A research tool, developed by the University of Malta to measure the views of Arab and Maltese people about migrant integration, is being adapted to be used across European countries to measure extremist views on various subjects ranging from politics and migration to environmental issues.
The 2019 study investigated majority-minority relations in Malta, mainly by looking at the views of the Maltese majority and the Arab minority on migrant integration and used an integration scale developed for the purpose.
This tool will now serve as the building block for the creation of another tool as part of a project called
OppAttune that has been awarded €3.2m in EU research funding with the hopes to manage extremist views.
Prof. Gordon Sammut, project leader at the University of Malta, said the project relies on methods developed at the university “that serve towards reconciling oppositional views”.
He added: “We are very pleased to see that our work is helping counter extremism in Europe and we hope that it will also serve to boost political maturity in our country.
“Extremism is attacking the principle of solidarity that the Lisbon Treaty is built on. We are seeing it around us. There is a split between the East and the West. Too many governments are concerned solely about what’s happening in their country.”
Sammut is an associate professor in social psychology within the Department of Cognitive Science and the director of the Centre for the Study and Practice of Conflict Resolution.
He explained that, in 2019, the University of Malta embarked on a study titled ‘Minority Relations in Malta 2019/2020’ that was funded by the Ministry for Home Affairs and National Security.
“Back then we were seeing a rise in far-right sentiment and polarisation of youth,” he said as he elaborated: “One must keep in mind that there are extremist views of both kinds: the anti and the pro. Both are considered extreme, as you might have someone who is so pro-integration that they ignore the cultural threats felt by many.”
Psychologists at the Open University and the University of Malta are working on developing tools for the project that has been funded by the European Commission’s Horizon Europe programme involving 17 partners across Europe and beyond its borders.
The new ground-breaking tool is being developed by academics who hope it will limit the development of extreme narratives through showing people that their views might be considered extremist by others.
It will be used in the lead-up to events that are likely to become polarised, including national and European elections as well as referendums that, in extreme cases, split families.
Sammut explained that once the tool is created, it will be administered as a standard survey. Citizens will be able to get a reply to the question: how extremist is my country compared to others?
The tool can also be used by individuals who want to understand if their personal views, or views of others such as politicians, are considered extremist.
Having such tools will allow citizens to pinpoint extremist speech, he said.
Maltese-Arab integration: both sides of the story
In the study ‘Minority Relations in Malta 2019/2020’, conducted in the first half of 2019, 15 Arab participants were engaged in in-depth semi-structured interviews concerning their views on the integration of Arabs in Malta.
A previous similar study with Maltese participants had been carried out, ending in 2016. The resulting views of both Arabs and the Maltese were used to compose an integration scale.
Based on this scale, an online survey was carried out among a total of 340 Maltese (non-Arab) and Arab (with or without Maltese nationality) respondents. Respondents were asked to indicate the extent to which they agreed and the extent to which they thought that Arabs (for Maltese participants) and the Maltese (for Arab participants) agreed with 12 statements that expressed either pro-integrationist or anti-integrationist sentiments.
Results showed that Arab and Maltese participants agreed to the same extent with the view that “Migrants would do well to keep certain cultural practices private in order to get along with the locals”.
Both Maltese and Arab participants resulted as being pro-integrationist overall, with Arab participants being more pro-integrationist.
Maltese participants perceive Arabs to be less pro-integrationist than Arab participants were in this study, suggesting that Maltese participants do not have an accurate perception of Arab views on integration.
Arab participants perceive the Maltese to be slightly pro-integrationist, implying that Arab participants have an accurate perception of Maltese views on integration.