American counterparts, there is enough evidence to suggest that they are emulating American ways. Barcelona became aware of the gang problem, in early the 2000s when school administrators noticed graffiti and turf wars on school grounds. Then in 2005, the names Latin Kings and Netas gripped headline news, with several murders linked to gang rivalry, and an array of robberies, theft, and rape.
During my stay in Spain in 2006, many people I talked to expressed concern for the slow erosion of their sense of safety. Some even spoke of a "besiege" from Latin America. Undoubtedly, there has been a dramatic turn in public sentiment against the country's 4 million foreigners who are held responsible for the recent upsurge in crime. Last year, residents of Villaverde, a poor Madrid neighborhood ran amuck after the murder of a Spanish youth by a Dominican immigrant. Citizens attacked immigrant-owned shops and chased off Latinos in the streets, who were conspicuous with their darker skin tones and certain style of clothing.
This wasn't the first time that animosity reared its head between newcomers and natives. Just over seven years ago, in January 2000, two Moroccan immigrants were held responsible for the murders of a 26 year old Spanish woman and two farmers in the Andaluc"an region of Spain. In response, several thousand people launched what was to become the worst case of racial violence in Spain's recent history.
The European Observatory against Racism, headquartered in Vienna, says "Spanish intolerance is hardening as immigrants are increasingly associated with crime and terrorism," as quoted in the Financial Times. In an El Mundo poll, a widely-circulated Spanish daily, 72 percent of the 800 people interviewed believed the number of immigrants was "excessive." That figure contrasts sharply with figures calculated prior to the March 11 Madrid attacks, which stood at 48 percent. Moreover, according to SOS Racismo, a Spanish charity organization, there are presently 400 websites linked to extreme rightwing societies in Spain. But perhaps the words of Jaime Mayor Oreja, former minister of the Interior, best reflect the nature of public sentiment: "Immigration is the number one problem for Spain in the next decade."
Spain's difficulties with immigration have come at the wrong time, population experts and economists say. As birth rates remain stubbornly well below the level necessary to replace Spain's current population, the country desperately needs a young workforce. Octovio Una, director of Sociology at Madrid's King Juan Carlos University, pithily explains the dilemma she sees in a Bloomberg report: "Spain is concerned about this phenomenon of youth gangs, [but] we live in an aging country that needs immigrant labor and peaceful relations."
The birth rate decline from 2.8 children per woman in 1975 to 1.3 in 2006 is one of the sharpest in the world ñcompare that to 2.08 children apiece in the United States. Death rates are now neck and neck with birth rates in this country of 45 million. By 2050, Spain is expected to shed 10 million of its inhabitants ñ primarily due to the graying of its population, making it one of the oldest countries in the world.
Robert Duncan, ombudsman for foreign press in Spain, indicates that the annual influx of hundreds and thousands of immigrants not only sustains the country's population but also helps to pay the country's unemployment benefits and social welfare. Spain has been unwilling to slash benefits, and instead has fallen back on its foreign laborers to pay for the cost of unemployment. Furthermore, "at Ä100 per month -- the amount a low-paid cleaner might contribute -- those immigrants pay well over 1 billion euros into the social-welfare system," he stresses. Miguel JimÈnez, co-author of the Spain country reports at the OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) in Paris paints a similar picture; he calculates that Spain would have to invite about 350,000 immigrants into the country annually just to "keep the working population growing enough to save the tax-financed pension system," as quoted in an International Herald Tribune report. Else, Spain risks bankruptcy "in less than two decades."
Without the economic dynamism young immigrants can inject into the system, experts claim, Spain will face a future of deficit and lose its competitive edge to countries that successfully assimilate its newcomers. All over the Spanish - and European media in general - economists praise the infinite benefits of admitting newcomers. Yet, as residents of Madrid and Barcelona can attest, Spain is unable to cope with the new arrivals it has already taken in from Latin America, Morocco and Africa, let alone new waves of foreigners. In short, the problems associated with immigration and integration have become a burning issue in Europe's southern border, which continues to be a magnet for immigration. And the problem has thus far proven immune to political or social resolution.
- Spain's population tops 45 million: http://www.int.iol.co.za/index.php?from=rss
- Science&set_id=1&click_id=31&art_id=nw20070611222036393C311842
- http://www.guardian.co.uk/spain/article/0,,1922777,00.html
- Outreach is Barcelona's tack with Latin Kinas, Chicago Tribune, Christine Spolar, October 2006
- Underworld or Overhyped? BCL Living, Genevieve Shaw, January 2006
- http://www.ecgia.org/
- http://www.ecgia.org/
- Future of Immigration in Spain, expatica.com
- http://eumc.europa.eu/eumc/material/pub/muslim/Manifestations_EN.pdf
- http://www.ft.com/cms/s/107c62c2-c026-11d9-b376-00000e2511c8.html
- The Future of Immigration in Spain, Expatica, May 2005
- The Future of Immigration in Spain, Expatica, May 2005
- http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000085&sid=aTlTnfuJFT48&refer=europe
- Hasta La Vista Baby, InMadrid Magazine, Handan Satiroglu, January 2007
- http://robertstevenduncan.blogspot.com/2007/06/latino-immigrants-sustain-spain.html
