The violent anti-Semitic Paris attacks in January 2015 shocked Europe. Jolted into action by the killings, Frans Timmermans, First Vice-President of the European Commission, last week gathered representatives of Jewish and Muslim communities, activists, experts, civil servants and politicians at a colloquium on anti-Semitic and Islamophobic hatred. According to Timmermans, "the darker, uglier forces in our societies always turn first against minorities. Always turn first against Jews." Put otherwise, anti-Semitism is the continent’s canary in the coal mine when it comes to detecting levels of intolerance in Europe.

If anti-Semitism is a sign that Europe is becoming hostile towards all minorities, it is hard to fathom why the Commission only focused on two vulnerable groups. The EU should be commended for helping to place another brick in a bridge of mutual trust, understanding and respect between two peoples who are often brought into opposition by peddlers of hatred. Some might say that this was a good enough reason to focus only on anti-Semitism and Islamophobia. But the narrow perspective of the colloquium is problematic in two ways.

Hate crime is a broad problem

First, taking a look at Europe as a whole, one sees that different groups are targeted by hate crime to differing degrees in different countries. In some countries extremists focus hatred against the Jewish community, in others against Muslims, and in others the Roma, travellers, persons of African descent, LGBTI persons, persons with disabilities, or against people of other nationalities.

What becomes apparent from this wider view is that Europe’s problem includes, but is broader than, anti-Semitism and Islamophobia. Europe’s problem is that a section of society in every country feels the need to target one or more minorities. The target group varies according to social, economic, political and historical factors.

As part of the fight against hate crime, Timmermans pledged to appoint two coordinators to report directly to him: one on anti-Semitism and another on Islamophobia. The EU risks sending a message that hatred towards other groups is less important. Furthermore, if hate crime is becoming a problem for all minorities, then it is likely to have a broader underlying cause. Policy makers will find the deeper causes more difficult to spot, and thereby to address, if they focus on only two groups.

Going after the roots

And this was a second problem with the discussion. Most speakers focused on how to address the symptoms of hatred, rather than looking at the deeper reasons behind a) why people develop prejudices and b) how people with prejudices are moved to acts of violence. Because of this, much time was dedicated to debating questions like how to control hate speech, how to ensure victims report hate crime to the police, how to ensure hate crime is prosecuted and how to improve security.

These measures are necessary to protect victims and give them justice, to deter perpetrators, and to reinforce society’s values of tolerance. But they do little to pull up hatred from its roots. Unfortunately, there was much less discussion among participants around how to educate people against prejudice or how to prevent them from choosing violence.

There is increasing research (relating to extreme right-wing and extremist Islamic crime) to suggest that sections of society that experience poverty and social exclusion are more likely to be vulnerable to radicalization. This is not to say that there is a simple causal link between poverty and hate crime. However, poverty and social marginalization, combined with other factors, do render populations more vulnerable to producing perpetrators of hate crime.

And yet the colloquium placed little, if any, importance on the fact that over a quarter of children in the EU are currently at risk of poverty and social exclusion, nor on the fact minority groups in Europe face marginalization because of discrimination in the fields of education, housing, and the job market.

Commission must step up

Commissioner for Justice, Věra Jourová, who closed the event, was right to point out that national governments bear primary responsibility for solving these problems. But in many member states, populist politicians are picking up votes by stoking hatred and mainstream parties consider that promoting equality for marginalized groups is a political risk.

The Commission has the power to change this by enforcing EU equality legislation against countries that segregate minorities or deny them equal access to education and employment. Similarly, it could enforce EU legislation on hate crime and hate speech and use its political influence by condemning peddlers of hatred. It could also make funding available to NGOs to help victims enforce EU law through the courts.

Unfortunately, the Commission has traditionally shied away from protecting fundamental rights in the EU and has only recently opened its first two cases against governments for discriminating against an ethnic minority. If policy makers want to stamp out hate crime, they need to attack both symptoms and causes. And when national authorities become part of the problem, the Commission must step up and enforce the law.

By Israel Butler and Dovilé Šakaliené