Inside the fight against Denmark’s ‘straight up racist’ housing law

Under a graffiti-covered bridge in Copenhagen's Norrebro district, Sara touches her hijab and speaks of feeling seen as 'not Western' by the government and media.

The 46-year-old, born and raised in Denmark, believes the country's 'ghetto law' is a way of cracking down on the Muslim minority, which accounts for little more than 4 percent of the population.

On November 23, Denmark's Supreme Court is due to rule on a case that could shape the future of that law, which can force the sale, demolition or conversion of nonprofit homes in areas where more than half of residents are classed as 'non-Western'.

First test at Supreme Court

Seven families from the Nojsomhed estate in Helsingor, north of Copenhagen, are challenging their former landlord, Boliggarden, after the estate was put on the 'ghetto list' in January 2020.

They argue that they were forced out because of where they or their parents come from, a claim their lawyer, Eddie Khawaja, says boils down to whether the evaluation is 'neutral' and 'detached from ethnicity elements or not'.

It is the first case to reach the Supreme Court since the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) ruled last December that the 'non-Western' categorisation could amount to ethnic discrimination.

Lower courts had ruled against the families, finding that 'non-Western' does not describe an ethnic group, but the EU ruling has opened the way for judges to look beyond the law's wording to how politicians talked about it.

Creating a racial category

Under Statistics Denmark's definition, 'non-Western' covers anyone outside the EU and a short list of countries, including the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

Amani Hassani, a Danish urban ethnographer and lecturer, said the criterion does something the social measures alone do not.

She added that it is a question of ancestry, not citizenship, capturing 'people who originate in non-white majority countries'.

Since 2020, Statistics Denmark has also published figures that separate out a third generation, which Hassani calls 'descendants of descendants'.

Her grandparents came to Denmark as migrants, and she believes the political class can speak all they want about how she is not Danish.

Rhetoric and resistance

Sara believes religion is at the heart of the issue, saying, 'I am Muslim, and that is really what they see as non-Western'.

Many people Al Jazeera spoke to said that the rhetoric used by politicians is ultimately directed at Islam.

Days after the housing law took effect, parliament adopted a resolution during a debate on the integration of Muslims, describing 'parallel societies' where attempts are made to enforce Islamic customs at 'the expense of Danish values'.

Majken Felle, a 52-year-old teacher who has loved Mjolnerparken since she moved there in 2014, said that from 2019, letters began landing in residents' mailboxes urging them to accept 'voluntary' rehousing, followed by eviction notices.

She has since moved three times, but she speaks warmly of her former neighbours, many of them women from the Middle East who fled their countries young, raised children, and learned Danish.

Felle said the government and housing associations underestimated many of those women, who were supposed to just move away but ended up taking on the Danish state.

Future of the law

Under the 2018 'parallel society' law, nonprofit housing areas with at least 1,000 residents, more than half of them 'non-Western', go on the list.

They must also meet two of four criteria on unemployment, crime, education and income.

After five consecutive years on the list, the areas must cut nonprofit family housing to 40 percent by 2030, through sales, demolition or conversion.

In 2021, the Social Democrat-led government removed the word 'ghetto' from the law, renaming it 'parallel society' and 'transformation area'.

A four-party coalition led by Mette Frederiksen's Social Democrats has governed Denmark since early June, with Housing now in the hands of Jacob Mark of the Socialist People's Party.

Hassani warned that even a win in court may not end the law, as the government could use 'political acrobatics' to keep targeting the same communities without the category.

Felle has the same fear, asking, 'People cannot change who they are. And if these estates are the target today, who is next?'